Seshagopalan's Sruthi Boxes

[melam72]

Upon hearing of the announcement about TM Krishna offering the tani avartanam to the much-maligned Tampura artist, Maha Vidwan TN Seshagopalan has decided to start a new sruthi box company to compete with Radel.

Speaking from his home in Mylapore, Seshagopalan commented "For too long, we have been using tampuras as drones. These tampuras are inherently faulty. Tampura players are in a consortium with violinists like Lalgudi Jayaraman to make me go off tune. But not anymore, for I, Sangeetha Kalanidhi Madurai TN Seshagopalan, have introduced new 'Vocal' sruthi boxes, where musicians can sing to my perfect, sruthi-pure renditions of tambura sounds!"

Seshagopalan Sruthi Boxes (SSB) Incorporated has also plans to introduce electronic, fully digital, Augmented Reality, Virtual Reality, sruthi boxes where drone support is provided by a variety of instruments, including the veena, the harmonium, the keyboard, the flute, the nadaswaram, the balakokilam, the swarabat, and the dhanurveena. However, research is still underway by Seshagopalan on the last three instruments, but knowing him, we will be able to expect them to be on sale by the time this article is released.

When asked to comment, senior vocalist R Vedavalli commented 'Apacharam! Apacharam!' before retreating into her home and listen to her impure, off-key tampura being strummed by her disciples.

We also reached out to TM Krishna for comment, but we were told by his secretary that he is busy shooting for his next song, 'Punnakku Paattu'.

[shankarank]

This is like Annadurai making fun of Rajaji after he retired from Politics and started writing epics!

[pattamaa]

keep them coming !!

Please work on possible discounts on these "vocal" surthi boxes.. i need 4 for my concert (one to placed in each direction) to give me shruti support. I want these shruti box to adjust automatically whenever i waver from pitch or my shruti change...

[ram1999]

Sruti oriented / sruti aligned carnatic music is like south pole and north pole. no artist gives any importance barring a very few.

[Sivaramakrishnan]

Though rasikas.org is a forum for free exchange of information and views, I am afraid it's losing sight of its cherished objectives. Though satire and humour are part of constructive criticism, things appear to drift towards unaesthetic debates. Or even meaningless jottings in the guise of wit.

Some of my friends who have been avid followers of the threads are not much interested to log on to the forum of late.
The off-season in Chennai must actually encourage us to concentrate on core topics / concerts of up-comers which pick up during this lean period. Let's gather stuff to counter the 'onslaught' of events of the forthcoming 'Season' to make the forum a challenging platform for rasikas as well as performers.

If we do not show restraint, melam73, 74, 75 etc are likely to appear on the scene!!

[SrinathK]

I agree. Of late there hasn't been much in the way of music related discussions as much as parodies and venom spewing. It gives me the impression that the General Discussions page is rapidly turning into the lounge...

[Nick H]

Though rasikas.org is a forum for free exchange of information and views, I am afraid it's losing sight of its cherished objectives. Though satire and humour are part of constructive criticism, things appear to drift towards unaesthetic debates. Or even meaningless jottings in the guise of wit.

Let us be glad that, at least we have not seen some of the verbal violence that happened in the past! We have had some terrific rows on the forum, and it is certainly better off without them.

It is hard to be witty; it is hard to be caustic with flair. Some write well when they are not attempting to be another Harimau: better they realise that!

A teacher at my school used to day, "When you try to be witty, be careful that you don't get only half way." ")

[arasi]

Well said, birthday boy! Enjoy the musical feast...

Whittling away at words, we know,
Our wits, the half-way ones too,
Keep us aware, amused, alert--
Barring utter twits, of course
Let them twitter away, somewhere away!
But here, we thrive, keeping things alive