Deconstructing the Applause

I have just returned from Chennai, having partaken heartily of the food of love,

namely music; in common parlance, the December music season. Not just any

old music, but the unfiltered, unadulterated pure offering provided by the

doughty purveyors of Carnatic music, one of south India’s many gifts to the

world of arts and culture. I have been doing this for over 25 years, year on year,

without a break, leaving out the Covid years. I have, on many occasions, put

down my thoughts on the various aspects of Chennai’s music season and it

would be safe to assume that I have pretty much shot my bolt. Enough said.

Then I said to myself, hang on, there must be something one can write about

that has not been covered with a single-minded focus. That is when the

metaphoric bulb inside my head came alight.

A Japanese Zen Buddhist monk once asked, ‘What is the sound of one hand

clapping?’ The question is rhetorical. Do not attempt to answer it. More to the

point, how do we express our appreciation to these persevering musicians who

slave day and night to bring us elevation and entertainment? We put our hands

together and applaud. That is what we do. Nowadays, the more popular artistes

are even showered with appreciative cat calls and wolf whistles, but we will put

that to one side. I shall focus my essay and attempt to shine a light on ‘The

Applause.’ In doing so, let me deconstruct this traditional show of approbation

into different categories, since it is not merely a simple matter of clapping

hands.

The spontaneous eruption. The singer has just completed a monumental

exposition of Kalyani, exploring every nook and crevice of the raga, traversing

up and down the scale leaving no stone unturned and no avenue unexplored.

The audience sits in stunned silence and as the artist finally lands on home soil,

the members in the auditorium rise as one, the applause never seeming to end.

This does not happen all that often, which is understandable since a

performance of such outstanding calibre is as rare as hen’s teeth. But when it

does, it can bring the roof down.

The apologetic applause. For some reason, irrespective of the quality of the

performance, the audience has been hardwired over the years into believing that

we must put our hands together, never mind if the artist’s effort was

demonstrably undeserving of an applause. When a song has been completed

perfunctorily, the audience feels it is incumbent upon it to display some kind of

gesture. Just to show that there is no ill feeling. This results in a deeply

embarrassing and hesitant, underwhelming clapping by a handful, while the

singer or the instrumentalist wishes the stage under him would swallow him or

her up.

The impromptu applause. Some artists, without meaning to do so, can draw

applause right in the middle of an exposition. This could happen when the

singer goes all the way up to the highest register on a 7-note scale and stays

there for a while. Or when a rapid-fire swara or scalar improvisation threatens

to shake hell’s foundations before the violinist and percussionists all join hands

with the singer to end the fireworks and drink in the rapturous applause while

patting each other on the back on stage. A bit of self-congratulation never hurt

anybody.

Applauding on length. This is an interesting one. When an artist essays an

alapana and / or a kriti and finishes the whole thing off in double quick time,

the audience feels short-changed and fails to show its appreciation. It might

have been a brilliant rendition, but the length was too short. The effort was not

worth the candle. It did not work up the required head of steam to forcibly

extract an applause. The other side of the coin is when the musician goes on

endlessly, often in adagio molto (very slow), boringly repeating phrase after

phrase and finally, when the audience has virtually given up the ghost, decides

to put them out of their misery, the congregation cheers and applauds

enthusiastically like the reverberating clap of thunder. More out of relief that the

agony has ended than anything else, but try telling that to the performer.

End of concert applause. If you are still sitting at the venue till the final curtain

comes down and the traditional Mangalam has been rendered, you have no

option but to stretch your hands and legs and give the performers on stage your

show of gratitude by applauding. That is the very least you can do, even if you

are the last man standing. Never mind if the other 20 or 30 stragglers are rapidly

rushing out to catch an auto or a call taxi.

The art of applauding at a western classical concert. If you are a connoisseur of

western classical music and particularly if you are not, you will quickly learn

that there is a time to applaud and a time not to applaud. They are very

particular about this. Take, to provide an example at random, that you are

attending a recital of Beethoven’s 5 th Symphony at the Royal Albert Hall in

London. All very prim and proper. This monumental orchestral masterpiece has

four movements, a standard structure of classical symphonies. Opening with the

stentorian Allegro con brio, followed by the Andante con moto, then a fast

Scherzo and closing out with the grand Finale. In case you are wondering, I got

all that from my precious vinyl record album sleeve notes!

An English friend of mine advised me to applaud only after I see the others in

the audience do the same. The thing is, when the first, second, third or fourth

movement is over, you instinctively feel an applause is due. It is a typical Indian

impulse. This can be deeply embarrassing as the rest of those around you, who

are more attuned to the idiosyncrasies of attending a western classical music

performance, wonder which planet you descended from. You can only applaud

when all the four movements have been completed and Zubin Mehta genuflects

to take a bow. I have always felt this practice to be quite illogical and that you

should be allowed to cheer as and when the mood takes you. Just as we do here

in India. Which is why I was delighted when I attended one such classical

concert some years ago in Mumbai, when a large group of the uninitiated was

present. They kept clapping loudly whenever they felt moved to do so, and they

couldn’t give a damn about all the stiff-upper-lips glaring down at them. I

turned round and whispered to one of the puzzled foreigners seated next to me,

‘When in India, do as the Indians do.’

As the late irresistible and irascible writer Khushwant Singh once said, ‘There is

no wine in the world as heady as applause; and it has the same effect. It

temporarily subdues anxiety and restores confidence.’