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Jazz isn't like Instagram

Music deeper than instant gratification, a keyboardist, a drummer and some father-son banter. Sohini Das Gupta prepares for International Jazz Day on April 30 with Louiz and Gino Banks

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There's nothing impersonal about the garage-turned music studio adjoining jazz artistes Louiz and Gino Banks' home in Mumbai's western suburbs. The walls are frocked in a photo collage trailing the father-son duo's musical journey, the keyboard and the drum kit, their respective instruments, placed at an angle of easy eye contact. Even the buttery yellow lights seem to add warmth to Louiz' painting of jazz icon Miles Davis. You'd agree, this is a room of good vibes.

All about ethos

Unfazed by my appearance in their rehearsal for a Jazz Day concert at NCPA, Louiz and Gino confirm that jazz is all about the vibe. "It is music made in the moment, relaying the musician's current mood to the audience," Gino says. Two decades of drumming, and constant collaboration with a father who spearheaded India's jazz movement in the 70s bear evidence to his claim.
To simplify, Gino fishes out "Dad's recent Facebook status", which explains how in every other form of music, the song is more important than the singer. But jazz grants performers the sovereignty of interpretation, soaking up their private ethos.

On keys: Daddy cool

Louiz insists that Gino is a strict teacher. And what about him? "I'm cool like that!" the 76-year-old keyboardist chuckles. It's safe to describe Louiz' career as 'cool'. As a young boy, Dambar Bahadur Budaprithi (Banks' birth name) studied music under the stern tutelage of a trumpeter father (George Banks), before becoming one of the most sought-after film and ad jingle composers in the country.

"There's a story that I turned down RD Burman's offer once. Truth is, when he offered me work after we finished recording for the 1977 movie Mukti, I had to return to my family and band (The Louis Banks Brotherhood) in Calcutta. I reciprocated later, when the live music scene in Calcutta fizzled out due to power cuts," he clarifies. After the big break with Burman scooped him out of his "300 bucks and a second class train to Bombay" days, Louiz went on to share space with luminaries like Dizzy Gillespie, Eddie Henderson, Hariprasad Chaurasia, Zakir Husain and many others. "Bombay handed me money like I'd never seen, but more significantly, it gave me an appetite for all sorts of work," he reminisces.

Young and evolving

The hunger to adapt and evolve resonates in Louiz' creative exchange with teenagers Rhythm Shaw, Kush Upadhyay and Mohini Dey, who are a part of his Guitar Synergy group. He also admits to being energized by Gino's presence on stage. "It lacked mainstream audience in India. But now, with kids exposed to the genre on YouTube and other digital mediums, suddenly jazz is young again!" grins Louiz.

Banking on fusion

"Most people identify me only as a jazz musician," complains Gino, whose 90s childhood supplied him with a steady diet of rock and metal. Featured on Rolling Stone India's Best Ever Drummers list in 2015, Gino prefers to call himself a fusion artiste. "My base is jazz—a form that can latch on to any music and turn it around," he explains. While he recognises that not every child in his decade grew up listening to Herbie Hancock and Chick Corea on their car stereo, Gino believes that jazz was constantly around. "There's ebb and flow, but unlike popular music of a particular era, jazz refuses to flat line." Naturally, he's thrilled that the contemporary youth culture is churning out a bold new jazz, mixed with EDM and even Indian Classical.The pair's current endeavours, an album with the Guitar Synergy group and an unnamed Latin Jazz album, reflect this syncretism.

Jazz 101

Gino recommends Kind of Blue (Miles Davis) and Beneath the Mask (Chick Corea) as good jazz initiation albums for rookies. Will they ensure instant love? "Jazz isn't instant gratification like Instagram," comes the reply. "But once you get it, you'd be hooked for life".

If anyone can make that promise, it has to be the two happy musicians I leave behind in their jingle-jangle garage.

Celebrate Jazz Day

When: April 30, 7 PM
Where: Tata Theatre, NCPA
How: BookMyShow

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