Women in percussion

makham · Post by **makham** » 27 Aug 2009, 10:51

Anticipatory bail: If this issue had been discussed earlier kindly point the link; I could not see anything from "search"

What could be the reasons that we do not see women playing mridangam, kanjira, ghatam in concert platforms? apart from a Sukanya playing ghatam I have not seen any other instance.

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 27 Aug 2009, 11:42

Rajna Swaminathan is an up and coming mridangam player. Here is a thread on her: http://rasikas.org/forums/viewtopic.php? ... d-usa.html

If you have real player, you can watch her play for Geetha raja here: [url]rtsp://rxn-rbn-sea09.rbn.com/farm/*/kennedy/kennedyg2/g2demand/11062006_1800_MSN.rm[/url]

smala · Post by **smala** » 27 Aug 2009, 12:24

vasanthakokilam wrote:Rajna Swaminathan is an up and coming mridangam player. Here is a thread on her: http://rasikas.org/forums/viewtopic.php? ... d-usa.html

If you have real player, you can watch her play for Geetha raja here: [url]rtsp://rxn-rbn-sea09.rbn.com/farm/*/kennedy/kennedyg2/g2demand/11062006_1800_MSN.rm[/url]

Rajna is on several videos on youtube - here's an excellent one --http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZV4HagDePA

mridhangam · Post by **mridhangam** » 27 Aug 2009, 12:37

Sir you are going from the junior most i think. When we thnk of women percussion artistes the list is heavy. First and foremost coming into my mind is Pudukkottai Ranganayaki Ammal of the Manpoondia Pillai tradition. then Sumathi Dandamodi Rammohan Rao, then comes Padma-sister of Tanjore Subramaniam, then Jayanti - i forgot really her name (disciple of Umayalpuram Sivaraman), then janaki Achutan, my own disciple Charu Hariharan and of course Sukhanya Prabhakar, Lata Ramachar in the field of Ghatam and Khanjira respectively. more later ..

Mannarkoil J Balaji

dml · Post by **dml** » 27 Aug 2009, 13:00

Smt.Rajani Venkatesh plays mridangam and had seen her on two occassions ( one with Dr.Balamuralikrishna for Vijay TV in 2007 season) and 2 days back on TTD channel with Sukanya Ramgopal troupe.

Any info on her lineage?

braindrain · Post by **braindrain** » 27 Aug 2009, 13:39

mridhangam wrote:Sukhanya Prabhakar, Lata Ramachar in the field of Ghatam and Khanjira respectively. more later ..

I'm sure you meant Sukanya Ramgopal. Sukanya Prabhakar is a vocalist.

laks1972 · Post by **laks1972** » 27 Aug 2009, 16:49

Still the original question has not been answered. The percentage of women in percussion is very small.

The reason could be that, percussion instrument is energy and power demanding as compared to , say, violin or veena. Also practice of percussion instruments lead to the whole of palm and fingers becoming thick skinned over a period of time. The fingers will no longer be "ladies finger". My hypothesis

rshankar · Post by **rshankar** » 27 Aug 2009, 17:44

Sri Balaji - one of the first women mrudangam players to be mentioned in the MMA archives of concerts is Smt. Hamsa Damayanti who was a very versatile artist....(Rajana's mother unearthed that fact, IIRC). And yes, we start with Rajana, the youngest, because, after Rohan Krishnamurthy, Rajana is the next 'home-grown' artist (mrudangam player) for many of us! And just like Amy [Chow] (concert pianist, gold-medal-winning olympic gymnast, pediatric intensivist) was/is an inspiration to the Chinese-American community, the Rohans, Rajanas, and the Aishwaryas (along with the Mythilis, Kritikas, Rasikas, and Shwethas) are to ours I guess!

srikant1987 · Post by **srikant1987** » 27 Aug 2009, 19:43

How come I'm not allowed to edit my posts?

laks1972 · Post by **laks1972** » 27 Aug 2009, 19:50

nick H wrote:I suspect that mridangam is no more punishing on the hands and fingers than veena. Any instrument that requires the string to be pulled needs some thick skin developed if it is not to cut. I hope someone with experience of both can confirm this?

True, veena creates deep marks in the fingers. But you dont get tired playing veena, you dont sweat etc, which can happen with mrudangam

srikant1987 · Post by **srikant1987** » 27 Aug 2009, 20:13

You can get tired playing the veena!

A veena can't break your bones, though; a ghatam probably can.

arasi · Post by **arasi** » 27 Aug 2009, 20:15

Mrudangists: Kanakambujam from the old days.
Among the young today, Jayamangala Krishnamani who is also a vocalist. Trained as a bharatha nATyam dancer too.

rshankar · Post by **rshankar** » 27 Aug 2009, 20:15

laks1972 wrote:But you dont get tired playing veena, you dont sweat etc, which can happen with mrudangam

And real women should not sweat, or get tired, right? Arasi - I see more fuel for avaL avan and adu in these threads than anywhere else!

arasi · Post by **arasi** » 27 Aug 2009, 21:08

Ravi,
adutAn nammaik kAkka vENDum--
avaLgaLum avangaLum en SEivar

The climate was such the past few days, but today is a beautiful day, no humidity but sunshine and a breeze too! There is always hope that things will pass

mridhangam · Post by **mridhangam** » 27 Aug 2009, 22:08

She is Jayamangala Krishnamurthy Arasi ji ..wonder where she is these days ...

J.B

rbharath · Post by **rbharath** » 27 Aug 2009, 23:18

i remember seeing some lady names in mridangists column amongst the academy list archives.. especially in the older lists...

cant recollect the names now though..

rbharath · Post by **rbharath** » 27 Aug 2009, 23:34

i have also been told that some of the women vocalists/violinsts are trained in mridangam too.. and can play decently well..

i can immediately recollect the names of Smt. Rama Ravi and Smt. Seetha Rajan, whom i have been told are very well trained in mridangam.

arasi · Post by **arasi** » 28 Aug 2009, 04:06

Balaji,
She was Jayamangala Krishnamurthy before she married. She was in the US, Banaglore too. I heard her sing and play the mrudangam during the season a few years ago. I don' know if she is in Chennai now.

srinivasrgvn · Post by **srinivasrgvn** » 28 Aug 2009, 08:43

makham · Post by **makham** » 28 Aug 2009, 12:29

Thanks all for participating in the discussion. I did not say that there are no women trained in percussion instruments. As rbharat has mentioned I also know that Seetha Rajan got trained in mridangam, but the objective was to get a better handle on laya and in turn reinforce the vocal competency. But we don't see women percussion players in greater numbers on the concert platforms. From some of the other responses I gather that the trend is declining. Even if I buy the argument that playing mridangam or ghatam is tiring and leads to hardening of hands, does it apply for kanjira? Handling and transportation of kanjira must be relatively more comfortable than handling and transporting ghatam or mridangam.

Anusha · Post by **Anusha** » 28 Aug 2009, 14:58

Bhagyalakshmi Krishna - Morsing

arasi · Post by **arasi** » 28 Aug 2009, 20:30

And she is very good too!
Thanks, Anusha. Good to hear from you

shriroop · Post by **shriroop** » 07 Sep 2009, 17:09

Women in percussion

Sukanya Ramgopal - Ghatam
Lata Ramachar- Khanjira
Bhagyalakshmi Krishna- Morsing
Rajani Venkatesh- Mrudangam
Vasavi Taranath-Ghatam

Regularly Perform at Bangalore

Shriroop

GautamTejasGaneshan · Post by **GautamTejasGaneshan** » 07 Feb 2016, 22:26

I'll just leave this here:

https://vimeo.com/99302517

Live @ ODC Theater [6.8.14] - San Francisco, CA

Gautam Tejas Ganeshan - song
Lavanya Kothandaraman - violin
Rajna Swaminathan - mridangam
Christina Boyd - tambura

Women in percussion

Re: Women in percussion