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I just thought I could truthfully write about SuryaprakAsh after reading vishnu's post(http://rasikas.org/forums/viewtopic.php?id=4017) .I would like to organize my thoughts chronologically, more centered on what I have experienced in the last 6 years.
SuryaprakAsh is now aged close to 40 years ,that means he is just reaching his noon of his career. His music started at the age of 12 more guided by his athimbEr ,thirukOdikAval ??? who was one of the disciples of semmangudi.Strangely even though academically proficient, he got totally absorbed in CM and decided to forego a seat in BITS, pilAni and land in MCC college for a Bsc Chemistry.
All the years in MCC gave him an oppurtunity to participate and he has finished in the top rank in all the competitions , where some of today's contemporary musicians finished behind him. He started to get a feel of ganakalAdhara Madurai Mani Iyer , and his perspective of CM just took a bigger picture. He decided to be a sishya of Shri TV sankaranArayanan, interestingly when Shri TVS was little apprehensive to take a sishya because of his frequent tours, SuryaprakAsh sang a very elaborate RNS of the popular bhairavi krithi koluvaiunnaDE of thyarajAr. Shri TVS was just amazed and took him as his sishya immediately.
In 1989 he decided to enter concert platform on his own also apart from giving vocal support to his Guru shri TVS.From 1999 he is giving concerts on his own. Well certainly I had not seen or heard him at all till 2002 . Infact what all I have documented above , I have only heard thru him in our rasikas.org concert (thanks to
karni ) when I had a chance to talk with him.The year 2002 was my first encounter with suryaprakAsh.It was in Krishna ghAna sabha, where I decided to hear a prime evening concert where suryaprakash was singing in the previous slOt. I was just noticing him where he was singing a tillAna in hamsAnandi .The tillAna was wonderful and he did not announce the composer. ONly after many years I knew it was his own. Still did not care enough to hear him again. Those years 2002 and 2003 , I did not have enough maturity to hear different artists , but I was more interested in going to concerts which The Hindu recommends and almost zeroed on the top 5 artists who had the marketing might.
Sometime in 2003-2004 things changed a lot for me.After beginning to post reviews in sangeetham , to a great extent I started appreciating independently and I did remove lot of fixations and prejudices . Once I heard an outstanding sarasa sAma dhAna in kApi nArayAni by SuryaprakAsh with a rAga alApanai of KApinArayAni(heard kApinArAyani alApanai for the first time in my life then).He brought in some outstanding manOdharma swara patterns. After few months gap I went for another concert in which he sang an out of the world devi neeyE thunai in keeravAni and he sang one of my favourite MMI krithi vijayAmbike vimalAmbike in vijayanagari. 2004 Academy was a watershed year for me, I heard him sing a beautiful intha sowkya in kApi with some fantastic swara prasthAram with very good support by our mannArkOil balAji.
Year 2005 experience was more perfect to hear Suryaprakash's natural open throated singing. My first experience of listening to pantuvarAli was SG kittappa's immortal kOdaiyiLe viruththam. Quite amazed with his voice felicity and range. Few months later he sang one beautiful neraval of tAye yashOdA in tOdi in 2005. Just lifting those lines which got buried in sangeetham.com.
<Someting unique and specical about the Neraval in the main krithi>
Little detour and a certain frame of reference from how we all hear a traditional neraval line in a main krithi will help. Atleast to most of us , taking a neraval line in a main krithi and in a pallavi line of RTP are equivalent.(Would like to hear if there is any difference ???). I know of atleast one illustrious Madurai mani who sings the Intha Sowkhya in kaapi as a main krithi ,where he always refreshes his memory by sequencing the swara-rAgamaliga and then ends up with the nearaval line in that raagam.Of course the line at the end of the swaram will just highlight the raagam that he handled before !!!
Suryaprakash took the long line "kAlinil shilambu konjak-kaivaLai kulunga muttu mAlaigaL asaiyat-teru vAsalil vandaan" for full close to 4 or 5 minutes in Todi(sounded a very good TOdi, but nothing unique and special).Then to my surprise he just <u>carried out the same Neraval linesin quick succession without losing the sarvalaghu style to Behaag , Kaapi and Malayaamarutham(each again for atleast 2 to 3 minutes)</u> . In each of the neraval lines, he took 2 words as a pivot . What I mean as a pivot if you listen to any one singing this popular neraval line (mmi is my frame of reference) one generally stays longer and brings the Todi rasam in just 2 words Kalanil Silambu !Here Suryaprakash took Malaigalai Asaiya as a pivot in Malayaamarutham . I cannot recollect what he did for the middle two as during this two it did not strike me . In short,he sang the neraval lines in all 4 ragams for full length and also as a pivot, without refreshing the memory with swarams. I am not sure if any one else has done that (Opening up as question, most of you know more???). This is an outstanding manodharmam to me .
After that he took the 4 ragams for a short swara pattern , 1/2 short swara pattern and finished with a long swarams in todi .
</Someting unique and specical about the Neraval in the main krithi>
SuryaprakAsh unfortunately (as vishnurAmprasad mentions )generally gets treated as a non prime artist . But even when he sings a 2 hour concert and yet he gives a performance of 2 and half hours + .In the last few year I had an occassion to hear few memorable 2 hour minus concerts. In NCA , a simply outstanding neraval "intha varam tharuvAy" and swaras in dazzling speed of Sivan's ambA manam kanindhu in pantuvarALi followed with a super on spot manOdharmam where he sang swara prasthAnam in "intha sowkhya" kApi with a doze of great creativity where he sang a short swara prastharAm than sang "swara",then sang a brief alApanai and then added "rAga" and then added a sprinkle of kanakku swaram and added "laya", connecting the neraval line swara rAga laya.
Another occassion in TTD temple where he sang a back to back mA jAnaki in KAmbOdhi followed with sukhi evarO was aesthetically perfect.His 1 hour and ten minutes of chakkani rAja last year at alwarpet Astika samajam was superb , not heard such a great neraval and such a long swara patterns in kharaharapriya. His RTP in simm madhyamam and mOhanarama in rasikas concert was also great.
One incident just wanted to share which is kind of quite unique , perhaps more indicative of how Carnatic Musicians perform in circumstances where it even becomes difficult for a layman rasikA to even concentrate. I did not write this anecdote then for that concert as I was confused then to write or not. In a concert in Sastri hall last year SuryaprakAsh was accompanied by vellOre ramabadhran and VV Ravi. There was a beautiful shreevaralakshmi in shree which just got over , it was SuryaprakAsh's turn to sing one high speed krithi before jumping to main.He took ManavyaaLagincaraa(S) in naLinakAnti , a dazzling sarvalaghu electric downpour of swaras just begun. A middle aged women who was one row in front of me who was always swaying her head and engrossed suddenly got into epilepsy with she screaming loud just before she getting that unfortunate fit .We all did not know how to handle and the whole concert was suddenly stopped for a minute . A typical indian mentality was prevailing no one knew what to do next inclusive of me? Suddenly with more froth coming from that lady's mouth, 2 of us just lifted her chair and took her down, just as the tension was clearing vellore ramabadran started stroking in his sarvalaghu style , from there suryaprakAsh exactly took the swara patterns and sang for another 5 minutes to give a well rounded swarakalpana of naLinakAnti. I always see his swara kalpana manOdharmam is top notch.
Of late there are also few Somu style renderings that he has given like madurai arasAlum and few swara patterns . There is one memorable darbAri kAnaDA swara he rendered a year before a long one for 5 minutes or so ,where Shri UKS weaved his magic skills where he played mridangam more like tabla. A rendition of brindAvana SArangA last year at MFAC is still fresh where his swara patterns where more like thumri, very very imaginative.
Also he has composed few no's , I have heard his long rAgamAliga devargAl arul seidha which is well received. His swarakshara of bhavapriya which he performed in our rasikas concert ,thillanas in hamsAnandi and vasantA. A very complete musician . Like any musician he also has few weakness .
1. He should add more base to his voice , it is getting more and more better but still adding more base will be wonderful.
2. At times he has to understand and play within the limits of what the accompanist can take. His speed and manOdharmam just does not at match well with the accompanist(especially mridangists are slipping ).
On a flipside , he is certainly most underrated musician who unfortunately has not got a senior artist status. I guess there are just 2 reasons,One he has no contacts and no push from anywhere, the other is CM is always groupism oriented art and he has been sidelined a lot by few or all (just leave it at that).These adversities have to be taken positively by suryaprakAsh and perhaps with gods grace he has to push more to do more asura
sAdhakam 
to understand the magnificence of CM and deliver more great music .I am sure SuryaprakAsh is going to be one musician who will be most talked in centuries to come as he came up by only musical merit.
:)
,so much of madurai somu like pidis everywhere in the tukkadas ,high energy concert ending with your kalyAna vasantham).
, load shedding for cm concerts :