Further to my post on Chari's piece, I just remembered the name of the band
that sons of Chris Perry worked with -- Boney M. I must add that both Chris and
Braz played together, perhaps for the first time, at the gala opening ceremony
of the First International Goan Convention in Toronto in 1988.They
rocked the Roy Thompson Hall with their music. It was indeed a pleasure to
match these two maestros on stage, each one in their own inimitable style.
It was a good idea that a cassette of their music was later produced. The
cassette titled, The Legends, features fine songs, Goa, sung by Jean Samion, an
Anglo-Indian, Beautiful Goa and Ola Goa, both sung by Yvonne Gonsalves, wife of
Braz. As for the solo on their respective instruments, Early Morning by Chris
on trumpet, and I Love Jesus and Mary by Braz on Soprano Sax are heart-soothing
pieces. I especially like Braz's piece which I play to destress myself.
I attended their practice sessions before they went on stage. Had long talks on
what shaped their music. However, most of it I have forgotten. One must
appreciate Chris's ability to train non-Konkani speakers such as Jean Samion
and, earlier, Mofd Rafi, India's greatest playback singer, to sing in our
language. Chris would later mention to me that it took him hours and hours to
get Mohd Rafi to get his pronounciations right.
Similarly, he got Lorna to get her Konkani right and also trained her in voice
modulation. Lorna rarely spoke Konkani and still today her conversational
Konkani is not up to mark. That's the mark of success that Chris brought to his
music and art. I have The Legends in MP3 format and would be glad to forward it
to anyone wanting it. Unfortunately,
I do not have a YouTube account where I could uploaded it.
Eugene
