Navaratri Special Feature @ Ranjani Fine Arts - 13th Oct

[arvind.brahmakal]

Ranjani Fine Arts presents the Navaratri Special Feature :

Date : 13th October, 2012
Venue : Sobha Lakeview Clubhouse, Off Sarjapur Outer Ring Road, Bellandur, Bangalore 560103

4 pm : Classical Music performance from children of "Natyasruti"
5 pm : Veena Trio : Vidwan D Balakrishna, Vidushi Manjula Surendra and Vidushi Vani Yadunandan
Mridangam : Vidwan K U Jayachandra Rao
Ghatam : Vidwan Dayanand Mohite

All are welcome !

Entry free for Members and donor passes available for others @ the venue

[Rsachi]

song list:
Sarasiruhasanapriye -Nata
Mamava sada janani - Kanada
Mamavatu sri saraswati -Hindola
Mamava meenakshi -Varali
Srichamundeshwari -Bilahari
Akhilandeshwari -Dwijavanti
Tatwameruga -Garudadhwani
Bhairavi Raga, Tana, Kriti -Tanayuni
Tani
Bhavayami gopalabalam -Yamunakalyani
Bhajare yadunatham -Pilu
Jinjhuti Tillana
Mangalam



Glad I attended a fine Veena Trio concert. The two ladies have been trained by Vid. D. Balakrishna and today combined well with him to present a sedate Mysore Bani concert. For me the highlights were a fine Dwijavanti and Varali. Vid. Balakrishna espouses a sedate, sweet, style reminiscent of his illustrious father late Doreswamy Iyengar.

The hall itself, the location etc. do not need much mention except that this Sabha seems to be doing a sincere job and will feature every second Saturday a concert. On Nov.10 will be Ramakrishnan Murthy. They served a sumptuous sweet prasadam.

I won't raise my pet peeve about the sound system but merely state that this aspect continues, like Bangalore Metro, to be a Works in Progress.

[srikant1987]

It was a beautiful concert.

There was a short break after Sri D Balakrishna played a "RSR" about sound check, but kAnaDa was already lingering in the air! Imho this is one of the greatest features of Indian Classical music -- Sri VS Narasimhan too has once pointed out that it demonstrates how evolved a system of music it is, that a tiny fragment of music can unambiguously identify a rAga.

Hindola by Smt Manjula showed her prowess with fast phrases, bilahari by Smt Vani was succinct and filled with rAga bhAva everywhere. The bilahari also included many brisk phrases -- goes without saying!

I especially enjoyed Sri D Balakrishna's bhairavi tAnam, varALi had some extremely moving parts.

It was also uplifting to watch the tempo build up, both in each piece, and over the concert. It was especially thrilling how Thyagaraja's composition tatvameruga was introduced with a bang!

Sri Doreswamy Iyengar's style has concise pAThas for songs, but sometimes playfully takes liberties during manOdharma, especially AlApanais.

Percussion support for all compositions and manOdharma was uplifting and never let the concert sag. The tani was enjoyable too. The faran played was also in tishragati, and added variety.

[Rsachi]

Thanks Srikant, fully agree with all your amplifications.
Balakrishna demonstrated what you describe as "playful liberties" apart from very classical imprint of gamakas.
Bilahari, a name that conjures up a mercurial Thumper-like marsupial for me, was classically showcased in the masterpiece of Vasudevachar.
Jayachandra Rao balanced active improvisation with sensitive embellishments, much appreciated by the vainikas themselves!

[gardabha_gana]

Thanks folks for the reviews. Veena is alive and kicking!

[srikant1987]

I also wanted to make a mention of the fact that there was NO nn,sd in the kAnaDa. It was very heartening to hear the -- yes, correctly-played -- nn,d in it! This and many other such pure piDis in the concert were no doubt owing to having one single (good) style and sticking to it.

'Composite materials' may have possess attractive properties, but they wreak a havoc in the environment, being difficult to reuse or recycle. Sorry for the poor analogy.

[kssr]

Nice new tri-veena concept. DB is definitely a very mature player now. Enjoyed his concert recently elsewhere. Missed this one.
BTW, whose painting is it at the background with an abstract Thyagaraja and Om? Her initials NH, by any chance?! Very impressive. Must be new, as it was not there when i visited the sabha a few months back.

[Rsachi]

kssr,
I have done some forensic processing of my photo. it shows in the painting a few musicians with instruments:
http://db.tt/GP4ZbJ2C

[arvind.brahmakal]

Your guess is right, KSSR...that it is new and the artiste. The Trinities ! You may take a closer look at the portrait on the home page of the website..www.ranjanifinearts.org

[arvind.brahmakal]

Link to :

1. videos of the concert : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9z1Tke-F ... e=youtu.be
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqg5X9yH ... e=youtu.be

2. videos of students of Natyasruti : http://youtu.be/9wY5nJvJqkI
http://youtu.be/zMpJa6is_lE

2. photos : https://plus.google.com/photos/10815268 ... banner=pwa

A soul stirring musical experience

The navarAtri festival season was ushered in in style at Ranjani Fine Arts with students of Natyasruti ( a school of classical music and dance ) presenting a very spirited rendition of dEvi kritis. The evening began on an auspicious note with the children presenting “sri varalakshmi” of Muttuswamy Deekshitar in sri rAga followed by another Deekshitar kriti “himagiri kumAri” in amruthavarshini rAga. The shankarAbharanam masterpiece of Shyama Shastri “sarOja dalanEtri” was rendered with sincerity which was followed by a brisk rendition of GNB's “saraswati namOstute” in saraswati rAga. TyagarAja’s “dArini telusukonti” in suddhasAveri rAga took the tempo a notch higher and the children concluded their recital with “bhagyada lakshmi bArama” in Madhyamavati. The quality of the music performance by students of Natyasruti spoke volumes of the dedication and commitment of their Guru Smt Sumitra Nitin, the founder of Natyasruti. The children's enthusiasm and spirit leading to a passionate rendition of the dEvi kritis indeed invoked the blessings of dEvi and charged the atmosphere with a festive mood.

The tone had been set, the mood had been created and the musical treat further extended to some very deep and chaste music presented by exponents of Mysore veena bAni. Vidwan D.Balakrishna, son and disciple of Mysore Doreswamy Iyengar along with his students Vidushi Manjula Surendra and Vidushi Vani Yadunandan supported by Vidwan Jayachandra Rao on the mridangam and Vidwan Dayanda Mohite on the ghatam enthralled the audience with their music.
The concert began with the commanding tones of Puliyur Doraiswami Iyer’s “sarasiruhanana” in nata rAga. What followed was sheer brilliance - a graceful AlApana of kAnada rAga by Sri Balakrishna followed by “mAmava sada janani” with some classy swara patterns. Smt Manjula Surendra played a melodious sketch of hindOla rAga and all the artistes came together to present the Mysore Vasudevacharya kriti “mAmavatu sri saraswati”. The rAga varAli was handled with a lot of finesse by Sri Balakrishna and stirred deep chords in the listeners. Muthuswamy Deekshitar's “mAmava meenakshi” was concluded with flowing kalpana swarAs where the veena and percussion artistes excelled in a very interesting kuraipu in Misra chapu tAla. The brisk AlApana of bilahari rAga by Vidushi Vani Yadunandan and the rendition of “sri chAmundEshwari” indeed altered the pace of the concert. A very lilting presentation of rAga dwijAvanti by Sri Balakrishna was followed by Muttuswamy Deekshitar's popular composition “akhilAndeshwari”. Sri Balakrishna further enriched the listening experience by playing some very creative kalpana swaras in this rAga. The fast paced TyagAraja kriti “tatva merugatarama” in garudadhwani rAga was played before the artistes embarked upon the majestic and graceful rAga bhairavi for elaboration. The graceful alapana and rhythmic tAna were followed by TyagarAja’s song “tanayuni brOva” in which some exquisite swaraprastAras were played. The percussionists Sri Jayachandra Rao on the mridangam and Sri Dayand Mohite on the ghatam who had been embellishing the music with their percussion support came to the fore in the tani Avartanam which was indeed a feast of rhythm for the rasikAs.

“bhavayami gOpalabAlam” in yamuna kalyani, “bhajare yadunadam” in pilu and a tillana in chenchurutti were soothing to the listeners. The pristine tone of the veena and the moving music lingers on in the hearts of the rasikas...

[vasanthakokilam]

Excellent reports everyone. Enjoyed reading them and watching the video. Thanks very much.

Rsachi, nice picture too. Looks like a panoramic shot given the wide coverage of the stage you got.

While watching the video of these three excellent veena artists, I thought about a particular conformance and correspondence in veena playing.
That conformance is between the movement of the hands and the music, whether it is ascent or descent, oscillation of a note
for the various gamakas or the pull to a different swara from the same place or whatever. It is all out there for everyone to see clearly
even from a distance. It is quite transparent, demonstrative and open, and quite satisfactory.

It is almost like abhinaya for the swaras and melody, if I may.

Then I thought may be therein lies a tool and technique for improving one area where I am embarrassingly poor at, namely the ability to
play a melody on the flute without thinking about swaras and thinking/feeling only the overall melody and song line.
I know several fellow forumites can do that in a cinch but I can not.
I am going to try to use this veena artists' conformance/correspondence thing as a guide to help me with that
and to push the swaras to the background. This is my own version of the method Ekalaiva employed.

I am sure I am not thinking about the complexities involved, like whether I can tell if they are playing on different strings that are tuned differently etc. That may mess up the simple linear correspondence idea I have in mind. I will make a humble beginning and go through
a calibration ( of hand movement to melody ) phase first! Let me see how far I get, hoping what happened to Ekalaiva does not happen to me!!!

[Rsachi]

Vasanthakokilam,
In other words you want to emote the melody much like a cuckoo in spring! Godspeed and all success.
I remember what Vid. Emani told me way back in '70's. He was directing the AIR orchestra consisting of North Indian and South Indian musicians. He said that the North Indians thought of the melody and reproduced the melody, and seldom could think in terms of the swaras, unlike Southies who could enunciate the swaras at the drop of a hat.

In a lateral context, the experiment of B-M of singing sahityam and swaras simultaneously is also a similarly taxing exercise to my mind.

Again, my best wishes to you sir.

PS: The HTC One V has an excellent wide angle camera. f2.0, 28m lens. I cropped it to 2592x1015 pix & corrected with Photo Editor app. Try viewing it on this link