Krishna gana sabha - any updates

[rajeshnat]

All
krishna gana sabha certainly was one of the finest sabha. Atleast these are the lovely things that I enjoyed with them

In the glorious past say till 2005
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# Gokulashtami series , most of concerts in early sangeetham.com days in 2002 to 2005 i spent there . They even had month long festivals and kept giving so many opportunities to artists . I recollect once i heard few artists

# holding lovely tributes like releasing a souvenir on pmi

# opening a lovely mini halls which haslovely sound. during season they line up atleast 3 to4 weekks of evening concerts.The most treasured is one that I attended of a rare kerala based musician V R Dileep kumar

# That lovely cane chair and real good setup especially mini hall

But in recent years
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# suddenly kind of transforming SKGS and calling that as YCPA (yagnaraman center of performing arts).While having the trinity portraits and all the lovely artists like ARI,PMI , etc in the form of portraits in the side was a lovely tribute , suddenly a bronze statue of the founder yagnaraman came up in the front

# They jacked the price quite heavily just hold very few main hall concerts. The hall has been in recent years taken bit more for dance and namasankeerthanam carnatic music has surely come down slightly or heavily depending on the month that you see .

# Just observing over the years atleast Lalgudi and Maharajapuram had considerable influence in the past and many musicians were very happy to perform in this lovely sabha.

# Possibly the bridge of Usman Road took away footfall as you drive you have a lovely mudhra in the same north usman road with more parking lot, where the mudhra and radha bhaskar curate very well. Still SKGS has its lovely charm.

All said as of Aug 2018
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# The days of shri yagnaraman and even early days of Shri Prabhu are certainly not there any more as of now . Right now I have not seen even gokulashtami series announcement and i am not sure if it is being planned in 2018. I have not seen any monthly concerts there practically not much activity . I keep hearing thru grapevine that shri Nalli chettiar the great patron is not happy with krishna gana sabha functioning (not sure if the grapevine is true). What exactly is happening to krishna gana sabha,any inputs from anyone. I hope and pray that this lovely sabha springs back to more fine arts action and get back to their glorious days of 60's to 2000.

[shankarank]

The hall has been in recent years taken bit more for dance and namasankeerthanam carnatic music has surely come down slightly or heavily depending on the month that you see .

Yes dance is idolatry and nAma sankIrtanam is, like qawali and carols, religious music!!

When a cherished sampradaya is not held as sacred by itself by the people who know it's worth and explained to people , and teach English and its nuances using that in fact ( I learnt English not by reading literature, but by reading Mir Publishers Physics books translated from Russian!) this is the result!

As Aruna Sairam says in the interview, it does not matter how artistic and how experienced Balamma is , she brought me the image of Krishna in front of my eyes and that is what matters !! So there you go.

krishna ceased to be a principle and became a God!! Same as Christ - well Christ is a son of god downgraded to a prophet in islam - our people don't even know that!

The result is more idolatry - put a bust of yagnaraman in the true tradition of Dravidian parties in public space!

[Sachi_R]

Shankarank,
What do you normally eat for breakfast? And what do you drink?

Vituperative Angst never gets such a head-start in the morning for me.

[shankarank]

I have to ask the Romila Thapar question now! Have they(you) read? Now you ask me about eating!

[rajeshnat]

Today Sept 01st ,i the HINDU engagement column it was put that SKGS inaugural concert is by TV Gopalakrishnan is free and they awarded sangeetha choodamani to Kadri gopalnath and Acharya choodamani to suguna varadachari . Congrats to them . i see in bookmyshow.com the list of artists are put in different order, tickets are priced Rs 200 onwards. I wish they update their website with schedules.

[yours_truly]

I hope the song for August-2018 gets featured today!

[CRama]

The minimum ticket per concert is Rs.100. Today I went for Vishnudev Namboodiri and got a ticket for 100. I did not attend TMK concert. So this was fine for me- two separate tickets for the two concerts.

[Nick H]

I went to a concert there yesterday.

The evidence of a new sound system was obvious! It is very much improved and equal to the best here now. I think the AC must be new too: cooling was very evident (but not too much).

Only one black mark: the place was not well cleaned, with litter under the chairs.

It may be a commercial reality that all this will mean higher ticket prices, and it may be a commercial reality that that, in its turn, means I will go there even less. There were only about 40 people present for a wonderful concert by Suguna Varadachary yesterday: Higher ticket prices can lead to less income!

[CRama]

Suguna Varadachary concert was excellent. I will be posting a review separately.

On the previous day I attended Prema Rangarajan concert. It was scholarly and enjoyable too. But attendance was much meagre. As a result the AC was too high- unbearable for me. I came lout after a few songs.

[Nick H]

Curious. We were not far apart, and I am usually the one to feel too cold!

But you were not the only one. One of the young students said it was too much when we were chatting afterwards.

[CRama]

The attendance in KGS is abysmally low for all the concerts- because it is a ticketed concert. Suguna Varadachary concert- there were about twenty students only. rest may be about 20. Ticket is not very high- Rs 100 only. But is it very unfortunate that most of the sangeeta rasikas dont want to pay anything for the concert.

Vani Mahal is having free concerts. Attendance is very good there. Under the circumstances, how we can squarely blame KGS for not holding many concerts. In fact in earlier years, Gokulashtami concerts will extend for more than 45 days. This year it is for 30 days.

[CRama]

Nick, somebody told me that if I sit in the corner seat, it may not be that cold. So last two days, I am sitting there. It is OK.

[Sivaramakrishnan]

I attended Papanasam Ashok Ramani's concert on 3 Sep.
Attendance was however low as for any concert during the ongoing Gokulashtami series so far.

Me and CRama were discussing the other day that concerts could be held in the Kamakoti(mini) hall in the same premises where the 'emptiness' won't be felt much. Fortunately today's (11 Sep) concert of Smt Bhushani Kalyanaraman is is shifted there and CRama is representing us in the audience.

I have observed that audience turnout is quite Ok during the ticketed evening music slots during the 'December season'. The Sabha's prestigious Natyakala conference is a class apart and well attended.

The venue witnesses a flood of devotees for the morning Margazhi (Nov-Dec) Namasankeertanam starting as early as 7 a.m.which is however 'free'.