Aparita

National Post, [04/28/2001]

 

Cricket, the game peculiar to prep-school boys and bourgeois gentlefolk, has been played in Toronto for 200 years. By rights it should have died off, a vestige of the city’s English past. But it hasn’t, thanks to the Toronto Cricket, Skating and Curling Club, private schools and a growing immigrant population that is in love with the game.

With the warmer weather returning, Aparita Bhandari went looking for cricket in Toronto in all its forms.

‘Howzat!” yells Srikant Sortur, striking the familiar pose of a bowler appealing his delivery: half-crouched, half-twisted backwards to face the umpire, one hand in the air.

Mr. Sortur’s face is contorted with a mixture of exhilaration (he may have bowled out the batsman) and agony (his appeal may be denied). The umpire stands with his hands behind his back for what seems like a full minute, then raises his hand, the index finger pointed toward the sky. The batter is out. Mr. Sortur exults as his teammates gather around to pat him on the back.

This is cricket, but not the pastoral, English version played by men in pristine whites on manicured fields surrounded by elegant ladies sipping tea. This is a motley gang playing or the parking lot behind a Pizzaville in Brampton.

They are not dressed in whites, or any uniform for that matter. A gravel road in a field serves as a pitch while an overturned shopping cart replaces the wickets.

This is street cricket, immensely popular among Toronto’s recent immigrants, especially those who are avid cricket followers from countries that were once a part of the Commonwealth.
Played where ever there is enough room to mark off a decent-sized field, street cricket is necessarily different from the traditional game.

“We use a tennis ball rather than a cricket ball, which is a hard cork and string ball covered with leather,” explains Mr. Sortur, 21, who moved to Canada from Dubai five years ago. “We wind electric tape around the tennis ball to make it heavier. It also becomes smoother, flies though the air quicker and does not have as much bounce as a regular tennis ball. And the friction between the ball and the ground is reduced so we get more pace, more speed.”

Other innovations include 10- or 12-over matches (an “over” being the cricket equivalent to baseball’s inning) as opposed to the normal 50-over match, a shorter pitch and playing half the field instead of full field. The list could go on, depending on your knowledge of the intricacies of the game.

“Back home we do the same thing,” says Maahir Ameen, 20, who came from Bangladesh two years ago. “We often have strikes and the whole city closes. So we play in the empty streets the same way we do here. Trash cans for wickets, tennis balls, no LBWs…”

Playing street cricket led Mr. Sortur to the Toronto and District League.

“We occasionally used to have inter-building matches in the summer and played five to six games of 25 or 12 overs. One of the guys in those matches was involved in club cricket and suggested that I play for a club to improve my cricket on a professional level.

“He took me to a practice and I joined a league team,” he says.

Mr. Ameen took a different route.

“My high school, Erindale Secondary School, had a cricket team. I joined it, happy I could continue to play cricket. Once I started playing school cricket, one of my teammates took me to a league team and I started to play for them.”

There are about 90 teams in the Toronto and District League, and some 70 cricket clubs in the city.

The lounge in the Toronto Cricket, Skating and Curling Club is an appropriately serene place. Located in the tony neighbourhood of Bedford Park, its large bay windows look out on a full-sized cricket field. Men and women dressed in squash gear saunter in and out. In one corner, two ladies perch on comfortable sofas and enjoy tea and bread, while in another corner four women are engrossed in a game of cards and social chit-chat.

The club, originally called the York Cricket Club before the city changed its name to Toronto in 1834, was formed in 1827. The game itself dates back even further than that in Toronto.

“It started at the beginning of the 19th century at the grammar school that preceded Upper Canada College,” says Ed Bracht, a long-time TCSCC member. “Prior to that, there are records of cricket being played by the British forces in the garrisons in Quebec and in Kingston.”

“It’s definitely the oldest sports club in Canada and it may even be the oldest sports club in North America,” says Howard Petrook, chairman of the Cricket Section of the Toronto Cricket Club.

The club’s history is dominated by names such as Seagram, Southam and Gooderham. They played the game and financed Canadian teams that competed in friendly and international matches.

In 1926, a group of the families, including the Seagrams and Gooderhams, purchased the grounds and left it in a perpetual trust for “the pursuit of the gentlemanly game of cricket,” failing which the grounds would revert to the five Ontario independent schools that still play the game: Upper Canada College, St. Andrews, Ridley College in St. Catharines, Appleby College in Oakville and Trinity College School in Port Hope.

There is no hope of that happening anytime soon, says Mr. Bracht, and Mr. Petrook agrees.

“There are four- or five-million people in Canada who come from cricket-playing backgrounds: the Caribbean, South Asia, South Africa and other parts of Africa, England, Australia and New Zealand. There are more than 10,000 players in Ontario alone, and those are just the ones that are registered in league teams,” he says.

However, they also agree that, other than with the recent-immigrant population and those who might pick it up in schools like Upper Canada College, cricket has not reached the status of a North American game.

“Native-born Canadians are not taking to the game,” Mr. Bracht says. “Cricket used to be the major sport of Canada. In fact, the longest continuously played competition between two countries in any sport is between the United States and Canada in cricket. Things like that show the history of it, and it is a pity that we are losing it.”

Mr. Bracht thinks North America’s penchant for violent games plays a part in cricket’s lack of popularity.

“It’s had a bad rap. The wrong image has been presented in North America, of it being a sissy’s sport contrary to the violence and the machismo that goes with the games here.”

Joe Harris, the India-born captain of the Canadian national team, who were practising at the Toronto Cricket Club this week, laughs at the idea of cricket being a gentleman’s sport.

“I won’t say that notion has died. The game is still played in very good spirit, and you still have the stopping for lunch and tea, and people clapping the opposition off. But it’s a very competitive and very tough sport. So you can say that the gentlemanly aspect of the game has taken a back seat for a bit.”

Says Mr. Petrook, “When you have a bowler bowling at a batsman at a hundred miles an hour, that’s faster than a baseball pitcher. In fact, cricketers regard baseball players as sissies. We always chuckle when we hear a baseball commentator saying that he ‘bare-handed’ a ball. Big deal. We do that all the time in cricket.”

And although it looks simple, it is a complicated game. “Cricket is a philosophy,” Mr. Bracht says. “It’s like a combination of chess and golf: chess because there is a tremendous amount of strategy involved, and golf because it looks so simple.”

Messrs. Bracht, Harris and Petrook hope this will change with the International Cricket Council qualifying round being held in Toronto later this year.

“If we are one of the top three teams out of the 24 that will compete, we go on to play at the World Cup that will be held in South Africa in 2003,” says Mr. Petrook. “That will bring a lot of interest to it.”

The sign outside reads Calypso Hut Restaurant and Nite Club. Inside the Brampton bar, a large empty dance floor is surrounded by seating all around. A half-dozen televisions in different corners and one giant-screen TV are tuned to a live telecast of a cricket match between the West Indies and South Africa. There are people scattered all over watching the game intently. By the bar three men sit in rapt attention, sipping their beer and munching on chicken wings, eyes glued to the TV screen. Srikant Sortur orders some pop and poulori and doubles — typical West Indian food.

“After a match we often go and have some food. We come from different places — West Indies, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka — but the food is the same. We just have different names for it,” says Mr. Sortur.

“We often watch cricket in bars, especially when India is playing. The last time I was here was when Pakistan was playing Sri Lanka at the Sharjah Cup.”

A few members of the Canadian national team file in after a practice at the nearby QASRA Sports in Etobicoke. Joe Harris, the captain, keenly watches the West Indies bowlers trying to bowl out the South Africans.

He talks about the passion cricket-lovers have for the sport.

“Cricket followers have grown up with it, ” he says. “Even if cricket may not have that big a following in terms of local interest, it is massive in terms of international cricket. Go to a bar like this and there will be people who sit from morning to evening and watch the game.

“I grew up in the sport. I was born in India, where cricket was the main sport, and when I moved to the West Indies in 1976 it was religion there. This will probably be my 24th season of playing cricket. I think the one game of cricket I missed in my life was when I got married,” he says.

Suddenly Mr. Harris whoops as another South African batsman is bowled out. “Where is Krinski?” he asks, looking for his South African friend. But it is friendly joshing that goes on between him and other team members.

“They always say never mix politics with sports. My team is made of Canadians, Australians, South Africans, Pakistanis and Indians, and I have got a wonderful bunch of fellows to play cricket with. We tease each other day in and day out about our cricketing countries, but we are a team.”

So what are the chances of the Canadian team playing in the World Cup?

“I think we stand a pretty good chance,” says Mr. Harris, and his cricket cronies drink to that.

CRICKET AT A GLANCE:

In the modern version of cricket, each team has 11 players. The team at bat sends two batsmen out to the pitch, where they run between two sets of wickets located 66 feet apart; they are allowed to make a run whenever they hit the ball into play, but can also choose to defend their wickets from the bowler. Each time they run from one wicket to the other, their team scores a run.

A ball batted out of the field’s boundaries on the ground automatically scores four runs; one in the air is good for six.

The fielding team’s bowler bowls the ball at the batter from a distance of 66 feet (compared to 60.5 feet in baseball); the ball can reach speeds well in excess of 100 miles-per-hour but must bounce off the ground in front of the batter.

If the ball goes by the batter and hits the wickets, the batter is out. The batter can also be ruled out (”dismissed”) if a hit is caught before it strikes the ground, if he is caught between wickets and the fielding team knocks the wickets down, or if he is ruled by the umpire to have used his leg pads to prevent the ball from hitting the wickets (an “LBW” — leg before wicket). The game is measured in “overs” — six balls bowled.

The fielding team must get 10 batters out in order to become the batting team.

A few terms

Duck: score nothing

Century: Hundred runs

Howzat!: Appeal to the umpire for a decision in your favour.

Bails: The two cross pieces that rest on the top of the three stumps that make a wicket.

A surprising fact

English cricketers are almost twice as likely to commit suicide as the average male and have a suicide rate higher than players of any other sport, according to an international study.

The suicide rate among British men is 1.07 %, but according to research by David Frith, a British author, the rate among cricketers is 1.77%, making them 75% more likely to take their own life.

The game’s toll overseas is even higher. In South Africa, 4.12% of players take their own lives. In New Zealand, the rate is 3.92% and in Australia 2.75%.

Source: The Observer

India Currents, [April 2001]

 

It has been 10 years of explorations and explanations. Having studied under tabla gurus like Zakir Hussain and Swapan Chaudhari, Ritesh Das, artistic director of the Toronto Tabla Ensemble, conceived of the ensemble a decade ago-it was an experiment that started with five students. Today the number has doubled and the ensemble enjoys a dedicated audience. The ensemble recently held a celebration at the Du Maurier Theatre in Toronto to celebrate its achievements, where I got a chance to speak to him.

When describing the philosophy that guides the Toronto Tabla Ensemble, Das admits that much of what he does is not new. He had already experienced this phenomenon when in India with Shankar Ghosh’s tabla ensemble.

“Then while studying under Swapanji in California, I played in Swapanji’s tabla ensemble at the Ali Akbar College of Music in San Rafael. Then I saw Zakirbhai’s Rhythm Experience. Seeing all of these things, I tried to get the best of all of them and come out with something new, which was in my own voice. That was my goal,” he reels off, much like he reels off a gat (a short composition made up of a series of bols, or the names of the different strokes of a tabla) full steam in order to confound his students.

In a way the ensemble is an offshoot of the Indo-Jazz movement that Ritesh Das was a part of while he was studying at the Ali Akbar College of Music. Inspired and influenced by the now famous Zakir Hussain and John McLaughlin “Shakti” collaboration, Das wanted to add his own twist to the idea of collaborating. He shies away from the complexity of what he calls “maestros composing.” The complexity of his work, he feels, lies in its mischievousness, the way it plays around with music. He also feels that his music is not so much about experimenting with instruments.

“It’s a full-scale collaboration-tabla with kodo, flamenco, dance. … It’s exploring cultures through music.” He even goes as far as to compare it with popular Bollywood music. “Hindi movie songs, some of them, were highly influenced by stuff coming out of the Middle East; some songs came out of Western classical music or pop. That was the whole idea of having a big ensemble and orchestra. Even with the rhythm, you had the Indian folk influence and a little bit of Western pop rock with a Middle Eastern rhythmic structure.”

Ritesh Das’ tabla experiments with other music cultures, may be giving it some Indian chutzpah in a jugalbandi besides proving that the tabla can hold its own against a melodic instrument.
Moving beyond the usual binary of EastWest fusion that is usually associated with collaborative efforts, the Toronto Tabla Ensemble has reached out to the world to borrow from and play with musical influences, while retaining an integral part of the tradition it has evolved from. This blend of tradition and innovation marks most of the ensemble’s work.

Their concerts, for example, start with the customary lighting of the lamp; but the faint glow of oiled wicks soon give way to the brilliant hues of the lighting effects. Another interesting reflection of this blend is the studio, where students come to learn the tabla and dance. In the heart of downtown Toronto, it is a warm welcome from the bitter cold of winter-Indian art decor and modernist wall etchings give it a splash of color, while incense wafts in the rooms. Sounds floating through these rooms suggest tabla, kathak, and belly-dancing going on in tandem.

While collaboration is an oft-used word with Ritesh Das, so is practice. “In order to do what the tabla ensemble is doing, one has to really, really study tabla to understand how really the material is executed or applied. The knowledge which the students get is not the knowledge that you can get overnight-as people mature, so does the ensemble, because it goes to the next step, a higher way of thinking of how to work with the taals and the rhythms and so forth. Once they get that kind of idea they can understand where collaborations happen. Instead of just playing regular grooves with the guest or something, you can apply tabla structure to it.”

The compositions themselves strongly demonstrate Das’s approach to the tabla. For example, Weaving, a piece from their upcoming album and played at the 10thanniversary concert, starts in a traditional Indian vein-successive pairs of tabla players drummed out in teen-tal, a simple 16-beat cycle. Playing around with intricacies of rhythmic patterns, the first pair start on the first beat, the second on the fifth beat, the third on the ninth beat and the fourth drummer on the 13th beat of the cycle, until all seven players are involved in a fairly complex composition. Once this rhythmic cycle is established, the two drummers on Western drums literally explode into it.

An interesting duality results-while the drums play “with” the tablas, they also completely rip out of the cycle carrying the piece towards a rousing crescendo. Bassist Ian de Souza, one of the guest artists of the concert, adds to this creative medley by inflecting it with a touch of jazz that is subtle and yet mind-boggling in the way he weaves in and around the 16 beats.

Another piece from their upcoming album, Waterfall, makes creative use of the Punjabi bhangra beat. At the concert, two of the tabla players came on stage with dhols strapped across their chests and proceeded to belt out the bhangra beat in the midst of the subtler tabla beat. With Das conducting the drummers, the three percussive instruments crash-boom-banged together to convey the raw power of rapids hurtling down a sheer drop.

Levon Ichkhanian, the other guest artist of the concert, has collaborated with the ensemble in their latest work. In an aptly named composition titled Nomad, three different traditions of music are brought together to emphasize the fluidity of boundaries and the way music seeps through it. Levon’s contemporary eclectic guitar somehow manages to sound like a Middle Eastern string instrument as his folksy Armenian and Lebanese heritage tune blends beautifully with the Indian influence of the ensemble.

The coming together of these two eastern influences with the drums and bass is especially interesting as they provide each other with a sense of contrast, but seamlessly integrate into the larger theme of the composition, emphasized by Joanna Das keeping the beat on the xylophone.

In fact, this is the most fascinating aspect of the ensemble-the dialogue that is established be tween musical traditions. How the tabla, which has recently gained popularity as a solo instrument, can play with musical traditions of the Middle East and jazz, and how these other traditions play off of each other within an Indian tradition. Das acknowledges that fusion of different influences is old hat, but believes in avoiding confusion. The ensemble does just that-it explores new interpretations, but retains the essence of each tradition.

For example, you don’t often see Western drummers freestyling, but in the ensemble the two drummers do several creative on-the-spot improvisations in a manner not unlike the tabla. Ritesh Das’s tabla, similarly, experiments with other music cultures, maybe giving it some Indian chutzpah in a jugalbandi besides proving that the tabla can hold its own against a melodic instrument.