BEYOND CONVENTION

For 71-year-old percussionist Trilok Gurtu, it's all about not being a slave to tradition and staying true to his identity

- Bhanuj Kappal

You can tell a lot about a musician by the instrument they choose to play, and that's especially true for Trilok Gurtu. The 71-year-old percussionist and composer has assembled a truly unique "floor kit" consisting of a tabla, drums, gongs, a djembe, ghungroo, cowbells and a water-filled bucket, which reflects the range of his stylistic influences. Much like his kit, Gurtu's music transcends genre and tradition-American jazz, Indian classical, African rhythm. This vision, of music without any barriers, has been his guide over a five-decade career as one of the most innovative musicians of our time.

"Music is one, God is one, that's what my guru [Ranjit Maharaj] told me," he says when we meet for coffee near his family home in Mumbai. The Germany-based musician is in town ahead of two shows, in Mumbai (on February 9) and New Delhi (on February 11) with Israeli classical orchestra Castle in Time.

Gurtu comes from a family with a strong musical heritage. His grandfather was a musicologist and sitar player. His mother, Shobha Gurtu, was a singer and popularly known as the "Thumri Queen". Unsurprisingly, he caught the music bug early, picking up the tabla at the age of five. At 11, he started training formally under Manikrao Popatkar from the Benares gharana, and would go on to learn from a series of notable masters, including tabla exponents: Ahmed Jan Thirakwa Khan and Pandit Suresh Talwalkar, and dholak player Abdul Karim Khan.