26 THE GUIDE mid-day Wednesday, December 7, 2016 | www.mid-day.com | twitter.com/mid_day | epaper.mid-day.com

Jazz, justice and a Dalit iconA panel will reflect on the student years of Dr BR Ambedkar in New York to learn how those times went on to shape his worldview, and India’s Constitution

DISCUSSIONKRUTIKA BEHRAWALAkrutika.behrawala@mid-day.com

tHE year 2016 not only marks Dr BRAmbedkar’s 60th death anniversaryand 125th birth anniversary but alsoa centenary since he graduated fromthe Columbia University in NewYork (1913-1916). this Friday, to com-memorate the occasion, GodrejIndia Culture Lab has organised apanel discussion in collaborationwith the Columbia Global Centres,Mumbai. titled New York AndMumbai In the times Of Dr Ambed-kar, the discussion explores the ed-ucational and intellectual spaces,forms of cultural expression, labourmovements, and discourses of iden-tity and inequality that were part ofthe urban milieu in his time.

“the event will be a reflection of

his legacy and explore his ideas thatwere instrumental in making Indiaan equal and free country, ideas thathe wrote about so eloquently whenhe framed the country’s Constitu-tion, but we seem to have forgotten,”says Parmesh Shahani, head, GodrejIndia Culture Lab.

the panel comprises Farah Jas-

mine Griffin (Professor of Englishand Comparative Literature andAfrican American Studies at Colum-bia University), Robert Gooding-Williams (Professor of Philosophyand a faculty member of the Insti-tute for Research in African Ameri-can Studies at Columbia University)and Anupama Rao (Associate Profes-sor of History at Barnard College).

While Griffin will present her re-search on Jazz, gender, the Bluesand public life on the culture of theHarlem Renaissance in Manhattan,Rao and Williams will share theirwork on key transformations associ-ated with historical inequality andsocial justice in the US and India.

ON December 9, 5 pm AT Auditorium(first floor), Godrej ONE, Vikhroli (E).RSVP indiaculturelab@godrejinds.com

FREE

The panel discussion has beenorganised to mark a centenary of DrAmbedkar’s graduation from ColumbiaUniversity, New York

IF you’re tired of the news, try a doseof funny news. the Bugle is a nine-year-old show, originally hosted bycomedians Andy Zaltzman and JohnOliver. When Oliver quit in 2004 topresent Last Week tonight, itstopped airing. It recently returned,and this is their sixth edition, specialbecause in the history of the podcast,it’s the first time a woman co-hostedthe show. the woman is Zaltzman’ssister, Helen. they joke about livingin the same place, sharing a set ofparents and ‘sibbling-ing’ for threedecades.

the 45-minute podcast touchesupon a lot: speculation that tonyBlair is actually running the popularWeRateDogs account on twitter,sharks turning vegetarian and likingtofu, tony Blair being back in thepublic eye just like the tV showGilmore Girls (both of whom werelast popular in 2007), tayyip

Erdoğan’s turkey overtaking China inhaving the largest number of journal-ists in jail and a man who stayed in asense of bliss for two weeks by not al-lowing himself to find out about theelection results. We love Helen’s useof ‘regretforendum’ when discussingthe Brexit issues and the need for asecond referendum. there was a sec-tion where Andy speaks about BlackFriday, tracing its origins back to acarpenter named Joseph and his sonJesus who wanted to get rid of theirexcess furniture.

Joanna LoboLOG ON TO www.thebuglepodcast.com

Listen to the Indie soundEVENT

DIPANJAN SINHA dipanjan.sinha@mid-day.com

It is difficult for a musician to get aplatform for a debut performance,and when they get their firstgig, playing before an au-dience hardly lookingforward to new num-

bers is not easyeither. It is this

struggle ofyoung musi-cians that led

Vagabond, a city-based events venture,to organise Pen and PaperSessions whose inauguralgig will be performedthis Saturday.

Each session aimsto provide a platformto musicians whowrite their ownmusic and lyrics,and free entry to theaudience. ShanonFernandes, thefounder of Vagabond,says, “It is an attempt topromote original musicin the city. Performerswith great originalmusic often have toplay covers or al-ready popular musicon audience de-mand.” He says thatit was possible forthem to keep the entryfree as the musiciansagreed to perform pro

bono for the inaugural session whenthe concept of the event was ex-plained to them. “Qtube Café, thevenue, has also helped us keep theexpenditure to a minimum,” he adds.

Aarifah Rebello, an aspiringsinger-songwriter and drummer

from Mumbai, who will beperforming at the event

says, “this initiativewill be a great help increating awarenessabout the independ-ent music scene inthe city. Very fewpeople know that

there are so manysinger-songwriters in

Mumbai who are creatingoriginal work,” she says. Re-

bello will open her per-formance with a few

lines explaining herlyrics because peoplepay little attention tothe lyrics of a song.“If the organiserswant, we can also

have a discussion onthe kind of music we

play,” she says. the otherperformers are Ronit

Sarkar, who goes by thename Awkward Bong,

Ramya Pothuri andtanya Shah.

ON December 10, 6pmAT Qtube Café, SVRoad next to TataPower, Bandra (W).

CALL 26401645

Grab free entry to an Indie music gig thatcelebrates original writing and fresh talent

FREE

The week that was PODCAST OF THE WEEK

THE BUGLE

Ramya Pothuri

Ronak Sarkar

Tanya Shah

AarifahRebello