A brilliant but short-lived flame (1926-1965)
Born on 16 April 1926 in Udaipur, Rajasthan, a young Chatur Lal, who later became a world-renowned tabla virtuoso, vigorously practiced the table night after night, his drum beating becoming a source of nuisance to his neighbours. One day, a policeman on night beat lost his patience and burst upon him, “You should be in bed by this time. You have no business to keep the locality awake”. A little frightened but undaunted, the little boy went on playing the tabla every night, except when it was time for the policeman to pass their house.
A year after Chatur Lal joined All India Radio in Delhi, in 1948,he started his musical journey on a bigger perspective, regularly participating in programmes and conferences all over India and abroad, with masters like Baba Allaudin Khan, Pandit Omkarnath Thakur, Pt. Ravi Shankar, Pandit Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, Ustad Vilayat Khan, Pt. Nikhil Banerjee and many others. He was among the first Indian musicians to introduce Indian classical music to the West and other countries in the mid 1950s.
Chatur Lal developed a style of his own, a light, rhythmic pattern and intimate understanding of the mood of the artiste he accompanied. Playing with great skills and finesse and weaving his percussion sonorities into every conceivable caprice of form of rhythm, he gave proof of his supreme command of the instrument. With perfect coordination, he played with much energy, passing at times into a mood of rhythmical abandon. It was an awe-inspiring recital – forceful, fluent and very earthy in its rhythmic appeal.
He had many firsts to his credit like being the first Indian percussionist introducing tabla to the West; the first Indian percussionist to be nominated for the Music Category in Oscars with Pandit Ravi Shankar in 1957 for Canadian Venture A Chairy Tale which also won a ‘Special Bafta Award’; the first Indian percussionist to introduce the concept of taalvadyakacheri, etc.
The Drums of India and Drums on Fire are some of the important solo recordings of Pandit Chatur Lal. He also composed and gave music for the short animated Canadian film A Chairy Tale, A Certain View, Now what my Little Man. French Television also made a short documentary film on him called Rythmes d’aillenres.
The Times of India described him thus: ‘He did not merely accompany, he did not dominate, he supplemented and deepened.’ Lothar Lutze of Max Muller Bhavan said, ‘he always showed an uncanny adroitness and skill in his accompaniment, while his solo was notable for case, clarity, diversity and grace where that were all his own’. Lord Yehudi Menuhin said, ‘He stole the hearts of his audiences wherever he went with his art and enchanting personality’.
Dr. Heimo Rau, called him ‘the incarnation of the god of music’ who opened to the listener a fourth dimension of experience beyond time and space.
When Chatur Lal was admitted to the Irwin Hospital in Delhi for blood in his urine, he had little money for his treatment, but had a lot of friends and admirers. He was a gentle soul, always submitting to tests, X-rays and operations without a complaint. For several months there after, he was in and out of hospitals, which ended on 14 October 1965, when he passed away at just 40 years of age.
The famous German Newspaper, Frankfurter Rundschan, opined, “Our little drums are stuck with sticks. However virtuoso they may be, yet compared to the art of the Indian tabla player, Chatur Lal, they sound barbarian. His playing sometimes sound like rhythmically arranged drops of rain, sometimes the finger flew over the membranes like a family of salamanders.” His legacy is maintained by the Pandit Chatur Lal Memorial Society, and his family.