Relationships Through Music: A Conversation with Zakir Hussain on Shakti at 50 (Part Two)

We continue our conversation with Maestro Hussain with a focus on how This Moment (Abstract Logix, 2023) differs from prior Shakti releases and, in the process, explores the band’s past, present, and future.

PostGenre: One thing that stands out on This Moment is the particularly strong connection between you and Selvaganesh. It sounds like you were playing and responding to each other in the same room. But, in reality, you recorded each of your parts remotely. It seems like that level of communication would be difficult when you were in different places.

Zakir Hussain: Yeah, unless you’ve grown up with [the music], and it’s been part of your DNA. Selvaganesh also helped co-produce the record this time because he’s not only a great percussionist but also a very fine producer and composer. He composes music for films in India, has his own recording studio, and understands the modern technical aspects of recording and all that stuff. His input sonically has been great in making this album what it is.

Selva and I found a way to be on Zoom with each other when we were laying down the rhythm tracks. I would play while he would watch and say, “Why not try this or why not try that?” And then I would do that, and he would say, “Okay, let me put my part on.” Then he would put his part on, and watched, listened, and said, “How about this and how about that?” So that part of the record was done at the same time with him in India and me in California, eye to eye, just like we would on stage. Yes, there’s a latency, so we couldn’t play together, but we could play one after another and in pretty much real-time and help each other.

PG: John’s guitar part also makes use of technology. Unlike in past Shakti albums, John uses the MIDI guitar fairly extensively on This Moment. Why the added electronic element on this one?

ZH: The circumstances in which we put this album together is what made John explore those sounds more. Normally, when we play, we do it live. Most of Shakti’s recordings were live, with A Handful of Beauty (Columbia, 1976) and Natural Elements (Columbia, 1977) being the only studio albums. Usually, we just sat down and played a song, and then it was done. But because This Moment is a studio album, we had a lot of time to revisit things and give them a second, third, or even fifth look and see if there was anything we could do to color it differently. The pandemic gave us an expanse of time to approach the music in a more compositional way, as opposed to an improvisational one. And once that graph was laid out, and the grid was right in front of us, we injected Shakti’s core element of improvisation as a quintet.

That is where John’s use of the MIDI guitar comes from. The recording process allowed John to experiment; to sit at home in front of his computer and share these ideas as they keep falling and cascading out of his mind. It is the same thing with the rhythmic scatting on the album. Selva and I scat in an orchestral and arranged manner, not just a spontaneous thing, and that comes from the same opportunities and process of experimentation.

PG: Do you feel your experience with Tabla Beat Science previously made you more comfortable working in non-acoustic settings?

ZH: As I said earlier, we as a group bring to our collective experience our own experiences from other various interactions. Whether it is Tabla Beat Science or what I have done with Mickey Hart, I can bring those electronic, heavily rhythmic and interesting rhythmic pattern elements into this concoction with John, Shankar, Ganesha, and Selva.

PG: Since you mentioned Mickey Hart, like with Shakti, you have been working with him for a long time.  

ZH: What’s interesting is that when the first Shakti album was released, I started [the Tal Vadya Rhythm Band], which a few years later Mickey Hart would join. We ultimately made an album called Diga (Round Records, 1976), which was like the predecessor to where we ended up on the Planet Drum and Global Drum projects. So, in the same year as Shakti, the [groundwork] for another very strong relationship in my life was being cemented. Now, fifty years down the road, those same two relationships are still going. Planet Drum came out earlier this year [ed. In the Groove (Valley Entertainment, 2022) came out last summer; close enough], and now Shakti. As I told you I love working with people for decades. 

What’s interesting also is that the new record, As We Speak, with Béla Fleck, Edgar Meyer, and Rakesh Chaurasia was also released recently. It’s amazing to have such long relationships in which the music flows and moves forward. I cannot express how lucky I am to be part of these experiences and these creative processes shown on new records. 

The title This Moment builds upon that idea. With John and I advancing in age, all we can do is enjoy the moment we are in and thank our lucky stars that we got this far holding hands together and still in the music. And now we are enjoying our butts being kicked by these young punks.

PG: [Laughing]. Do you feel that as you continue to tour and perform together – in person and not across Zoom, the group will continue to evolve and change? 

ZH: I’m sure it will evolve and change further. I’m also sure that different versions of the group will happen. It’s possible that somewhere along the line, in the next few years, John and I will move onward to other things while people like Selva, Shankar Bhadega, and Ganesh carry on with the Shakti thing, which is as it should be.

I mean, John is almost 82 years old, and he’s had a comeback in a way. His hand where he holds his pick was almost gone. He couldn’t even hold a pick a few years ago. The thought then was that he wouldn’t be able to play anymore. We had talked about how it was too bad we couldn’t get to play Shakti again. But then, through focus and treatments, he was able to get to a point where he can work again.

PG: Which is incredible. I was at the Austin show on what was planned to be his final US tour. He sounded great, but it seemed like things were over for him musically. Now, he is, fortunately, still going strong. 

ZH: It has been a boon for all of us. But God knows how long that will go. I am 73. Somewhere along the line, especially for drummers or percussionists, you can’t play like you used to 20 years ago. And across the stage from me is this young punk who’s kicking my butt and playing all this stuff. I’ve got to keep up with him and huff and puff my way through. 

We’re going to go for a while, and then we’ll see what happens. We did a small tour in India, and it was great fun. But after every concert, John and I sit together and say, “God these kids I hate them.” [laughing]. They’re so good, so fantastic, so amazing, so perfect when it comes to making the Shakti experience come out there and be alive again.

PG: So Shakti is not just you, John, and the other artists working with you?

ZH: The idea of Shakti is the experience. That joy. That ecstasy that happens when musicians come and work together for a long time. That is the central idea. There are no fences. There are no boundaries. All it takes is a willing, open heart and a mindset open to the injection of suggestions, ideas, and visions. And if that idea can get across to people, we can create stuff that would astound people in its universality. That’s what Shakti represents. Shakti is not just John and I and the music we make. 

When Shakti’s first album [Shakti with John McLaughlin (Columbia, 1976)] came out, there was no New Age music. There was no world music. I remember, after we had recorded the album, [producer] Clive Davis had John and I in his office. We handed him the master tape, and Clive asked John, “So, what do you call this music?” We had no clue. We had just played music. As far as we were concerned, it was music without a name needed. And then Clive said, “But John, we have to put it in some bin. We have to put a label on it and have the PR team promote it in a certain way. So, what is it? What is it?” John said, “We don’t know. Call it whatever you want to. For us, it’s just music.” That kinda laid the ground for what many now call world music. It’s gratifying and satisfying to have been part of the inception of a musical idea that brings or encompasses an understanding of music in a global tongue.

PG: Do you feel that desire to avoid labels is part of what keeps people talking about Shakti almost a half-century later? It does not seem people are drawn solely to the merger of jazz and Indian music. For example, you are also on John Handy and Ali Akbar Khan’s Karuna Supreme (MPS, 1975), which is an excellent record but does not have the legacy of your work with Shakti. 

ZH: Yeah, but if we had continued with the group on Karuna Supreme, it may have evolved into something more interesting. That didn’t happen. An extended interaction could have brought forward ideas or possibilities that were not allowed the opportunity to come to fruition. 

What’s interesting about Shakti is that because of the injection of so many different musicians coming at certain points in John’s and my lives, Shakti has remained relevant and valid because the music represents an idea, not just a song. The music is a way to communicate. A way to interact. A way to move forward on a more universal level where so many different thought processes could come together and connect to the world as one thought. Because Shakti is not just the music, it remains valid today and will still be tomorrow. 

PG: However, Shakti also does not seem to ignore the past. At certain moments on This Moment, particularly at the beginning of “Bending the Rules”, John’s MIDI guitar sounds reminiscent of the flute part on your album Making Music (ECM, 1987).  

ZH: Hariprasad Chaurasia’s flute.

PG: Yes. And while John’s not trying to copy the part, it does seem to be a nod to that record, as if saying that project is also part of Shakti’s music. 

ZH: Working with Hariprasad inspired John to try to find a way to bring that sound to his guitar. Over the years, he has developed that sound and loves it so much. It’s great that we have that. In a way, it pays homage to that organic sound that comes from the wind going through the bamboo. There are organic elements like that that have been transformed and brought Shakti’s music to where we are today. Sounds that fit right in with what’s happening and yet maintain the core sound and feeling of Shakti.

We have also now gone full circle back to Shakti’s original sound by adding the violin. When Shakti first started, it was violin, guitar, and percussion. Coming back now with the violin in place kind of completes the circle. It sonically elevates our sound to a place reflective of today while leaving the possibilities open for it to move forward. If we are willing to shape ourselves for this moment of our lives, then we can keep reshaping ourselves for whatever comes our way in the future.

This Moment is now available on Abstract Logix. It can be purchased on Bandcamp. Shakti will be touring Europe through June and July, 2023 and the United States in August and September, 2023. More on the tour can be found here. Read more on Hussain on his website.