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Accompanied by embAr kannan - violin, the professor whom we lost due to brain drain
- mrudangam and ghatam v suresh.1A. slOkham??? - bEgaDa -???
1B. kaDaikaNN vaithennai(N) - bEgaDa - ramaswamy sivan
Neraval in "taNjamam enDrOr ... sarvabhAgyamum uNdAki??"
2. shree parvati parmEshwara(S) - bowli - MD
3. rAmabhi ramA maNasu (R,S)- dhanyAsi - T
4. shree kamAkshi mAm pahi(R) - sArangA - annaswami sAstri
5. sAmaja varadA nIku - sudda sAveri - poochi
6. Sri TulasammA mAyinta- Devagandhari - T
7A.sharana nAtaka vatsala rAmA (R N S T) - kharaharapriyA - HMB
rAga alApanai for 14 minutes
10 minutes violin return
9 minutes of neraval in "sharAdhi baNdana daya ThogEsina???"
6 minutes of swaras
7B. tani for 24 minutes
.... had to leave at 08:48 pm time after listening from the start at 06:45pm
The start of vijayashiva in a slOkham (wish he repeats the slokham lines at least twice) was too brief and he went into one of the heavy rAga that he always excels . It was a rare krithi in begadA with a lovely neraval. The top pick in this concert was the subsequent bowli, simply brilliant and outstanding rendition with a very very aesthetic bowli swara patterns.
I have a big crib in dhanyAsi .For one of the finest present day musician who knows how to sequence rAgas with clear contrast , taking bowli and dhanyAsi is certainly not a best choice. Putting that sequence point aside ,I rate him as the best dhanyAsi singer particularly as a submain , usually it hovers between excellent and outstanding . Today he was just very good certainly there was that dhanyAsi musical tranquility that was missing , which usually he gives .
A back to back dhanyAsi and sArangA got the contrast back in track and was handled quite differently and I felt he did not lose the tempo. The sudda sAveri was something I thought as the pre main filler , but that number was bit drowned a bit by slight heavy percussion support. The devagAndhAri was very good , but certainly for the last few numbers since sArangA I did not get vijayashiva's excellence (he is my top 2 favourite, i have a lot of expectation)
Out Popped from his blocks one of the finest expressive kharaharapriyA , he had lot of maNodharmam and he went non stop and was excellent to outstanding there in the alApanai .The krithi rendition was a rare one had a harikesa mudra and I am hearing this number for the first time .The neraval was continuing with the same excellance as rAga alApanai . Swara patterns were slow moving and brilliant for about 4 minutes , but he just lost a bit of breadth there and did not climb the last 22 steps of this majestic melakartha and the swaras just did not happen to be as detailed as main. Overall still an excellent main.
The violinist embAr kannan was very good to excellent , his play had lovely nAdham , his proportion of 10 minutes to 14 minute main alApana of Vijayashiva though may appear little longish by looking at just the numerical number, but certainly with the charge that the vijayashiva sang , he was perfect there. I am hearing embAr kannan - vijayashiva for the first time and would wish to hear more of this combo.
The Professor from Trichy Shri sankaran whom we lost due to brain drain was strokeful and his tani was excellent to outstanding . There was one weakness in his play at times vijaya shiva has his voice thinning a lot(intrinsic weakness) , and during that time shri sankAran was disproportionately banging , I felt that in devagAndhAri and at few places in the main that was bit evident, I am discounting the premain fast suddasAveri where it is a 200 year old tradition for every mridangist to play little hard.
ghatam suresh was outstanding throughout , he gave superb returns during tani with a lot of knotty variations , particularly need to appreciate that as usually the upapakkavadhyam artist will give up and start hero worshipping the mridanga legendary superstars.I had to leave at the end of tani as my home is very far though the sabha is bit close to my work (hard choice prefer to lose tukkadAs near my work place ,than to lose the first few numbers in a sabha near my home).
Would be nice if Shri narasimhan (a great speaker) decides to forego few speeches in his sabha . He began something like "antha kAluthla canteen la vadaya vazhla pottundu palakkad mani iyer tani ya ketka varuvA" (those days for palakkad mani iyer mridangam tani, rasikas will quickly grab the vada from canteen and stuff in their mouth to hear.)
I just hope vijayashiva sang few more numbers despite the speech as he must have had a bit of more lung space and voice rest(some one else can fill the tukkadas). Overall a very good to excellent concert with the best accompanists.
]. He sang the bEgaDA krithi very beautifully as a filler between karuNAnidhi ilalO and rAma kathA sudha. Must have been a treat to hear it elaborated.