Montreal Serai

               One does not have to be a militant environmentalist. Neither does one have to be a duck, a penguin or a halibut to feel encrusted, choked and oxygen-less. One needs to be just an engineer and scientist here, in far away Montreal, Quebec with a minimal sense of social responsibility, to feel incensed by the outrageous and cynical behaviour of those corporate hoodlums who failed to take the prescribed preventative measures. Measures that would have easily pre-empted the blow-out that is ravaging the Gulf coast and now beyond.  By now, it has also pretty much been forgotten that eleven workers were blown to bits and of course their families were also destroyed.   

Sketch of a Cameron Blow out preventer from Wiki commons

                A bit of technical detail is in order, for a start. Preliminary evidence suggests that the explosion that destroyed the rig was caused by methane gas coming up from the explosion well. Drilling and well-capping are well established procedures in the oil industry, since methane is a highly explosive gas. Specific capping devices, blow-out preventers, have been in use for these specific situations for decades. When a well is drilled, it is also filled with “mud” or drilling fluid in order to prevent the gas from running up the pipes. Once drilling is completed, a process known as “cementation” follows. It is generally done in two stages, first around the drill casing, and then a “plug” is placed to seal the well. Evidence suggests that the explosion that destroyed the Deepwater Horizon rig, and perhaps damaged the blow-out preventer on the seafloor, was caused by methane gas coming up from the well. There are suggestions that unusual procedures were used to place the final cement plug.  It is being suggested that instead of the “mud” that is normally used, sea-water was pumped in.   

                This is where the 3 finger-pointing companies step in and start their obscene “not me” routine. Halliburton (of Dick Cheney pedigree) says it was told to do so by Transocean. Transocean says it was told to do so by BP! And no one is willing to take responsibility. Tim Probert, Halliburton’s president of global business, says, with some degree of arrogance, that the company was “contractually bound to comply with the well owner’s instructions on all matters relating to the performance of all work‐related activities.” In other words, whether the instructions given by the well-owner were safe or not for its workers and the environment, Halliburton was going to comply with the contract.   

                Then there is the BP President for America, Lamar McKay, who is more concerned why the blow–out preventer did not work, more than why recommended Best Practice was not followed. In other words, an accident was spec’d in! The question for him is not why there was accident built in, but why the accident fallout preventer did not work after the accident!   

                Finally, there is the U.S. Federal agency charged with regulating drilling — the Minerals Management Service (MMS). It turns out that these folks who are charged with the responsibility of regulating drilling operations and the accompanying safety, while promoting explorations (that by itself being a conflict of interest), abrogated their responsibility by agreeing that “offshore operations have become so complicated that regulators ultimately must rely on the oil companies and drilling contractors to proceed safely.” Hello? Wasn’t there such a hullaballoo a couple of years ago about corporate governance —some device called the Sarbanes–Oxley Act that was going to set things right after the Enron-Wescom mega collapses?     

                Conservative estimates suggest that 2,500,000 gallons of crude a day is spewing into the Gulf of Mexico.  Here is a link to a real time leak meter.    There is no point in repeating here the damage that has already happened to human-marine-biological life.  Never mind the food chain, which is now shot for the next few years at least. Meanwhile, the fossil fuel industry is raking in windfall profits. According to the advocacy group Avaaz, “BP, which operated the sunken rig, more than doubled its first quarter profits in 2010 to $5.65 billion.” Oh! We must of course let the oil companies make obscene profits. That is a sacred right. After all, in 2005 BP’s Texas city refinery managed to kill 15 of its workers and it was determined that the company had a poor safety and quality record. A year later 4,800 barrels seeped out of a BP pipeline in the Alaskan North. In 2007 BP paid a fine of 300 million dollars for fixing propane gas prices. This company has become somewhat of an all-rounder it seems.  And they refer to themselves as BP-Beyond Petroleum! However, Beyond Perfidy would be a more appropriate moniker for them.       

                BP Engineers and their friends in Transoceanic and Halliburton will someday get to the bottom of why the Blow-out preventer did not work, why so much pressure built up and why after the catastrophe the blow out preventer was not actuated. There will be a tendency to blame individuals and not of course the invalid systems that these companies have deployed, based on mindless penny-pinching. All the spectacular attempts at lowering a coffer dam etc. are really band aid measures for public consumption. Unless a parallel horizontal bore is made into the main well to relieve the pressure and siphon out the oil to the surface, nothing will have been achieved and we know that it is going to take months to drill 18,000 feet below.     

                It will be sometime before we find out if this new buzz tech that BP is touting is going to pan out on the ocean floor.  As far as the extent of the damage goes, there are indications that even by conservative estimates, this spill will have exceeded the Exxon Valdez spill by a factor of four.    

                OK, we can all go home raving and ranting. And ask for reparations and BP will oblige with a couple of billion dollars out of their quarterly pirating. Here’s what I think should be happening now (never mind the long term issue of getting rid of cars).   

                What on earth is Barack Obama doing leaving BP in charge of the plugging of the well, even now? What are the mighty US defence forces doing? They mine the sea bottom in Korea, they scour the Pacific and Atlantic laying cables, they develop space planes that can launch attacks within two hours anywhere in the world. Why is the US government not plugging the well themselves and then sending the bill to BP? It would at least shave a couple of billion of the trillion dollar deficit. Why does the US government have such a knee-jerk reliance on Big Oil?  Why is BP still playing Big Dada, dishing out clean up jobs to the families whom they have devastated?  Why is it that sea foods, vegetables and other foods are already disappearing from North American grocery stores and meat and poultry prices are already jacked up? Will BP pay for that?

Montreal Serai Editor Rana Bose interviewed Catherine Potter, leader of the Catherine Potter-Duniya Project, after her show at the MAI in Montreal.

MS : The show La Convergence des Continents at the Montreal Arts Interculturels on 23rd January, 2009 was very tight and innovative with an interesting visual backdrop provided by VJs jocool and Liberty. North Indian classical flute as played by you fused with the Senegalese Kora played by Montreal Kora player Zal Idrissa Sissokho, and Quebecois Jazz guitarist Jean-Marc Hebert. Resulting in some very interesting improvisations. Let me ask you right away, what was driving the pulse of this show, meaning what beats were you improvising around, the tabla of Subir Dev, or the drums of Tom Gossage. I ask this because both of them are so tight and volatile and yet set an interesting dual pace?

CP:  What you refer to as “the driving pulse” of this new repertoire is not so much the percussion instruments, as it was with my last album, but rather the rhythmic and harmonic force of the kora, the West African harp. I had worked with different kora players over the years and, in fact, my first Duniya group in 1985 was with kora player Nathalie Dussault. I had been waiting for an opportunity to integrate the kora into Duniya Project because it is such a beautiful palette to play off of; like a wonderfully complex and rhythmic tanpura around which the drum and tabla grooves were also created. I worked a lot with Zal while writing these new compositions in order to tune his instrument, quite exceptionally, to the modes of the North Indian ragas. This allowed me to write original material for the kora with the other five instruments and to find ways to use the traditional Mandingue kora accompaniments with these new tunings. 

MS:  I know that you trained under Hariprasad Chaurasia and you have played live with him in concerts. Who in the Jazz flute world has had an influence on you? I heard Yuseef Lateef and Rahsaan Roland Kirk in some segments. Am I right?

CP:  My approach to cross-over music is not only in my way of composing and in bringing musicians from different traditions together, but also in my own improvisational flute vocabulary.  I have a background in jazz flute, having completed a jazz studies degree at Concordia, and I’ve probably been influenced by those jazz flutists whom I like such as Yuseef Latif (who himself was influenced by Indian music.)  However, I’ve think I’ve also been influenced by many other jazz and world musicians including Wayne Shorter, John McClaughlin, Zakir Hussain, Pat Metheny, Paul McCandless and Jan Garbarek.

MS: This is a world music ensemble you have put together Catherine Potter-Duniya Project .  How did you put this band together and what were your inclinations towards this fusion? Is this where you are settling into? Or would you tour also playing exclusively North Indian classical? Also tell us something about the musicians and your interaction with them. How did it develop? They are all such individual stars, especially the Kora playing of Sissokho, guitarist Jean-Marc Hebert and contre-bassist Nicholas Caloia.

CP:   I founded this ensemble in 2001 as a performance platform for my original compositions. Since the early 1980′s, it was something I knew I would eventually do but I had to wait until I felt that I had certain mastery over North Indian classical music first. I needed to feel that I was using the knowledge and art which has been passed on to me with respect and was able retain the depth of this music rather than simply borrowing from it, as do many musicians trying to create world music would do. I was shuttling back and forth between Mumbai and Montreal to study with Pt. Chaurasia Between 1990 and 2001 and I released my first album of ragas, Bansuri,– in 1997. As much as I love North Indian classical music, my original work better reflects who I am artistically and culturally. It is also great to practice and perform as a group. Here in North America where Indian classical concert opportunities are few and far between, one can spend a lot of time practicing alone and it becomes quite isolating. I feel privileged to have such amazing collaborators such as Thom Gossage on drums, Nicolas Caloia, Subir Dev; they all contribute their creativity to the project and they are all excellent improvisers. Zal Sissokho is an excellent traditional kora player who is in the process of opening up to new ways of using his instrument and Jean Marc Hébert was an excellent choice for these new pieces because his eclectic playing is like a bridge between our different musical cultures.   

MS:  It is great to see a woman composer from Quebec, highly accomplished in North Indian classical music, lead this world music band and put it together. This issue of Montreal Serai has a theme Women: Changing the World! You are unique in that sense. Over the years I have seen you perform, there has been a consciousness about the rights of women and the relationship to your music. Comments?

CP:  On the eve of International Women’s day, I must admit this is a difficult question to answer.  Unfortunately, I don’t  feel things have changed much and many of the challenges faced by women musicians remain the same.  If I have made any contribution in changing things, it would simply be in the choice to persist in a extremely male-dominated musical milieu, where even my guru-bhais would often tell me I was wasting my time because i was a woman and certain male musicians I’ve collaborated with have told me “no woman musician could ever kill like men” (?!) What to say to that, besides the fact that I’m not interested in killing?

MS : Tell us something about the India tour you did in 2008. What were the venues and how was it received? Who accompanied you? Give us some highlights.

CP:  We had a fantastic tour Europe and in India where the Duniya Project album was released by Music Today under the title “Following in the Footsteps of Pt. Hariprasad Chaurasia”.  We performed in Delhi, Kolkata, Bangalore, Mumbai, London, Dublin, Paris and Brussels, including some prestigious venues like the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Mumbai, Congo Square Jazz Festival in Kolkata, the East-West Encounter Festival in Bangalore and the Pavilion Theater in Dublin.  What I found most touching was doing 3 cd launches in large music stores in India.  Ordinary people just showed up not knowing what they were about to hear and were very visibly touched by the music. There was a question period with a microphone for individuals to express their impressions or ask questions. I was really touched to learn how they were moved by my music and my playing, more so than some of the feedback from “elite” audiences.   We also got a very good response from the Indian press.  I understood that it is easier to be acknowledged as a musician doing what they call in India, “fusion” and which I prefer to call original cross-over music, than as a full-out Hindustani classical flutist.  While here in the West, we have gotten beyond the need to have Caucasians Europeans perform Western opera in order for it to be considered “authentic”, there is still a widely held belief in India that you have to be ethnically “Indian” to be able to play Indian classical music “authentically”.  This attitude has had an effect on how the Western world perceives those like myself who have chosen this path.

 MS: What is the look ahead? What plans do you have? What are you working on?

CP:  I’m presently in pre-production of my third album, which will include most of the pieces from La Convergence des continents.  We are also promoting this new show to eventually tour both in Canada and again internationally and will hopefully show-case it at CINARS 2010. I was brought to Morocco a couple of months ago where my career is being promoted and had some wonderful opportunities to collaborate with Moroccan musicians. I will return later this year for more collaboration and to continue working on building a festival tour there for Duniya Project in 2011. I also plan to return to Indian next winter for a few months with a Shastri fellowship to continue to study ragas with Hariprasad Chaurasia, to seek inspiration in the wealth of South Asian musical traditions and to work on new original material.

George Orwell had a sixth rule for writing: Break any of these above rules sooner than say anything barbarous. George Orwell was perhaps not talking about political barbarisms alone, but the barbarity of inappropriateness in general. His sixth rule pretty much gives the licence to write or say anything, short of being barbarous. But because barbarity is itself a relational call, where does it leave us?  George Orwell’s sixth rule intrigues me.

Or, is there a universal understanding taken by all of us on what constitutes barbarism? I do not think so.  Let me therefore deviate partially here, before I disclose the other five rules. The other day on TV, I saw the launching of a new US troop carrier, named the New York. Its bow is made from steel melted from the WTC shell retrieved from “Ground Zero.” Now the Navy spokesperson, talking to the CNN reporter, very solemnly invoked the memory of those who had died on September 11th and proudly also stated that, “this ship can take our forces to go to war anywhere in the world.”   There is a barbarous choice of words here. It is the righteousness in the voice of the young Navy spokesperson, when she talks about the readiness to “to go to war” anywhere in the world, that is worrisome. Why do the big powers inculcate such marauding language in the mental makeup of their citizens? Should someone break the news to this person, that there is an element of barbarity she is engaging in?  Can language and literature be removed from the politics of the times? Can literature be independent of social development? Of course not!

Why is Literature Still a Must?

Without being disdainful about blog and twitter/facebook language (being a partially active practitioner myself) there is an emerging need to uphold the literary event, that is the written word. The book. The novel. The work of fiction. The well-written, well explained document that does not simply engage in a pop haze, a txt language miasma that passes off as literary expression. There is a place for that and there is need for pop culture experimentation, but literature needs to be preserved for distilling the truth, instead of promoting a haze in the name of experimentation.  In the social conditions we inhabit, or in Orwellian language-the times we live in, the word is blurred by sound, fury, effects and Mbps transmissivity. If you don’t trap it in a blitzkrieg millisecond, it has gone past you and delivered to those who live in bytes and pixels. Their needs are fundamental and cannot be suppressed. The flamboyance of the web and the 140 space compact with Twitter is actually a curious deal with the devil. It forces the truth to be stated in a precise and economic manner, for those who wish to convey anything seriously. And for those who don’t wish to do so, the obscure 140 space ramble is possible. It is self serving. Unless one can use this same medium and invent a way of telling the truth. I know of someone who is writing a whole novel on Twitter. Space by space in 140 space releases!  Literature is however, for the time being, only conceivable as the permanently printed hardcopy version! And there is a dire need to preserve that medium.

Now obviously there are five other rules, which we are all interested in and which if stated first would make the life of an aspiring writer considerably self-conscious, restrictive and possibly miserable. I could have blithely started out on this essay by saying, “When I first dived into writing this editorial essay…etc etc etc  ” and I would have ended up on a well travelled path.  Incidentally, one of Orwell’s first rules is: “Never use a metaphor, simile or figure of speech, which you have seen before in print.” There are several other rules about not using long words, when short words exist, cutting out superfluous words, using foreign words unnecessarily, not using the passive when you can use the active —- violations which we have carried out and which I am doing right now, instead of stating simply that “We violate the rules, often.” But most of all we often write stuff, that we have seen somewhere else.

This essay and editorial is not so much about the rules of writing as much as it is about the need for Literature to be preserved and allowed to flourish, as a significant means of mass communication and artistic endeavour in changing times.  Literature is all about telling a truthful story.

What is of the essence in Orwell’s writing, and more so in Homage to Catalonia, than in 1984, is to state the distilled truth, the absolute truth, the feeling that is at the heart with as few words as possible. Are we always able to achieve what we really intended to say? Can we say in a single word, or a phrase, or a sentence what lies at the core of our mind? With half a million words available in the “official” English language to play with and the new words that we can create and introduce,( because the language does not belong to any ethnocracy), can we come across with the clarity of a freshly poured glass of water in a super clean tumbler? Is there a morning that we can describe that best reflects the news that we read in the newspaper? Is it a coffee morning? Is it an alcohol morning? Is it a flower morning? Is it a blood drenched morning? Is there an inherent deficiency in language that disallows true expression or do we garnish the truth with unnecessary eloquence?

Writers, novelists, authors cannot live by rules. The rules are there to assist. In fact writers must settle down to earth early in the morning, after flying around late at night in a daze of expressions and words. The task of the editor then sets in.  Seeking the truth and expressing it, is the cardinal need. It is the essence. But, style, eloquence and a certain cadence intercedes as technique. In fact, writers do engage in deception. Juxtaposing words in an unexpected manner to wake the reader up and cause some interaction and interest. Thus careful and accurate choice of words is followed by an attractive style. Such is the essence of Literature.

In this issue of Montreal Serai, we have combined several poems, short stories, book reviews,  filmmaker interviews and essays that uphold the idea of telling the unambiguous truth.  Included are award winning writers like Rawi Hage and Jaspreet Singh, as well as our own prolific and much published Maya Khankhoje and frequent contributors Nilanjana Iyer, Lesley Pasquin, Anna Fuerstenberg and others.

Art is Democracy !

Acknowledgements:

1)The Design of Dissent, Milton Glaser and Mirko Ilic, Rockport Publishers Inc. www.rockpub.com

2)Paper, Paper Publishing Company, New York, www.papermag.com

3)Jean-Michel Basquiat, by Richard Marshall, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York

          I am strolling past a a well-known Tea and Chocolate store in Broome Street, Soho, New York.  And I catch a glimpse of a magazine called Paper.  On the cover is Gael García Bernal.  The Mexican new wave actor, who played Che in the Motorcycle Diaries. I thought it was a great flic. Very inspiring. Of course on this cover feature, he is modelling clothes  or occassionally talking a bit about Tarkovsky, Buñuel and Antonioni. All the films he mentions are my favourites as well, especially Zabriskie Point and Los Olvidados.  It spurs my interest in the magazine.  He is branded as a great thinker. “ More like García Lorca than George Clooney—(he)  has the mind and soul of a poet.” But, of course!  One would expect so, from a person who has acted in a few thoughtful plays and movies and in one or two esoteric /quirky ones, as well. Thinking artists provoke notions of the democratic process in the roles they play. Benicio del Toro does the same. Warren Beatty, Marlon Brando have done the same, at times. And directors like Gilo Pontecorvo, Mrinal Sen, Costa Gavras, Ken Loach and Montreal documentarist Mary Ellen Davis and Indian documentarist Anand Patwardhan (the latter two interviewed in Montreal Serai, previously) maintain this thoughtful process of interrogating democracy through their Art.  

I am compelled to sit down at the café, notwithstanding the legendary reputation of the chocolates and teas served here,  and breeze through this rather well produced magazine and then I notice there is a very interesting feature on rebranding America.  It’s put together by Kim Hastreiter. Kim has invited several well-known American designers to take a fresh look at a post-Bush America. What has changed? What can be changed?  What are the new ways of looking into the future? And the designers have done a superlative job.  The mandate is to turn the United  States into a new U.S.A. The tone is set by a graphic which has the stars taking the place of the stripes on the flag.  A caption says “ A new US.” This one is done by Ivan Chermayeff.  “Rebranding means changing the values of the United states,” he says. Banal? Simplistic? Or, hopeful? I would say it is Art  for Democracy!  A valiant and hopeful expression, a  way forward and only artists and designers can practice this democracy. They are not constrained.  They are not fearful of litigation, despite it being the US of A. They are not shackled by lobbies. Like the new President of the US seems to be more and more, every day. But that was not a surprise, anyway. He is a utopian and as well an excellent  brand manager to boot, who believes that the philosophy that has governed the US for a century can still be made to work, somehow. He is handcuffed to the Pharmaceutical lobby, the Israel lobby and even to the Military lobby. He has waffled on Health Insurance, on Palestine and now even on the torture photos and Gitmo. An Artist is not shackled, tongue-tied and hamstrung.  An artist is fundamental to Democracy.  I turn the page and another great design catches my eye. It is an outstretched hand of the world gripping a hand-sketched outline of the US map. The caption says “Nice to meet you again.” It is made by Weiden + Kennedy 12, a creative school based in Portland, Oregon.

The next one that catches my attention is  a “SORRY” carved out of the US flag on a plain white background, with a diminutive  US bald eagle emblem  saying Humble, Strong, US in a very small caption instead E Pluribus Unum.  It is done by Andy Spade. He says the following- “Our thinking behind the assignment’s solution is that by offerring a simple apology, we acknowledge our mistakes with the hopes of restarting our relationship with the rest of the world.” Indeed!

I flip the page, as my interest is definitely aroused.  There is now a rather well done rendition of a US one dollar bill. In a text note  attached to it, it says that Benjamin Franklin questioned the choice of the Bald Eagle as the national symbol of the US, claiming it was “ a bird of bad moral character.” It was, he suggested, too lazy to fish for itself, survived by robbing smaller, more vulnerable birds.  So instead of the bald Eagle, the artist has changed the bird to a dove.  Look carefully!

 What a potent message in 2009, indeed for the US, to live up to! It is done by Kevin Roberts, the CEO  of Saatchi and Saatchi, the same people who have clients like Toyota, Lexus and JC Penney! The Bush era really pissed off so many layers of people and classes that even the handful at the top feel the need for some sort of “change.” And Mr. Obama, sure knew how to capitalize on that.   And then there is another one by Roberts, that says in bold letters on a white background “No more US  and THEM.” The US is made out of a US flag.

New York is where Jean-Michel Basquiat, exploded on to the scene and then disappeared so painfully at the age of twenty seven only.  Basquiat, it is said, painted with the militant emotions of Malcolm X and the subtlety of Miles Davis. Montreal Serai covered his works, a few years ago. I am back in Montreal and I am leafing through a book on his works, brought out by the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. The picture that I notice, is not by Basquiat. It is a conceptual photograph by Renee Cox. It is entitled, The Wall: They Say a Mad Man Wrote This, 1992. 

 A sublime rhyme  says it all “They never taught Marcus Garvey in our school, Christopher Columbus is their golden rule.”

Finally, I dust off a book I got as a present, three years ago. The Design of Dissent. It is an excellent catalogue of wall art, posters, guerilla stencils from all over the world, both before and after the Cold War, and also into the eight hellish years of George Bush. Extraordinarily well annotated and curated, it is a work of art by itself. It propels you into a sense of imminent reactiveness to the world around you.  Here, I find the essence of democratic dissent and art! For a start, using the format of the Arm and Hammer logo for selling Baking Soda, the artist Dejan Krsic from Croatia proclaims, Art is not a Mirror, it is a Hammer! 

Finally, in the wake of Roe V Wade the same publication has this graphic poster by Trudy Cole-Zielanski entitled Preserve the Right of Choice.  As per Wikipedia, Roe v. Wade , 410 U.S. 113 (1973), is a United States Supreme Court case that resulted in a landmark decision regarding abortion. According to the Roe decision, most laws against abortion in the United States violated a constitutional right to privacy under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The decision overturned all state and federal laws outlawing or restricting abortion that were inconsistent with its holdings. The note from the artist says “This poster was designed to promote the understanding that a woman’s body is her own, and she has the ultimate right to say what she does with it.” 

Finally, in these times of rabid Islamophobia and incoherent terrordom politics,  Anatoly Omelchenko has the over-used and cliched  Che stencil of Korda on a Muslim green background, but alongwith the star on his beret is also a crescent moon. “One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter,” says the artist.

Democray without Art? Like humankind without O_2.