A unique photography exhibition, aims at reviving the forgotten jazz era in Mumbai
While the thriving jazz scene in Mumbai around late 60s and 70s is often spoken about, not much has been done to revive those memories today. But, through a unique combination of music and photography, an effort has finally been made to bring back to life, the earlier jazz culture in Mumbai.
As a part of the research for playwright Ramu Ramnathan’s ‘Jazz’, jazz enthusiasts Denzil Smith and Naresh Fernandes have put together a photography exhibition of some forgotten Jazz legends of Mumbai from the 30s to 70s.
“In the course of meeting families of various jazz musicians like Mickey Correa, Chic Chocolate, Anthony Gonsalves, Lucila George Pacheco, we ended up collecting some very interesting photographs that perfectly define their musical era. In a city that once recognized jazz as much as Bollywood is now, we thought it would be a great opportunity to familiarise youngsters and others with the culture that existed then,” says Denzil Smith.
The exhibition on November 15 at Zenzi in Bandra somewhere incorporates over 70 personal and professional pictures of these musicians who were once identified with the ethnicity of Mumbai.
Adds Denzil, “There is no set target audience this exhibition would attract; in fact if a cross section of people can relate and try to understand the intensity behind the images, our purpose will be served.”
In addition, the exhibition also incorporates photos from the Taj Hotel of the earliest African American musicians to play in Bombay.
“Today it is only places like ‘Not Just Jazz by the Bay’ that recounts the essence of jazz music, while in the 70s almost every restaurant and hotel had live jazz music. Putting together these memories ha been a great experience for us and we hope it can provide a lot of information for our viewers,” he signs off.
