Ruskin bonding - II

Jyaneswar Laishram *

Ruskin Bond, author of many widely sought after books, was at the Landmark store in Forum Mall, Bangalore, on June 6, 2012, to release his new book of poems "Hip Hop Nature Boy and Other Poems" published by Penguin Books India. :: Pix - Wikipedia/Jim Ankan Deka

The title above might sound like second part or continuation of the article 'Ruskin bonding' I had written in this column last week. Yes, it's a continuation, but not in a way that I take up the story from where the earlier article was ended. This is totally a fresh episode of my 'bonding' to India's most loved hill-man storyteller, Ruskin Bond, on a brand new theme. Here the theme is music. Ruskin Bond loves music and enjoys singing. For the latter, he is popular for being an inexhaustible renderer of classic songs in distorted or alternative versions; but it doesn't bother him to give up singing in bathroom or while mopping floor. He rather says people who sing out of tune may not become singers, but they are equally music lovers.

When it comes to music, I enjoy almost all genres, irrespective of geographies or eras they belong; but oldies have special place in my playlist. As people enjoy music in their own perspectives, I do have mine too in this—when I listen to a classic piece I always visualize how the melody would have resonated around the open fields, meadows, streets and town halls of the then era. Such delight is what I dig up a bit here from some of the Ruskin Bond's non-fiction stories in which he recollects the way people from elite section of the semi-hilly town of Dehradun used to party all night long to the tune of some good contemporary music—of course, jazz of the 30s & 40s.

In a chapter that captures Dehradun's snowy winter of 1945 in his memoir Scenes From A Writer's Life, Ruskin Bond relives his nostalgia attuned to the sound of some good old jazz pieces like that of Glen Miller. He was then merely a boy of 11. Dehradun received snowfall on the second January that winter, covering the surroundings, including all lichi and guava trees on roadsides, with soft white mantle of snow. Miss Kellner, young Ruskin's old unmarried lady friend, informed him the snow returned to the town after an interval of forty years. She further told him that it had snowed when she first arrived in the town, now it (the snow) perhaps signaled that she should go away.

As the mid-1940s was such a traumatic and transitional period perceiving the anguish of World War-II and India's independence was hanging on the edge amid a series of pre-partition communal clashes almost all over the eastern and northern parts of the country, many Britishers in the country started packing up their belongings to leave India for good, marking the end of the colonial era. Miss Kellner was one among those who geared up for the departure, but not Ruskin Bond who was more Indian at heart than ordinary Indians like me. Eventually, Miss Kellner never left India till her last breathe; to the advice of young Ruskin, she decided to stay back till the next snowfall in Dehradun.

Unlike the big cities, Dehradun during the World War-II was a lively little town, which had been made a recreational den for war-weary allied troops, particularly for the US soldiers, who loved to sway awhile in the tune of swing jazz. There were large contingents of British and American soldiers stationed on the outskirts of the town. In turn, a number of cafés, dance halls, night clubs, casinos and bars popped up all over the places, bringing in the culture of jazz revelry that continued till early hours of every morning. Many girls of Anglo-Indian background were main attraction and subject of commotion in those night-long parties which often ended with brawls between British and American soldiers.

Ruskin Bond still remembers a night at one of the casinos for two reasons. First, he met a pretty little thing called Doreen who had lovely legs and sensuous lips. Secondly, it was some Glen Miller swing hits that shook him a bit along Doreen. In jazz, I enjoy both swing and bebop styles equally. Yes, bebop, another jazz form, came up into existence in a big way in the 1940s, but Ruskin Bond in his stories mentions only about relishing swingers like Glen Miller, Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw and Dinah Shore (famous for her hit What Do They Do On A Rainy Night in Rio?).

As jazz is still a far cry in the music scene of Manipur, a little introduction to this genre will make a great sense. Era of swing jazz (take Kishore Kumar's Ina Meena Dika as a simpler example) unfolded in the 1920s led by a bunch of less-known jazzmen in the US. But its popularity gained full swing when Benny Goodman, who is known as King of Swing, emerged in the year 1935, followed by other popular swing singers/musicians like Billie Holiday, Louis Armstrong, Ella Fiztgerald, so on. On the other side, bebop is the style we contemporarily witness these days in jazz where each player in a band improvises solo act. This style is primarily characterized by un-tempo and frenzied pace—not suitable for dancing sessions that young Ruskin Bond attended at casinos in Dehradun.

Why I'm saying so much about jazz and Ruskin Bond is because, like this beloved old hill-man storyteller, I also have the reminiscence of some good old music (not necessarily jazz); whenever I listen to them, nostalgia of certain bygone years erupts. For instance, whenever ABBA's song I Have A Dream plays around, it reminds me of the puff of chilly wind that brought the tune down from the hills of Nungsai Village near Loukoi Pat in my hometown Bishenpur, which is semi-hilly like Dehradun, on December mornings during the Christmas seasons. Enjoying the song that came oscillating in the air from a nearby hilltop church, while the chill outside forced me to remain wrapped in quilt on bed, was something I still savor.

Even my boyhood memories are buried so fresh in some romantic and pulsating film songs popularly played at thabal nights, paan dukans and photo studio shops around Bishenpur town in the eighties. Laishram Mema's Lamlaanbani Khankhi Nangbu from 'Meichak' and other tracks including Kanaagee Wakhalda by Aheibam Shyam from the same film were often heard playing from event venues during festive seasons in the town. These timeless classic songs still bring memories of those hey days me and my leikai buddies had during our winter breaks, playing on the open paddy fields located adjoining the Laimaton foothill as harvesting was over and farmers left some hay-heaps for us to play with.

It could be either Ruskin Bond's nights at casinos in Dehradun or my hip-hops on hay heaps on maning labook paddy field, all that accumulated in the songs of Glen Miller or Aheibam Shyam is still lingering, undying, as reminiscence of the past in form of present nostalgia.