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Sep 11, 2009

"Teaching music is not my main purpose. I want to make good citizens. If children hear fine music from the day of their birth and learn to play it, they develop sensitivity, discipline and endurance. They get a beautiful heart." --Shinichi Suzuki

Bach In The Hills

Getting lost on Shillong, India's roads, with clouds and thoughts for company, is most often a matter of pleasure. If you have drifted near Neil Nongkynrih's house in Pokseh, the music will find you. On a regular day, the house fills the neighbourhood with melody -- the strain of a violin, the lilt of the piano as it plays a Bach fugue and voices of children singing. This is home to a unique experiment in Western classical music, special even for a city as soaked in music as Shillong. Here, concert pianist Nongkynrih watches over rehearsals of his Shillong Chamber Choir, a collection of 16 musicians that he has gathered into his fold over the last eight years. Music, for Nongkynrih, has been a way to re-connect with society and give something back. In the initial years as a choir leader, he found children from villages or from modest backgrounds and trained them.