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BEGIN THE BEGUINE: THE MUSIC OF "EL DOURAD"
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by Francis Rodrigues.
"When they begin...the beguine....,
It brings back the sound...of music so tender...,
It brings back a night...of tropical splendor...,
It brings back a mem--ory of green......"
[Cole Porter - 1935]
*
A rich rain roars outside, roiling red rivers of recollection....
His hands were marble-veined leather, the fingers squat and spatulate.
When his husky bow rose to their bidding, rosined strings sang in
powdered counterpoint to his giggling gaggle of solfeggio students,
who fled before its wrath. But with me he was gentleness itself, and
when he raised his beloved Amati to pour out those liquid notes of
molten metal, I could naught but christen him my "El Dourad".
I knew him really for just a couple of years, but what a magical
time it was - and coming across Keith Antao's tribute last Sunday,
for a moment the mists of memory melted and Martinho Dourado smiled
at me again. Three decades ago....and yet surely it was yesterday?
The rain thunders down, and a late seventies' memory comes alive.....
I slipped from the stage to the hearty embrace of gushing, raucous,
nubile teenies, most flown out from England for a cousin's wedding.
Moments before I'd struggled back-up harmony with a couple of them
who insisted on singing the latest pop hit onstage with Johnson (and
His Jolly Boys), unannounced and unrehearsed. Clube Nacional reeled
before their gawky gung-ho, but they pressed ahead with more gumption
than rhythm, and triumphantly finished two glorious bars ahead of
the Jolly Boys. I squirmed, and gasped. Johnson was livid.
"These, these, this...!" he spluttered, his dark tan purpling. "If
you don't know....timing...aaaaargh, you, you..!" He never finished.
I sank onto a warm lap, nosed into another's rich tresses, as the
belles laughed uproariously at Johnson. Then I saw Martinho.
"Of all people....you, Franchic, how could you allow them....to do
this to Joaozinho?" I hadn't noticed Martin was a wedding-guest too.
For a moment, two dozen invitees at adjoining tables froze, then a
couple of stifled guffaws escaped. In a furious whisper, I tried to
indicate to Martinho he was ruining me in the eyes of these lovelies,
but his lips whitened, and hurt eyes glistened.
"You are ashamed of us...old musicians...and me..your old friend??"
That did it. My bravado melted and I untangled myself, walked over
and put my arms around his broad shoulders. No longer did I hear the
laughter. We were back together, the two of us, just like old times.
Bound by the abiding love for jazz, inculcated in me by this wise
and wonderful man. There would be other, softer girls.
And he, who was this enigmatic fiddler, Martinho Filipe Dourado?
Lightning sizzles through the rain-sheets in a pyrotechnic display.
Last Sunday I went down to the San Francisco Conservatory of Music,
six floors of terracotta splendour on Oak Street, off Van Ness. A
Goan lad (he founded the Goa Guitar Guild) is studying conducting
there. The hour was late, we'd been partying all afternoon at the
waterfront, and by the time we climbed Oak, Devang Mehta had left.
"I'm sorry," the security girl quivered, "He did wait an hour...."
From the vestibule, faint stirrings of melancholy strings carried
on the still air, so we tarried awhile and slipped into the hall
off the foyer. A small orchestra was rehearsing the Bruch G minor
violin concerto, but it was the soloist who was attracting attention.
Compact and concise, his sinews rippled as the great Westphalian's
score yielded to his facile technique. Smoky eyes flashed beneath
tendril overhangs of dark hair, and catching his swarthy Armenian
complexion, it suddenly struck me what the young "Dourad" must have
been like, for here was an incarnation of similar temperament.
"Without technique," Martinho often remonstrated, "You are nothing!"
That image stayed with me for the next few days though a vague sense
of unease lingered, simmered and grew as I flew on back to Toronto,
reminding me of a companion flight four years ago when I touched down
at Pearson on New Year's Day 2006 to a similar foreboding, only to
learn that my beloved mentor and muse was no more.
"Dourad," my mother's dulcet tones crackled across the transatlantic
lines, "Passed away the night before. The funeral's Friday."
The rain grumbles, globules glisten, gather and glide down the pane...
I'd spent most of my early education abroad, where I was born. Then
a decade of forays into and out of India, "enriching my perspective"!
Goa mostly, lots of Bombay. And much wandering of the subcontinent.
"Travel toughens the timid" my father said, "And hones the haunches!"
A medical man, he was a fine violinist, passing on his burnished Strad
(a copy of course) to me, and a love for the art. So I had lots of music.
And girls. Which is how the story begins - of Martin and the beguine.
Fr. Camilo Xavier taught me the classical guitar in the late seventies
at Margao's musty Escola Da Musica - which is where I met mando magus,
Fordham's Jose Pereira - bermudas, rucksack et al, in one of his yogic
incarnations. But I digress. To pry me out of a torridly escalating
romance he disapproved of (the siren was a 'mistis' mix), Fr. Camilo
despatched me to meet a brilliant young pianiste, all of 21, who'd
just arrived from Kuala Lumpur. Pure Goan too, he stressed.
At a distance of three decades, I have to apologise to Tracy - the
chemistry just wasn't there, though she did try. And I was horrid.
She came from Majorda, to teach young neophytes in Froilano Machado's
cavernous basement on Mangor Hill in Vasco, where the "Chocolate
Highway" band practised. My driver had no difficulty locating it.
"The chick is chikna" he reported back irreverently, "And juicy!"
If he thought I would drool, he was mistaken. And besides, Tracy
already had the coveted piano LRSM diploma, which I was still two
years away from, working with Hyacinth Brown at Dadar's Five Gardens.
But we hung and chilled, even as her soft brown eyes left me cold.
The storm gathers momentum, drumming, as it did that basement long ago.
An arresting tone, sensuously keening, wet and smoky in timbre was
making its way from the motley gang of solfeggio kids gathered round
the table-tennis table - its author a squat, powerful violinist. We
hit it off immediately - and when everyone had left, Martinho and I
started to make music together - the schmaltzy pop of the day, Abba,
The Eagles, The Bee Gees. Ever so slowly he began to edge me outward.
Classically-trained, I suspect Martinho was a closet-jazzman, his
leanings known to but a few. Yet he introduced me to a cool idiom,
spectacular in its brilliance. I was fascinated, a moth to a flame.
The guile of Gillespie, the elegance of Ellington, the magic of
Mingus. Never a great violinist, I did however know my way around
the piano, and from the figured bass Martinho scored for me, got
to play keyboard foil to his scintillating violin. And so we began.
Mondays and Thursdays. And if the piano was otherwise unavailable,
my guitar subbed, to create our version of Reinhardt and Grappelli.
Yet, he was never one to be overawed by the adventurous West.
"Many," he elaborated kindly, " Posture, without having even the
faintest notions of swing, even bebop! You and I must know better!"
The rain is possessed now, screaming, as if mocking Martin's words.
I was embarassed. Fats Waller or Thelonius Monk I was not. And
then there was the little matter of Dourad's view on interpretation.
Right from his favourite, that earthiest of staples, Cole Porter's
"Begin The Beguine". Liquid four-four time, opening three notes of
the scale bedded in syrupy-sweet chords - C, C6, Cmaj7, Dmin7, G11.
"It's meant to be swung, not bent...out of shape!" Dourad raged.
It's a blenchingly trite melody that rises above its origins and
mutates often into compound and irregular time avatars - much
to Dourad's dismay, despite the apparent commonality of rhythm.
Physics teaches us the entropy of a system is inviolate, and this
was the crux of Dourad's views on jazz interpretation, as it were.
"Syncopate the swing as far as you dare" he said, "But not a half-
beat more, nor less!....Listen to 'Atishoo' to hear how it's done!"
'Atishoo' of course was the peerless Artie Shaw, whose magical 1938
clarinet recording of "Begin The Beguine" has enthralled generations.
And so he began to write arrangements for me - violin and piano parts,
painstakingly by hand, in his beautiful script. One every week, for
almost three years - loosely-bound together in an elegant manuscript.
A veritable gold-mine of jazz arrangements in all genres. El Dourado!
"L. Dourado you call me?" he grinned wryly,"But really, I"m M. Dourado!"
A light vapour rises from the rain, a seductive mist tingling of Circe.
Allied to his eclectic tastes, we shared a love for the Romantic Latin.
We spent gorgeous hours exploring Pablo de Saraste's Spanish Dances,
Op. 22, exquisitely scored by that virtuoso, for violin and pianoforte.
"When I am going, Franchic," he smiled pensively once, "I should like
to hear this one - number three - the Romanza Andaluza. In my last
moments on earth, I can think of nothing so beautifully moving".
Of course I understood. Despite its virtuosic nature, the Romanza
Andaluza was deeply heartfelt, if overly lush. The wonderfully
expressive bass opening statement leads into the early and later
middle sections that describe not merely Iberia, but our lilting
Goa even. The challenging double-stops voicing our ladainhas, step
directly into a gorgeous mando-like dance section, before tackling
the ethereal harmonic-laden finale, so celestially evocative.
Despite his equanimity, I never knew (nor enquired) of his antecedents.
There were allusions to a film/recording industry past, hotel/big-band
years. A murmur that he had recently arrived from Calcutta to retire.
He spoke fondly of four sons, and I did meet his delightful wife once.
Soft snow cottons the raindrops now, and that forgotten Easter returns....
Sister Dolores, a vivacious organist friend from Karwar, visiting her
nunnery in Majorda invited me over for Easter lunch. I took "Goldie"
along. Nelson "Goldfish" Rodrigues - that sobriquet bestowed on him
by Vasco beauty queen Norma Dias - gaped at the sight of any pretty
face, blowing wide bubbles to reveal serrated chalky canines.
I enjoyed his brazen effrontery - once performing as his own composition
(on All India Radio), a tear-drenched soliloquy "While My Guitar Gently
Weeps", and subsequently expounding at length to the unknowing A.I.R.
interviewer Mr. Subramony on the angst that inspired this gem! Never mind
that four lads from Liverpool actually 'stole' this from Goldie earlier!
We got off the chuffy rail at Majorda, walked to Martinho's pretty place
at Utorda. Antonette, gracious and charming, invited us in, but Martin's
presence had been requested at the convent. Sister was thrilled, and we
made merry mayhem of Bach and Verdi. At lunch, Goldie surpassed himself.
"Oh my God! "giggled Sister hysterically, "It's Somerset Maugham's 'The
Luncheon' all over again! Do you remember Francis?" Do I remember???
"I'm sorry Sister, I can only eat a tiny morsel, I've a pigeon's stomach!"
was Goldie's gargantuan refrain through four courses, a sparkling port and
two desserts. One can only hope Goldie, a Gulf ad agency exec today, has
exceeded Maugham's protagonist's twenty-one stone. Martin was traumatized.
"Pigeon's stomach???" he gurgled in disbelief, "Mhunis haathi mere saathi!"
Six months later I was gone, a lawyer now, through a wet Europe, past sunny
African ports teeming with dark mercenaries. Left behind was the priceless
manuscript and a whirlpool of memories. I visited often, but never met Martin.
The rain is murmuring now, eddying and tugging at my delinquent conscience.
A dozen years later, my father was stricken. I flew back to see him at the
Port Trust Hospital. His face bound up, he was heavily sedated and there
was barely a glimmer of recognition. My old driver drove me morosely back
through the teeming streets of Vasco. Suddenly he slowed.
"Do you know" his face lit up, "Dourad teaches violin at the Port Institute?"
We parked and ambled slowly to the little billiard-hall annexe from which
was emerging once again, fainter but unfaltering, that smoky, tangy tone.
The years had been kinder to me than most. I'd lost the Lennon glasses and
Magnum moustache, and, bronzed, muscled and jeaned, looked in my teens.
My driver shuffled in to enquire of violin lessons for "Bab". An instant of
recognition, animated conversation. Martin looked out tentatively, withdrew.
"Ah, this is the younger one...." I heard him say, "Oh my, you remember the
older one...he was so talented, what he played!" I was numbed, mortified.
From the corridor outside, I began to warble softly, in slow syncopation.
"Doh-doh-re-mi-sohhhh...mi-mi-re-mi...doh-doh-re-mi-lahhhh" I held the note.
"When they begin..the beguine...it brings back the sound...of music so tender.."
The door creaked, the student chatter dimmed. Martin appeared, teary.
"Is it really you Franchic??" he quavered, "It's been, what, twelve years?!"
We waited an hour for him to finish. The unspoken years smiled between us,
as we drove to my old place where my beloved Kastner piano still waited. In
my bedroom closet, I found the yellowed manuscript book, tattily beloved.
The decade melted away as the old songs came alive again, even the Kastner
valiantly riding through broken strings. Strangely, the "Beguine" was missing,
so we improvised. We must have played for at least two hours before Martinho
refused my offer of dinner and a ride, to catch the 5:30 local to Majorda.
"You must be with your father!" he insisted firmly, with a glinty foreboding.
The soft rain picks up, as though hurrying to a seemingly inevitable climax.
I never saw Martin again. Father passed on early the next morning, the service
was hurried, crowded and weepy, and if Dourad was amongst the mourners, I was
shielded from all, but family. I flew out immediately and the world changed.
It's early spring in Toronto - the lawns green, bluebirds sing. Unexpectedly,
the snow returns for a couple of days this week as I write long past midnight,
echoing the chill in my bones. The steady rain has journeyed with me, swirling
and twisting by turn, providing a constant syncopatic refrain to my keyboard
staccato. Thirteen summers have come and gone since I saw Martinho, and three
of those he has spent deep beneath the earth of the land he loved so dearly.
I'm done. The catharsis has been wrenching, but true. Dawn is yet a couple
of hours away, and the house is still. A light gleams in the nether regions,
so I pad down to the study, and reach up for Father's lovingly-preserved
Strad. Affixing the mutes, I reach for the nearest volume.....of course!
Sarasate's Spanish Dances, opens quietly again to Romanza Andaluza. Did they
remember to play it as they lowered Martinho for the last time? I wasn't there.
I lift the Strad and hunt around for the rosin. There is a faint bulge beneath
the duster. I reach under and a folded manuscript falls out, the script faint,
Martin's calligraphy still exquisite in the early dawn..."Begin the Beguine".
Outside, the mist steals softly away.
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**Francis Rodrigues, a young Toronto attorney, divides his time between the
U.S. and Canada. Having lived around the world, he moved to North America
3 years ago, where amongst others, he founded the Goanetters Association of
Toronto - who successfully organised the 2008 International Goan Convention.
He's currently putting the finishing touches to a much-awaited seminal work,
the "Greatest Konkani Song Hits", a unique resource of sheet-music, etc.
His contact: 416-510-1347 / 647-232-6014 (Toronto); 408-256-6923 (San Jose);
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