The Freedom Jam: How it all began

www.freedomjam.net

Pics 1 - 3: The Bangalore Music Strip. Some of acts that jammed at the Strip included "Bharat Mata Nach Kud Baja" a.k.a "Mother India Jive Band" (famous for its dead man's beat, locally known as the 'Thapan Kud'), "The Chronic Blues Band", the outrageously named punk band "Dr Dong & the wrinkled scrotums", "Human Bondage", "Hot Rain" and "Stylus".
Pic 4: Radha Thomas and Babu Joseph (with shaker) of Human Bondage.
Pic 5-6: The Freedom Jam at The Club. (2004)

"To foster a creatively explosive, original contemporary music scene one needs an appropriate space -- where there is freedom to express oneself, no commercial bias, non-judgmental ambience, and a receptive, music loving audience. The Freedom Jam is such an oasis." – Gopal Navale.

The Bangalore Music Strip (1983 – 1986)

In 1983, Bombay businessman Shorab Rubina brought down renowned London theatre artists Laura and Geoffrey Kendall to the city to stage 'Dear Liar: A Comedy of Letters' at Chowdiah Memorial Hall. Using street music as a novel promotional ploy for the play, Rubina decided to have a few city musicians come together and jam on the embankment on M.G. Road -- making it 'The Music Strip'. But the then police commissioner denied permission, and instead, allowed Rubina to use Cubbon Park. It was thus that the grassy area between the Ashoka trees behind Queen Vicky became known as the Music Strip.
With the play having done remarkably well, Rubina donated Rs.5000 to his friend Sunbeam Motha asking him to further the strip before he left for the States. In his words, "Musicians should run the Strip all by themselves and only for people who love music." Motha along with his friends Peter Pires, Michael Furtado and Geoffrey Pope soon registered as 'The Bangalore Music Strip Trust'.

The Great 80s Jam

"The hangover from the hippie movement in the 60s and 70s, the thirst for 'live' music and a musician's need to share his experiences with like-minded souls were some of the forces that had Sunbeam and his friends organize this unique commune." - Gopal Navale.

"Although highly disorganized, the music scene was most fun back then in the 80s," says guitarist-turned-poet Jeet Thayil. "The Music Strip is unforgettable; petromax lanterns and amps set up on the rocks in Cubbon Park, a bunch of freaks gathered for the music, smoke rising into the night sky. I remember jamming with Peter Isaac's Chronic Blues Band and, later, with the Baja."
If Woodstock was where it all happened in the 60s, then here in the city, the Music Strip was where it was all at in the 80s. The scene was set every Friday and Saturday evening for one hell of a jam. Musicians (and non-musicians) lugged their acoustic guitar, mandolin, flute, tabla, didgeridoo, bongos, maraccas, harmonica and what have you to entertain all and sundry at the Strip. A collection hat -- into which some blithesome Strip-per would drop a hundred-rupee note -- would be passed around to raise funds for the music equipment. On Sundays, the Strip-per crowd only got bigger as the jams went electric thanks to some beat-up battery-powered amplifiers lent by Reynolds. And who do you reckon, prepared and sold coin pizzas and sandwiches at these jams? None other than Konarak Reddy! "I had to stop doing it once it got political," he laughs.
The Strip-pers also included travellers and tourists (largely from Kodaikanal and Goa) who got wind of the Strip. Visiting bands (invited to the city by USIS, MMB and AF) were often asked to perform here after their scheduled shows. Almost invariably, local musicians would jam with these bands. Says Konarak, "The intimacy between the musicians and the audience helped them understand the city and its people better."
The Strip had, within a few years, become these pearly gates that led its hippie souls into an almost-utopian musical paradise where everything just seemed to flow in the right direction. In Motha's account, "The freakishly informal set-up was just perfect. It was sort of a neutral place in between City and Cantonment, so there were no cultural problems."
But not for too long. As the Strip grew popular, local authorities and groups often linked the Strip with western decadence, and the Strip had to be discontinued. A beautiful dream had come to an abrupt end. But as it would soon turn out, it was only the beginning of a new dawn.

The 90s Revival – "No Bread, lots of Jam"

August 1997: Heavy-duty rock riffs grab everybody's attention on the city streets. The Navales are driving with a young 'Malleshwaram gang' at the back of their funky open jeep with an electric guitar amp-ed to… the jeep's battery! Speeding away just before the cops arrive, the guerrilla entourage snake their way from Malleshwaram to MG Road via Cubbon Park handing out fliers and announcing the first all-night Freedom Jam at Samsa -- the outdoor arena behind Ravindra Kalakshetra, on the eve of Independence Day.

A few old-timers -- comprising Guruskool trustees Gopal and Geetha Navale, Bajaa member Siddhartha Patnaik and blues-fusion player Michael Sorenson -- had revived the 80s jam culture in '96. The Sunday Jam revived the Strip spirit with its 'No Bread' motto. Furthermore, the organizers put a high premium on originality. Many local bands responded, a small but growing number of whom performed their 'own comps'.
Soon the local music scene burgeoned with live gigs at the Sunday Jams (held on the first Sunday of every month) and the annual all-night Freedom Jam. Goodwill gestures from music lovers, including Colin Timms of Pecos and Dr. Thomas Chandy of Hosmat, helped raise funds.
Some of the bands that made a name for themselves here were The Sarjapur Blues band, Gopal Navale's Esperanto, Dr. Chandy's Jazz Revival, guitarists Gerard Machado, Amit Heri and Konarak Reddy, drummer Roberto Narain, and Babu Joseph's Human Bondage -- the highlight of the '97 Jam. Music festival organizer Srinidhi Anantram who sponsored the '97 Jam was instrumental in bringing down the members of Human Bondage from as far as Spain, Germany and the US as they came together solely for the Jam.
Abhijit Tambe, who performed with his band Jamtree at the '97 Freedom Jam and is now the lead of Lounge Piranha, says, "It was a cool thing. People simply got on stage and jammed for as long as they liked. There were very few rehearsed acts."
Soon the jams became not only a hotspot for local college bands but also a launch pad for most up-and-coming acts. Practically every local band has performed in the jams at some point in their musical careers: Thermal and a Quarter, Threnody, Kryptos, Galeej Gurus, and what have you. It wasn't just rock, but every genre of music: Hindustani, Carnatic, jazz, and forms from all over the world.
Over a thousand people communed in 1999, when the Freedom Jam moved to Navales' farm some 30kms from the city. Recounts Gopal: "There was no sight of the colored Khaki then; just a campfire, music, and the rain…nothing else." All this was set to change at the turn of the century.

The Consumerist Millennium – "Win Bread, then Jam"

"Every passing musician somehow ended up at these jams. I remember a couple from a village in Karnataka who did an aural history of Bangalore in Kannada, a Spanish lad who played the Sarod, a group of Columbian jazz guys, and even a John Coltrane who wanted to stay at Navales' farm. There was a strong spirit of adventure to these jams; many funky and innovative things were happening. Everyone had a place here to make it his or her own." - Film music composer Gail Hart.

August 2001: It is 2 a.m. on the morning of Independence Day. A long trail of cars and bikes follow the NH4 highway for about 25kms from the city then cut into a small rugged dirt lane near Nelamangala. With the number rising to a few thousands within the next hour, the ensuing chaos does enough to disturb the peace in this village neighborhood as residents sit up and take notice. One among them is a cop who follows the vehicle trail and finds himself bang in the middle of a 'live party': loud rock music, a startling number of revellers, with a sizable number (not surprisingly) intoxicated. Enough reason to set the alarm bells ringing at the local police station. The 'party' is soon busted, and the sound equipment, seized.

This was how the Freedom Jam at Navales' farm would end that fateful night. It was effectively, as many old-timers would have it: "The death of the Freedom Jam." As it turned out, it wasn't so much of a 'death' -- thanks to The Club on Mysore Road opening its premises for future jams and UB stepping in to sponsor -- but the jams would never remain the same again.
The event got bigger and better every month. College bands from all over the country could simply not let go of an opportunity to perform at the annual event. Even as established bands slowly began to distance themselves, and a strong nostalgia of the 'jams-gone-by' crept into the evenings, they were steadily becoming the 'official posse phenomenon' for the youth. There was no way any corporate bigwig would leave this awesome market untapped. In swooped Levi's in 2004. The Freedom Jam was now re-christened, "Levi's Freedom Jam", and the Sunday Jam, "Levi's Sunday Jam"; they will remain so, till at least 2010.

Reactions to Sponsorship

"The Sunday Jams would have preserved their purity and sanctity if they remained at Samsa. The Samsa atmosphere could never be duplicated." –Raghupathy Dixit

"It was a mistake that the jams were sold out. The lookout should always have been towards the safeguarding of the interests of musicians, music and even instruments." -Konarak Reddy

"In spite of all the pressure the Freedom Jam still stands for original music and jam sessions. The 'free spirit' of the old days cannot be justified today when there are tens of bands waiting to take stage. Furthermore, Levi's lets Guruskool handle the jams entirely on their own. So, the freedom still remains." -Abhijit Tambe

Last Word
"The Navales and the jam organizers have truly created a unique and special place for local musicians. Their passion, energy and commitment in keeping it going from the time they revived jam sessions in the 90s is amazing. Commercialization had to happen sooner or later. But the spirit of the Strip still exists." - Sunbeam Motha

(Photo Courtesy: Sunbeam Motha, Peter Pires and Guruskool)