Dancing in the streets

With the Ballard Estate festival kicking off this weekend, the city is ready for its biggest street festival yet

Once a bustling centre of activity, Mumbai’s “business district” Ballard Estate has borne the appearance of a ghost town on the weekends for several years now. But from this weekend, this century-old precinct with its buildings in the Edwardian neoclassical style, large open spaces and an uncharacteristic absence of vehicles, will not just wake up, but even compete for the title of ‘Mumbai’s best recreational venue’. All because the Mumbai Port Trust (which owns the area) has opened up the precinct to the best of music, arts and weekend fun with the first edition of the Mumbai Ballard Estate Festival.

Planned as a four-month-long event in its first leg, the MBEF will be a continuous fixture in Mumbai’s cultural calendar for the next three years with breaks only during the monsoons. And with open air theatres with bean bags, musical concerts by the likes of Raghu Dixit Project, Band of Boys, Blackstrat Blues and more and even a play area with huge Jenga blocks, it is all set to give even established events a run for their money.

But calling it merely a festival would not do the effort justice, says Shubra Bhardwaj of Ferriswheel Entertainment, which is organising the MBEF. Describing what the MBEF actually is, Shubra, who is also the festival’s creative director says, “We are not the Kala Ghoda and neither are we the Flea Market or the Dome...”

“...We are a little bit of all of Mumbai’s choices for recreation put into one.” But even apart from being a potpourri of various recreational activities, it is different from conventional festivals in more than one way, adds Shubra. “The plan is to give the people of Mumbai everything while not taking away their time. We want to give Mumbai back its relaxed weekends and at the MBEF, nobody will have to feel ‘Oh, if I don’t catch this now, I’ll miss it’, because there’s always the next weekend,” she adds.

And it is not the city’s audiences alone who are excited for the MBEF, it is the musicians and performers too. As Sherrin Varghese, a member of Band of Boys who will give the opening performance at MBEF, points out, “Open spaces are something that South Mumbai’s music scene has been sorely lacking. All you have is the Dome (at NSCI, Worli), which is too big for smaller acts like ours. South Mumbai has a cultivated audience, but no space for niche events along the lines of Mahindra Blues Festival, which takes place in BKC. And this will be a perfect space for indie bands because here, unlike the big concerts at the Dome, you will actually be able to see the faces of the audience and interact with them.”

Adding to why the MBEF marks an important change in the city’s music and art scene, musician Raghu Dixit of the Raghu Dixit Project adds, “Our cities need to re-establish themselves as centres for art and culture and having this easily accessible to the citizens is a great step. I think this is a fantastic initiative and a most required one in our cities.”

The MBEF is a conscious step away from convention, adds Shubra. She enumerates the highlights of the fest: “The biggest highlight will be the availability of space. People can come, walk around and take part in whatever they find interesting. We have a Segway ride, a U-board tour and a huge kids area. Apart from this, there will also be an open mic area where anyone can come and perform. A very special addition is the open-air theatre, which will mark a first of sorts for Mumbai. It is a very different and beautiful setting with beanbags for seating and headphones for sound.” And as far as programming for the event goes, it is just as laidback as the festival. “There isn’t any long term fixed programming because we want to provide a venue and want the people of the city to make it into a festival. As of now we’ve pegged the entry at Rs 150, but the open-air theatre will be separately charged, for which we are working out the pricing. As to what we will be playing there, it will be much like the festival itself, with a mix of commercial and artsy. We want to focus on indie cinema and in fact we are inviting all filmmakers to approach us for screenings.”

As far as the music is concerned, Sherrin reveals what the opening performance will have in store: “The venue is a bit of a free-market so we’ve tailored our music to suit it. It will be a medley of underground and sub genres along with the ’90s chartbusters and commercial hits ranging from a tweaked version of We Will Rock You to the recent hit Lean On. So there’s enough for everyone.”

On his part Raghu Dixit, who will be playing in Mumbai after a long gap says about his band’s performance, “Firstly, we will be playing a public show in Mumbai after a long time, and secondly, we will be debuting some of our brand new songs that Mumbai has never heard before! That should make it a very special gig for us.”

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