Vijayalakshmy Subramaniam@NGS (Mini)on Sept 25th,2009
----------------------------------------------------------------
The occassion was pApanAsam Sivan yearly festival, and it appears year after year in NGS, the tribute of musicians to thamizh thyagayya is to an extent always enjoyable.All compositions were 'EllAm shiva mayyam(shivan as in pApanAsam shivan)'. The accompanists were BU ganeshprasad - violin , A S RanganAthan - mrudhangam , sreenivAsan??(not too sure of his name, I dont recollect seeing him before, there was a quick mention by ashok ramani when he thanked at the end) - kanjirA.
I have heard vijisubra in one full length concert (reviewed some time before) and a half one during last kutchery season. I joined from the second half of natabhairavi.
1. Shree vaLLi dEvasENApathE - natabhairavi
2. ksheera sAgara sAyi (RS,S) -poorvikalyAni
swaras for 4 minutes
3. shree shAradhA veena vAdana(R) - devagAndhAri
5 min alApanai and 4 mins return
4. karpaga maNohara (N,S)- malayAmArutham
neraval in "nAdhu Adi pANindhiya"for 4 mins and swaras for 5 mins
5. kaLpaga mAdhA kaNiNdharuL thA thA (R,S)- hindOlam
5 mins alAPanai and 4 mins violin
6. siNgAra veLavan vandAn - Anandhabhairavi
7A.saravana bhava guhaNE shanmughaNE(R S T) - madhyamAvati
alApanai for 9 mins,violin return for 5 mins and 11 minutes swaras
7B. tani for 10 mins
8. karpAgAmbikai Nee allavO - behAg
9. enna thavam - kApi
10. slokham "kalyAna gutha... shreenivAsAya"- madhyamAvati - ???
Pluses:
--------
1. This being a thematic concert , smt vijisubra has put a lot of effort in bringing a lot of rare krithis. I have heard few rare krithis like poorvikalyAni,devagAndhAri,Anandabhairavi and behAg. But to me I felt the hindOlam was just a top fantastic pick as a vaggeyakkara shivan is just extraordinary. I urge musicians to take this kalpaga MadhA in hindOlam- it gives a run for money with mA ramanan .
2. VijiSubra has a quite a melodious voice and it generally suits more melodious ragas like hindOlam and anandha bhairavi.Also when vijisubra talked and thanked rukmini ramani at the end, her voice appeared very melodious.
3. vijisubra's diction is impressive , almost most being thamizh and the devagAndhAri being sanskrit was all fairly clean.
4. The top pick of the four artists was the mridangist ranganathan, he really played well and lifted the concert,the strokes were clean and to me he was the star of the show .BU Ganeshprasad violin was just good
5. Both tukkadas the rare behAg and omnipotent kApi were delivered quite well with the right emotive dose.
Minuses:
-------
Having noticed few pluses I personally felt almost every number that she sang had shortcomings , some of them minor and few fairly major.
1. In thamizh we usually say Ettam and iRakkam (meaning voice reaching both up and down of octaves), to an extent VijiSubra was typically a middle order madhyama kAlam practitioner. Almost all songs were having the same tempo. Particularly poorvikalyANi, devagandhari ,hindolam and anandhabhairavi were fairly of the same tempo to an extent there was not much sustained interest. Intermediately between devagANdhAri and hindoLam even though there was a fast malayamArutham , I still felt the turns can be more quicker for even karpaga manohara. In short tempo was noticably sagging .
2. Swaras should be fairly more than what was exhibited also the neraval was just there and not there, she could have excelled far more in neraval and swaras in both time and manOdharma patterns.
3. Too much of sowkhyam emphasis, not comfortably peaking with higher pitch was something that I felt in almost all the songs , possibly madhyamAvati was one exception. In short I would prefer her to sing more open throated and cruise more in higher octaves than what she exhibited.She appeared to avoid in general higher sthayi, staying too long in her zone of comfort.
4.Every krithi can have more sustained voice strength , some of the numbers just during the second half ,there was just a noticeable loss of voice strength and also breathing cycles.
5. The kanjira artist had a very mediocre play.Mridangist appeared to save him more.
Overall the kalpaga mAdA in hindOlam was the biggest eye opener . Her repertoire is evidently high and well exhibited, but overall I would rate it as a good concert for 2 hours.
Vijayalakshmy Subramaniam@NGS (Mini)on Sept 25th,2009
-
balusatya
- Posts: 320
- Joined: 13 Dec 2007, 17:17
Karpaga matha -Hindolam,Karbambigai -Behag were rare kritis. I liked malayamarutham swara patterns. Ashok Ramani recollected an anecdote when Sanjay was singing this rare kriti he had asked for the composer"s name who told that it is his grandpa! VS has a lineage of his guru SKA.S.Rajam having learnt from PS directly. BTW I remember Rajam sir in course of his Lecdems.has covered PS composition " Sri Ramacharitham "-Kosalai pudalvanai panivom" covering24 ragas .I have also requested her to sing next time ,if possible . I also thought some of the performers for this occasion would cover PS kritis having" Atheetha eduppu"She presented a good combination of both known&rare,Sanskrit&Tamil kritis-Realising the fact that it is a thematic&PS exclusive concert one should not look too much into all the parameters of a regular cutchery format- about which all the senior artists are adepts(VS is no exception).Nevertheless I endorse the view that weighty vioce will further enhance the level of concert.
Last edited by balusatya on 27 Sep 2009, 06:42, edited 1 time in total.
-
arunk
- Posts: 3424
- Joined: 07 Feb 2010, 21:41
rajesh,
it is an eduppu before samam (e.g. on Adi starting on the 7th out of 8 count). IIRC, another example of PS krithi which has this is Sivakama sundari (mukhari) - here Si of Sivakama starts this way which leads to "ri" of sundari falling on the half way point of the talam i.e 5th out of 8)
Arun
it is an eduppu before samam (e.g. on Adi starting on the 7th out of 8 count). IIRC, another example of PS krithi which has this is Sivakama sundari (mukhari) - here Si of Sivakama starts this way which leads to "ri" of sundari falling on the half way point of the talam i.e 5th out of 8)
Arun