Malladi Brothers at Odukathur Mutt, Bangalore - Aug 28, 2007

seldnplan · Post by **seldnplan** » 30 Aug 2007, 15:15

Vocal: Sreeram Prasad & Ravikumar (Malladi Brothers)
Violin: Sriram Parashuram
Mrdangam: V. Kamalakar Rao
Kanjira: B. S. Purushottam

Songlist:

sarasijanAbha (varNam) - kAmbhOji - khanDa aTa - svAti tirunAL

nannu brOva - AbhOgi - Adi - tyAgarAja (RS)

nA moralakimpavEmi - dEvagAndAri - rUpakam - tyAgarAja

mAtangi - ramAmanOhari (rAmapriyA) - rUpakam - dIkSitar (RNS)

shAntamu lEka - sAma - Adi - tyAgarAja (R)

enduku peddala - shankarAbharaNam - Adi - tyAgarAja (RNST)

mUrutiyanu nilliso - khamAs - Adi - purandaradAsa

sAyankAlE (shlOkam) - Anandabhairavi, mOhanam, AbhErI (?), shuddha sArang

vaddaninE (jAvali) - kApi - rUpakam - paTnam subrahmaNya ayyar

marali marali (mangaLam) - madhyamAvati - Adi - annamAcArya

A very good concert; review will follow later tonight!

gobilalitha · Post by **gobilalitha** » 30 Aug 2007, 16:14

in these days of terrorism and loss of innocent lives , sama raag , especially santamuleka is timely . rendition was excellent . ears filled with sundara telungile as quoted by the ledendary mahakavi bharathiar. they never disappoint, all performances marked by classical brilliance, missed their favourite pahadi gobilalitha

srkris · Post by **srkris** » 30 Aug 2007, 18:29

Wow excellent choice of songs... particularly nAmorAlakimpavEmi and the javali (vaddaninE)

vijay · Post by **vijay** » 30 Aug 2007, 18:51

Ramapriya is another raaga that one does not hear so much these days...good to see this having been taken up as a main

rmdeer2000 · Post by **rmdeer2000** » 30 Aug 2007, 22:06

where was neraval performed in matangi?

grsastrigal · Post by **grsastrigal** » 30 Aug 2007, 22:37

It is uploaded in S.Priya. Thanks to Sri. Hariharan

seldnplan · Post by **seldnplan** » 31 Aug 2007, 05:44

This was my first Malladi Brothers' experience and it was very impressive. Their intense training in the 'Andhra school' is reflected clearly in the precision, melodic, rhythmic and lyrical, that they exhibit. And they complement each other tremendously well: Sreeram Prasad, with his dry, rich baritone, greatly reminiscent of his guru's, provides stability during the song renditions, while his brother's slightly more nasal, and just as slightly more pliable, voice threads through the more intricate phrases. Never did it feel like either was upstaging the other--to compare with another pair that one is most likely to associate them with, this feeling of imbalance is a chronic discomfort for me at every Hyderabad Brothers' concert.

I was prepared to be miffed at the preponderance of tyAgarAja kRtis, but the sAma and the dEvagAndhAri are such lovely pieces of music--nA moralakimpavE (thanks to srkris for correcting these words) has one of the most beautiful pallavi lines I've heard--that it seems petty to cavil, especially when they're rendered with such heart and poise. Even the AbhOgi kRti (not such a hit with me--the composition, that is) was redeemed by Sreeram Prasad with some Voleti style svarAs. It would have been nice, though, if they'd been more adventurous in their choice of composition in shankarAbharaNam: there must be so many great songs in this rAgA, lying around dusty and disused, just waiting to be picked up and returned to their sometime glory.

The ramAmanOhari was the piece de resistance (the neraval, btw, was at the usual line, the beginning of the caranam: ramAmanOhari rAjEndushekhari). Everything about it was measured and well-done, beginning with the AlApana by Ravikumar, which began with a sedate progression up the scale and cascaded to its end with a series of pretty brigas. I would have liked for Ravikumar to have experimented with some extended pa varjya phrases, but you can't have everything!

The post-tani session was wonderful. The floor seating, thinly populated (can't imagine why), provided ample room for me to lean back on my elbows, while the Brothers' unhurried rendition of the shlOkam filled the hall; a very young girl of about three, or four, excited by something, I don't know what, kept making frequent forays to the front of the hall, holding her hands up at the performers--out of appreciation, one hopes--and running back to her parents, still as excited. The atmosphere gained for a few moments the intimacy of a house concert, to add to the serenity that it had always possessed.

One can't but come out of that feeling all fuzzy inside.

Aside 1: People who have had the patience to read my ramblings, and so have been left bereft of time to read any thing else, will be surprised to find that all the concerts that I've ostensibly reviewed featured percussive support (also, the stock market's on the mend, the Left and the Congress are still at an impasse, and India leads the ODI series vs. England 3-1...All right, I lied there. Just checking). I just failed to make any mention of it, mostly out of ignorance, really. This tani here, though, I really did enjoy: Kamalakar Rao, who'd been fairly unobtrusive till that point, got to strut his stuff, and I thought he did it very well, but just as unobtrusively. And he didn't make any speeches neither. What a man!

Aside 2: Much of this post was written hours ago and lost to the perversities of my computer. It has since been restructured with much reluctance and heartache. So here it is, complete with extra ramblings, thrown in for free!

sramaswamy · Post by **sramaswamy** » 31 Aug 2007, 22:05

Seldnplan

Your reviews make an interesting read. We not only find about the music that was played but are actually transported to the site - thanks to your description of the events going on among the audience.

Please keep your reviews coming. There are rasikas for your brand of music.

rajaglan · Post by **rajaglan** » 03 Sep 2007, 11:40

Hi,

How was the Sankarabaranam RNST. I missed sankarabaranam in this season, actually nobody sang sankarabarnam. How long was the raga alapana and neravals?

Why was RTP not performed? not Planned or Again the sponcers intrusion of long speech?

Thanks for your interest in the descriptions of the scene?

Ragjay · Post by **Ragjay** » 03 Sep 2007, 16:50

Hi i am also a great fan of Malladi Bros. I met a renowned critic of Madras and he was of the opinion that their Music was too much kannaku oriented and techinical and hoped sincerly that they would not fade away like Hyderabad Brothers. They ought to invest more of their effort in singing numbers rather than get involved in such aspects to sustain their musical acumen.Bye Ragjay

sbala · Post by **sbala** » 03 Sep 2007, 17:08

I hope the renowned critic isn't SVK. I fail to understand why laya oriented vocalists are shunned by the critics. You can't expect everyone to sing the same way. Some choose the popular route, some choose the sowhyam/emotional path and there are others who opt for the scientific route.

I just love it when Mandolin Srinivas starts his dialogue with the mridangists. The same goes with other performers like TNS who are very strong in laya and kanakku. Incidentally, I liked the Hyderabad brothers concert at KGS. There were some intricate swaraprastaras and even Varadarajan had problems accompanying them in some sections. No way they are fading away!

Ragjay · Post by **Ragjay** » 03 Sep 2007, 20:17

HI Bala I did read ur post. and respect your view. But the critic sincerley hoped that this talented duo would not go the Hyderabad Brothers way after a few years. That was his view and I tend to agree with him. Per say there is nothing wrong with kannaku etc., if it is overdone then it becomes monotonous and tends to get too loud. They sing some lilting numbers with a lot of emotional shades which soothes the rasikas. I wish that this duo perform for many more years with the same fervour and may their rasikas increase manyfold in the days to come. BFN Ragjay

vijay · Post by **vijay** » 04 Sep 2007, 12:58

Interesting. Artsites from AP generally tend to be strong on the laya front - Hyd Bros, Pantula Rama, Manda Sudha Rani, BMK are some examples that come into mind immediately. I thought this was somewhat less pronounced in case of the Malladis! In any case, my opinion echoes that of Bala's - an eclectic mix of schools/approaches makes the art form richer...felicity in laya is one of the trademarks of the AP School (if there is any such thing!) and I for one would not like to see it die away.

I also doubt whether the "fading away" of the Hyd Bros can be attributed to kanakku alone. To begin with, I don't think they are out of the reckoning just yet. They still manage to get prime slots at most venues and while their concerts are rarely sold out, crowd turnouts are respectable...

There are many kanakku specialists who are quite popular, TNS being the prime example, so I am not too sure that is the reason. Their base in Hyderabad is a more likely cause - and they are not the first ones to experience this - from Voleti down to Pantula Rama today, artists who are not based in Chennai tend to be somewhat less "visible" and the Hyd Bros have no doubt suffered on this account...another reason is that there is much more competition in the field today than when they started out.

They also have a lower "glamour quotient" than many younger artists - in TMK's concerts for example, it is surprising (and heartening) to see the number of rasikas below 40 - at the KGS concert I thought it was close to 50%! A large part of this crowd, I suspect, are recent converts (I was among them not too long ago) who are drawn towards performers they can identify with - Sanjay, Unni, Ranjani Gayathri, to name a few more...

Anyway, while the brothers are getting older, their music has not suffered much. Despite criticisms about lack of balance, I think they complement each other fairly well although the younger is clearly dominant. Their concerts are almost always a refreshing change from that of Chennai based performers whose styles seem to converging around SSI's and MS'. Their concerts can be somewhat inconsistent though and their vocal acrobatics sometimes come at the cost of the blurring the reference point...

Bala, the KGS concert was decent but they were not quite at their best.

sbala · Post by **sbala** » 04 Sep 2007, 14:18

The Hyd bros concert was good in parts but the swarams the dominant sibling executed were definitely challenging and absorbing and not the run of the mill stuff. I'm tired of this grsnd, rsndp, sndpm stuff. Only artistes like these do some justice to swarams. You are right about the Nedunuri and Voleti school being strong on laya though classifying them as AP school possibly highlights a huge gap in our understanding of the AP music scene (just like how we use RK Srikantan as a proxy for Karantaka artistes).

SVK also did not take kindly to Mandolin Srinivas's Mohanam in last week's review. However, it was one of the best Mohanam I had heard in recent times. Again, lot of laya orientation but that's a great strength that not many artistes have. You can't expect Sachin to bat like Dravid or Akram to bowl like Mcgrath. We as rasikas or reviewers have to fine tune our expectations based on the artistes strengths and approach to music. Asking them to change that is not our business.

Interesting that all the child prodigies seem to be strong in laya - Mali, Bmk,Ravikiran,Shashank and Srinivas.

vijay · Post by **vijay** » 04 Sep 2007, 18:04

Bala although an "AP School" is a misleading simplification a lot of artistes from AP have their roots in the Pinakapani school. Nedunuri, Voleti, Nookala Chinna Satyanarayana and the Malladis among others

Ragjay · Post by **Ragjay** » 04 Sep 2007, 19:47

Hi Vijay and Bala my remarks on Hyderabad bros was echoed in your posts Vijay agrees that this is not one their better concert and Bala agrees that in parts the concert was not good. This is precisely what I meant by their fading away. They have given some outstanding concerts but they are not able to consistently perform to their ability and I am afraid a lot of their recent performances are very very ordinary and stale When I heard the first concert of Mandolin Srinivas at the 5050 club in early eighties the audience was astound at the felicity with which he played.But of late his performance oscillates between brilliant and average the same goes for concerts of TNS. Probably far too many concerts are undertaken by the artists and hence it effects their performance. By fading away I meant that they are not able to maintain the level of their performance consistently say like KVN . BFN Raghavan

arasi · Post by **arasi** » 04 Sep 2007, 22:35

When the Hyderabad Bros first came to the US (nearly 20years ago?) I was really impressed with them. Their 'sadAcalESvaram' still is very pleasing for me to recollect. While I admit I hadn't heard them for a while after that, I was disappointed in the recent years with a couple of concerts I attended which lacked a balance in structure. Also, the element of gymnastics was given prominence, in my view. Vijay, I feel exactly the way you do about their 'somewhat inconsistent performance and vocal acrobatics'.

vijay · Post by **vijay** » 04 Sep 2007, 23:29

Inconsistent they certainly are, point taken - but that sparks off another strand of thought...I have this theory that genius is inconsistent by nature - TNS, as pointed out by Raghavan, is an example here as well...the Hyd Bros, like TNS, are "thinking musicians" - always on the lookout for something new and novel. And often indifferent to the outcome - such artists are likely to have more off days than others but even on an off-day, there is much to learn from listening to them....

Anyway, this thread is about the Malladis concert and it has strayed too much already....my apologies