Bhargavi (Balasubramaniam) Ganesh - vocal
Srividya R S Iyer - violin
Thillaisthanam Suryanarayanan - mrdangam
Sunday Dec. 20th 2009, 10:00 AM, Nada Inbam, Raga Sudha Hall, Mylapore Chennai
1. Sarasuda - Saveri Varnam - Adi
2. Pranavakaram - Arabhi - Oottukkadu Venkata Kavi - Adi
3. Gnyana mosagarada - Poorvikalyani - Tyagaraja - Roopakam
4. Dharalo - SHahana - Chitravina Ravikiran - Khanda Ata
5. Mariveradikkevvaru - Latangi - Patnam Subramanya Iyer - Khanda Chapu
6. Raksha bettare - Bhairavi - Tyagaraja - Adi
7, Adi neepai - Yamunakalyani - Dharmapuri Subbarayar - Adi
8. Ramachandra Prabho - Sindhubhiravi - Svati Tirunal - Adi
9. Tillana - Nattaikkuranji - Mishra Chapu - CHitravina Ravikiran
I had to leave after the Raksha Bettare and I consulted others for the complete list.
For want of better words I can only say that this concert was executed flawlessly. Bhargavi sangs to her strenghts, not the least of which is modulating her voice to attain a very keen fidelity to shruti. To me, this, coupled with enough audience-audible volume for the tambura, goes a long way in establishing a sedate classical atmosphere to a concert.
Anyways, to this sedate atmosphere, Bhargavi added her flawless execution of the kritis whose pAdam was carefully and lovingly embellished and perfected by her guru-extraordinaire shri Chitravina Ravikiran as well as her manodharma in Alapana, neraval and swaraprasthara.
The kriti selection, in terms of diversity of ragas, tAlas, composers and genre can only be termed excellent.
The Arabhi kriti Pranavakaram by OVK is a refreshingly non-standard, yet deeply classical approach to the rAga. Normally, taking the example of several well-known kritis, compositions in this rAga are highly oriented towards "Pa-centric" sangatis like P,,,M,,GRS throughout the compositions. This particular OVK masterpiece presents a refreshingly "Sa-centric" facet of the RAga, starting at Sa and emphasizing the SND aspect of the rAga in many places.
Continuing with the non-standard theme the choice of Daralo in Shahana by her guru was a materstroke. There are several great compostions by Ravikiran but this one has the additional bonus that it is in Khanda Ata tAla (a tAla scheme usually relegated to sAhitya-sparse varnam settings), delivered in sanskritized Telugu.
If there's any composition in Latangi worth singing it is the PSI masterpiece.
The Bhairavi Alapana was developed beautifully and swarams were delivered at Raksha Bettare, a kriti which seems to be the flavor of this music season. For some reason Bhargavi did not sing any neraval...I believe it would have enhanced the katcheri if she had.
Violinist Srividya was competent in her alApanas and kalpanaswarams.
The mrdangam player Suryanarayanan gave good support, relishing the music, and made a good effort to keep the shruti-creep in check...thanks to the A/C it kept creeping up all the time.