East is East and West is West and never the train shall meet is how the saying goes. Often used to describe two diametrically opposed opinions, the sayings origins rest in the supposed separation between the philosophies of Western and Eastern thought.
Thankfully for the fate of the world there are people who refuse to buy into that statement, and attempt to bridge what was formally seen as an unbridgeable gulf. While in the past we have seen some Western performers either work with musicians from India or incorporate instruments into their songs, very few have successfully melded the two into one sound.
One musician who makes the integration of these supposed opposites seamlessly is Harry Manx. This Canadian based musician has mastered the intricacies of the multiple rhythms of the Indian ragas and blended them with Mississippi delta blues, and a touch of Gospel to create something funky and beautiful..
His CD West Eats Meet is chock full of examples of how successful this seemingly bizarre marriage works. The first track of the disc, "Help Me", only shows hints of what is to come. Having established his blues credentials with some slick guitar work and aching harmonica, the sitar in the guitar solo near the end of the song comes as a surprise.
It's not until the third track of the album, "Shadow Of The Whip" that the full implications of what we are hearing come clear. From the pulsing of the tabla drums in the percussion to the guitar lead that evokes the shimmering of the sitar, Manx is blurring the line that separates East from West musically.
I don't know if you can tell from the picture above, but if you go to his web site you'll be able to get a better idea of how he is able to generate the sounds he does with his guitar. He plays a Mohan Veena-a, 20-string guitar/sitar. The instrument was designed by Vishwa Mohan Bhatt, best known for his collaboration with Ry Cooder on the disc Meeting By The River. Manx studied with Bhatt for five years in the mid eighties, and at the end of that time he was given the guitar.
From what Manx says on his web site it sounds like it could have taken him the entire five years just to learn how to tune and play the instrument. The additional strings are what he calls sympathetic, which I would assume to mean that they resonate in relation to what is being done on the principal strings. He also describes the slide techniques used by Indian musicians as being a circular motion instead of the up and down the fret board style that we associate with the blues.
Article comments
1 - DrPat
"East is east, and West is west, and never the twain shall meet" is how the phrase goes.
East and west trains meeting is a whole 'nother trainwreck...
2 - gypsyman
And I thought Bugs Bunny was deliberatly screwing it up...The only time I ever heard the expresseion was on an old Bugs cartoon, and I thought the writers were making a joke out of the phrase by having my old pal Bugs say "Twain" silly me.
Is twain some sort of old fasioned way of saying two...