Shreya Devnath@skgs on Sept 27th,2013
-----------------------------------------------
Violin : Shreya Devnath (disciple of shri LGJ)
Mrudangam : Madipakkam suresh
kanjirA : Alathur rAjaganesh
Concert duration/Day : 2 hrs and 05 minutes /Friday
Concert Type : Nirvana (no concert to follow)
Hall : kAmakoti hall / mini hall of skgs
Shreya devnath is perhaps one of the youngest disciples of maestro Mahavidwan shri Lalgudi Jayaraman . She is also the daughter of Lakshmi devnath who has written few notable biographies and come up with Pictures of Melody - kind of amarchitrakatha like visual + text comics on few of the greatest of great musicians of 20th century .
This is my first experience of hearing shreya in a live concert , neither heard her thru youtube or any recordings . My only expectation was centered around the facat that she is the disciple of maestro LGJ and with that she will bring a touch of intense musical aesthetics
1. Late may be misssed the varnam
2. bhAgAyyanayya(R,S) - chandrajyothi -T
swaras for 4 mins
3. alAPana in kalyAni , vasantha and kalyanavasantham for 6 mins
nAdalOludai - kalyAnavasantham - T
4. sangeetha sAmrAjya (raagA sketch)- mOhanakalyAni - Bangalore rAmamurthi rao
5A. pakkala nilapadi(R N S T)- kharaharapriyA -T
17 mins alapana in kharaharapriya
neraval for 3 mins and swaras for 8 mins
5B. tani for 13 mins
Went late and possibly missed the first , I am assuming it would have been some varnam of LGJ.As i settled it was chandrajyothi , a lovely rAgA that has an oomph effect , she was in the second half of the rAgA alApanA of moonlight(chandrjyothi). The first impressions always has a deep impressions on every rasikA ,the one thing i noticed even before I got seated was she has a special liking towards longish bowing for slower sangathis. Incidentally there were many moments of her enjoying the longish bowing kind of vilambit but definitely the Lalgudi bAni was in full signal mode.
The next alApana for nAdalOludai was not beginning with kalyAnavasantham , but she started with alapana of kalyani and vasantha and then phrases of both and then she sailed towards kalyAnavasantham alApana. She clarified clearly while speaking that there is no aesthetic overlap of kalyAni , vasantha and then kalyAnavasantham and said she felt like just playing these 3 ragas as the names appear in that form . I raised bit of eyebrow within myself when she presented the 3 raga alapanas thinking it was perhaps a style of TMK that caught her , but when she clarified it appeared ok . All said as she began to caress with nAdalOludai , T's bhakthi of RamA indeed got inducted with 4 generations of Lalgudi and found a place in shreya's bowing . It was really superb.
The next krithi in mOHanakalyANi was bit brief and I liked it . If i remember there are 2 rounds of cittaswaras too and I liked that too. I have personally not heard mohanakalyani version of sangeetha sAmrAjya from either LGJ or his son/daughter , very likely whenever they play mohanakalyani they usually play Lalgudi goPala iyer krithi of tamaddam tAgadayyA , so it was a welcome change to hear another krithi in mohanakalyani.
The main was a very grand one , the rAga chosen was Sadguru T's rAgA -kharaharapriyA . I did not notice any dhurita kAla sangathis in neraval or swaras, but again with her few characteristics longish bowing and staying with few mandara - madhyamA sthayis of kharaharapriyA (especially in alap)was really good . THe krithi pakala nilapadi was brisk , the neraval was bit fleeting and the swaras had a spread maintaining somewhat the intensity of LGJ bAni.
Shreya Devnath@skgs on Sept 27th,2013
-
rajeshnat
- Posts: 10121
- Joined: 03 Feb 2010, 08:04
Shreya Devnath@skgs on Sept 27th,2013
Last edited by rajeshnat on 28 Sep 2013, 23:23, edited 1 time in total.
-
rajeshnat
- Posts: 10121
- Joined: 03 Feb 2010, 08:04
Re: Shreya Devnath@skgs on Sept 27th,2013
6. RTP in lathAngi
10 mins alapana
Taanam for 5 mins
pallavi line was "vEnnai thinna chinna thanamA harE krishnA"
pallavi for 5 mins
swara ragamAlia in lAthAngi+ shree rAgam + garudadhwani??? + malayamArutham ??? + behAg
talam in khanda jampa
7. bArO krishnayyA - rAgamAliga - kanakadAsA
8. thillAnA - pahAdi - LGJ
With a very early main and tani , I do knew she was heading for a rtp. IIRC I have personally not heard a lathANgi rtp ever in a live concert . lathAngi is a tricky rAgA to give a fairly even spread of attention in me (it is one of those chow chows of your lunch , you just cant like it all times). Having said that lathAngi to me is a kind of mixture of equal dose of kalyAni in melancholy and a kind of different assertive type of rasa like a vAchaspathi. I found Shreya in her alapana bit circled too much in the melancholy muse of lathangi . Perhaps with she not giving any fast fillers before rtp or rather there was not even one fast number it must have made me feel that way. The alapana was very good .The tAnam was kind of hit and miss effort , I was not sure if she was consistenly playing tAnam throughout , there was a bit of overdose of alapana in tAnam - may be little more cut bowing would have been better for tAnam.
In pallavi and swararAgamAliga she came out with a right aesthetics and was near lalgudi jayaraman typecast . The pallavi was in khanda jampa thalam and she had a nice laya poruttam , kind of rAga bhavam was really cut well with layam and a very nice trikalam. The leap of ragamaliga ragams was very nice.I remember few years back when Lalgudi siblings played ragamAliga swaras in bharath kalachar and I certainly felt the same level of aesthetics was there in swara ragamalika by shreya .The transtion into shree and may be garudhadhwani ?? and malayamArutham??? was lovely. In particular after behag wrap her virtuosity in traversing back and land back in lathangi was really very lalgudish and was well done.
Tukkadas were bit too short(that too considering the concert was just in 2 hours + , she could have gone with few more). The bAro krishnayya was nice . I was whispering within myself for a brindavani or revati or madhuvanthi (a truly incurable romantic rAgA) but she decided to go with the hills and took refuge with the pahadi thillAnA of LGJ.
If there are few things that she can work they are these all in ascending priority
1. She announces ragas and krithis for all krithis like nadaloludai which every one knows,but she does not announce the sangeetha samrAjya . May be she did not know the composer of sangeetha samrajya. For few months i knew the krithi but never knew the composer . Also she can announce the ragamAliga ragas too at the end of it .I found the same thing with Lalgudi siblings where they announced the trivia and left the tough ones for the rasikas to figure out . Of course this is just a minor trivial point not affecting the aesthetics of the concert.
2. A fast krithi would have made me little more attentive . Taking chandrajyothi,kalyanavasantham ,mohanakalyAni and then a longish kharaharapriya alApana was bit of a challenge as she played all more in slower shades of raga swaroopam.
3. One thing that Shri LGJ does when he plays alApana was he abstracts the raga essence from the krithi and I find it very very difficult to guess the krithi that is coming after alapana . But when shreya played kharaharapriya with few phrases that resembled few sangathis of pakala nilapadi, it was not that aesthetic as her illustrious guru . Perhaps this is something I hope she will only get it after few decades after all LGJ is just light years ahead.
4. Her bhAva is centered on slower or medium tempo phrases , it is conspicously absent in fast sangathis and when it is not done conspicously even for any big main krithis in kharaharapriya , it is surely a bad miss.
The percussion department of madipakkam suresh and alathur rajaganesh were like a shadow .There was not a beat that had any over powering hit that can tradeoff very easily the aesthetics of LGJ style of concert. Rajaganesh tani was more vibrant than suresh ,overall they did contribute to the success.
Looks like Lalgudi sir has indeed trained shreya a lot . Shreya appears to follow intense carnatic gayaki style of LGJ without tampering sangathis :ymapplause: .
Overall a very good to excellent concert for 2 hours and 5 minutes.
10 mins alapana
Taanam for 5 mins
pallavi line was "vEnnai thinna chinna thanamA harE krishnA"
pallavi for 5 mins
swara ragamAlia in lAthAngi+ shree rAgam + garudadhwani??? + malayamArutham ??? + behAg
talam in khanda jampa
7. bArO krishnayyA - rAgamAliga - kanakadAsA
8. thillAnA - pahAdi - LGJ
With a very early main and tani , I do knew she was heading for a rtp. IIRC I have personally not heard a lathANgi rtp ever in a live concert . lathAngi is a tricky rAgA to give a fairly even spread of attention in me (it is one of those chow chows of your lunch , you just cant like it all times). Having said that lathAngi to me is a kind of mixture of equal dose of kalyAni in melancholy and a kind of different assertive type of rasa like a vAchaspathi. I found Shreya in her alapana bit circled too much in the melancholy muse of lathangi . Perhaps with she not giving any fast fillers before rtp or rather there was not even one fast number it must have made me feel that way. The alapana was very good .The tAnam was kind of hit and miss effort , I was not sure if she was consistenly playing tAnam throughout , there was a bit of overdose of alapana in tAnam - may be little more cut bowing would have been better for tAnam.
In pallavi and swararAgamAliga she came out with a right aesthetics and was near lalgudi jayaraman typecast . The pallavi was in khanda jampa thalam and she had a nice laya poruttam , kind of rAga bhavam was really cut well with layam and a very nice trikalam. The leap of ragamaliga ragams was very nice.I remember few years back when Lalgudi siblings played ragamAliga swaras in bharath kalachar and I certainly felt the same level of aesthetics was there in swara ragamalika by shreya .The transtion into shree and may be garudhadhwani ?? and malayamArutham??? was lovely. In particular after behag wrap her virtuosity in traversing back and land back in lathangi was really very lalgudish and was well done.
Tukkadas were bit too short(that too considering the concert was just in 2 hours + , she could have gone with few more). The bAro krishnayya was nice . I was whispering within myself for a brindavani or revati or madhuvanthi (a truly incurable romantic rAgA) but she decided to go with the hills and took refuge with the pahadi thillAnA of LGJ.
If there are few things that she can work they are these all in ascending priority
1. She announces ragas and krithis for all krithis like nadaloludai which every one knows,but she does not announce the sangeetha samrAjya . May be she did not know the composer of sangeetha samrajya. For few months i knew the krithi but never knew the composer . Also she can announce the ragamAliga ragas too at the end of it .I found the same thing with Lalgudi siblings where they announced the trivia and left the tough ones for the rasikas to figure out . Of course this is just a minor trivial point not affecting the aesthetics of the concert.
2. A fast krithi would have made me little more attentive . Taking chandrajyothi,kalyanavasantham ,mohanakalyAni and then a longish kharaharapriya alApana was bit of a challenge as she played all more in slower shades of raga swaroopam.
3. One thing that Shri LGJ does when he plays alApana was he abstracts the raga essence from the krithi and I find it very very difficult to guess the krithi that is coming after alapana . But when shreya played kharaharapriya with few phrases that resembled few sangathis of pakala nilapadi, it was not that aesthetic as her illustrious guru . Perhaps this is something I hope she will only get it after few decades after all LGJ is just light years ahead.
4. Her bhAva is centered on slower or medium tempo phrases , it is conspicously absent in fast sangathis and when it is not done conspicously even for any big main krithis in kharaharapriya , it is surely a bad miss.
The percussion department of madipakkam suresh and alathur rajaganesh were like a shadow .There was not a beat that had any over powering hit that can tradeoff very easily the aesthetics of LGJ style of concert. Rajaganesh tani was more vibrant than suresh ,overall they did contribute to the success.
Looks like Lalgudi sir has indeed trained shreya a lot . Shreya appears to follow intense carnatic gayaki style of LGJ without tampering sangathis :ymapplause: .
Overall a very good to excellent concert for 2 hours and 5 minutes.
-
mahavishnu
- Posts: 3341
- Joined: 02 Feb 2010, 21:56
Re: Shreya Devnath@skgs on Sept 27th,2013
Nice review, Rajesh.
For #3 did she actually do separate alapanais for kalyani and Vasantha? Why not just a good old Kalyanavasantham that her guru's bani is famous for?
All the best to the young performer. I hope she will have some opportunities to accompany others as well.
For #3 did she actually do separate alapanais for kalyani and Vasantha? Why not just a good old Kalyanavasantham that her guru's bani is famous for?
All the best to the young performer. I hope she will have some opportunities to accompany others as well.
-
rajeshnat
- Posts: 10121
- Joined: 03 Feb 2010, 08:04
Re: Shreya Devnath@skgs on Sept 27th,2013
She played alapana in kalyani then followed with vasantha ending with few quick sangathis of both kalyani and vasanta .Then followed with alapana of kalyanavasantham .Then she played nAdalOludai krithimahavishnu wrote: For #3 did she actually do separate alapanais for kalyani and Vasantha? Why not just a good old Kalyanavasantham that her guru's bani is famous for?