Status of the Chennai December music season

[SrinathK]

Since today is Dec. 11th, let's all think for a sec. about how much M S Amma and Sadasivam Mama had contributed to society through music and what they might have done in this situation. Therefore this year, let's all see the season not as entertainment, but for the healing and contributing power of the music. The fact that this is MS Amma's centenary year makes it all the more relevant.

[thaaye]

This year Parivadini will not do any live webcast during the December season. Instead, our webcast engineer - Padmamani, a native of Cuddalore, will be doing flood relief work there...

Appreciate your genuine commitment to flood relief work. Cuddalore is the worst hit. Also, genuineness stems from the fact that there are not many photo-ops in that area.

[carnaticwriter]

Cancelling concerts means these supporting artists lose a major share of their annual earnings while still having to cope with the financial impact of the flood on their lives.

Out of curiosity, harimau, do musicians including accompanying artists really 'earn' during a concert, leave alone season? Correct me if I'm wrong but I thought there is only expense and no real income from concerts be it main singer or accompanists.

[mridhangam]

Thank you Rajesh for your enquiries. We had 5 days of problems in our Quarters with 4 ft water logging. Fortunately it was all organised by Reserve Bank of India and they supplied drinking water and water for other purposes. All our ground floor flats in RBI quarters were filled with water and they were all evacuated and accommodated in 2nd and 3rd floor vacant flats. No power, No internet, No communication. For once in may years we could spend quality time in family together. Of course my car and one two wheeler got damaged.

I heard Vijay Siva's house was fully affected.
Lakshmi Rangarajan's house was totally devastated.
Karaikkal Venkatasubramaniam's house was totally devastated.

I found a dig about TM Krishna by one of our members earlier. People talk all types of these things without knowing how much TMK does for the musician community. We know it very well and what he does to the fellow musicians. I would request rasikas not to make a dig at musicians in the name of subtle humour at these times of crisis when even a small courtesy extended looks big. Also individual decisions taken by musicians at these times may not be reviewed please. All of us have to be together to show our solidarity and show a little kindness towards all. Humanity, Humility matters and not Humiliation.

I smile at a stranger and even talk to him at signals just to make him feel great. I would like to quote Shri TNS whose house was also affected at these crisis situation. Even after getting affected so much Shri TNS showed his greatness by comforting me with the following sentence shows the height of his humanity and humility. Quote : "Inda Maadiri samayathula age la senior a irukkara engalai maadiri people should talk something to comfort is a padhdhathi adopted by vaishnava Dharma propounded by the great acharyas". Hence let us unite to talk nice about all the artistes who have decided to contribute and also who have decided not to sing.

We as astistes community seek your solidarity and support.

Namasthey
Mannarkoil J Balaji

[thanjavooran]

Shri Balaji,
The ground reality is very well expressed. We the Rasikas stand behind you with prayers. Your views are highly appreciated.
With tonnes of love and affection,
Thanjavooran
11 12 2015

[harimau]

Out of curiosity, harimau, do musicians including accompanying artists really 'earn' during a concert, leave alone season? Correct me if I'm wrong but I thought there is only expense and no real income from concerts be it main singer or accompanists.

That depends. A couple of years ago, the Sangeetha Kalanidhi of that year got 7 awards from various sabhas. Most of these awards carried a cash purse of Rs 100,000. Add that to the Rs 300,000 as the total honorarium/prize money for becoming the Sangeetha Kalanidhi and you get the nice sum of Rs 1,000,000. Then you can add any fees from any other concerts that artist performed in. (This is public information from the awards announced by various sabhas in the newspapers so the administrators of this website don't need to get their undies in a knot.)

Such persons don't (need to) pay accompanying artists out of their pocket to top up their honoraria. But well-regarded artists with little recognition by the sabhas get tiny sums of money. Just yesterday, the main artist gave out 75% of honorarium received to the mridangist and Ghatam artist so that the accompanying artists could feel they received fair compensation. By the way, the main artist received fees in the very very very low thousands so it is not as if millions of rupees changed hands.

The entire music circuit is a rat race, and as they say, only the rats are winning!

[sureshvv]

I found a dig about TM Krishna by one of our members earlier. People talk all types of these things without knowing how much TMK does for the musician community.

Mea culpa! I apologize for the bad timing. I am happy to be educated about his contribution.

[hnbhagavan]

Harimau Sir,

As per your report then only the Sangeetha Kalanidi gets to make money.You can add a few more lakhs from Bangalore sabhas.The Sangeetha Kalanidi gets SV Narayanaswamy National award.Incidentally the sangeetha Kalanidhi gets one lakh from SRLK,bangalore.
What about other senior artists?Any way as per reports junior artists get a meager sum.The pakavadyam artists get to make some money due to large number of engagements.
I wish the Carnatic Music community make enough money for comfortable living.

[harimau]

Harimau Sir,

As per your report then only the Sangeetha Kalanidi gets to make money.You can add a few more lakhs from Bangalore sabhas.The Sangeetha Kalanidi gets SV Narayanaswamy National award.Incidentally the sangeetha Kalanidhi gets one lakh from SRLK,bangalore.
What about other senior artists?Any way as per reports junior artists get a meager sum.The pakavadyam artists get to make some money due to large number of engagements.
I wish the Carnatic Music community make enough money for comfortable living.

All senior artists in high demand -- many of them are deserving of the Sangeetha Kalanidhi according to discussions on this website -- earn sizeable honoraria for concerts. You can say that is the top 30-50 musicians. Nor do they share their loot with accompanying musicians. Their attitude is:

a) let the organiser negotiate separately with each musician who is going to be on stage
b) each musician has made his deal with the devil so why should I care
c) it is an honor for these accompanists to play for me.

As to the rest of them, literally the negotiations are about availability on the specific date, willingness to perform, and perhaps a question about preferred accompanists. At the end of the concert, they are handed the envelopes with cash inside and they sign a register stating they have received Rs xyz. They are not in a position to demand anything; they are happy to have an opportunity to perform and have their names in the Sabha program sheet and that day's newspaper, with perhaps the distinctly small possibility that the concert may be reviewed and their name (if they are the accompanists) might be mentioned in it. I know of mridangists who received Rs 150 for a ninety-minute concert at 3 pm.

So, what does an excellent artist who is not in the viewfinder of the Sabha secretaries do if he wants a good violinist, mridangist and Ghatam player to accompany him? He essentially pays out of his pocket extra money to the accompanists so they will remember that this particular musician will make up for the small honoraria they received from the Sabha and agree to play for him again. Otherwise, it is bye-bye and find some other sucker for your next concert!

So how do these people earn a living? Just find out how any of them have a day job.

Several of them teach music students. Some are fortunate enough to get concerts for wedding receptions though those opportunities tend to go to popular artists with commensurately high remuneration in "society" weddings or to fusion groups in case of some code coolie 's wedding with a fellow code coolie (what is female for coolie, anyway?).

Didn't I say that the music business is a rat race? I am only surprised that the hungry rats are not attacking the well-fed ones!

Don't blame the Sabha secretaries for this state of affairs. They have a limited budget - despite all the corporate sponsors who of course demand to see sizeable audiences for the money they shell out and thus the top-ranked ones grab all the money -- and have to fill 75-125 slots during the Season paying money to 250-500 artists with very little in terms of gate collection.

The top-ranked musicians have to thank the gods for their good fortune but at least for some of them this is impossible as they publicly claim to be atheistic. Thus their belief is that they are where they are because of their superior skills and extraordinary musical knowledge, which goes to swell their heads several sizes. Of course, a properly-humble attitude is projected whenever they receive major awards and adulatory paeans are written by court jesters and jaalras and chamchas and the unsuspecting public actually buys into that crap.

Let me ask just one question: can anyone honestly say that the current crop of top-ranking musicians are better than Sri Lalgudi Jayaraman or Sri GNB, to randomly choose just two of yesteryears' giants?

Ask me for more of my flaming hot opinions based on facts.

[hnbhagavan]

Let me ask just one question: can anyone honestly say that the current crop of top-ranking musicians are better than Sri Lalgudi Jayaraman or Sri GNB, to randomly choose just two of yesteryears' giants?

Surely No.I feel They laid firm foundation and brought up the music to what it is today.Lalgudi Sir could have demanded any amount today with so much sponsorship.It is a known fact that Sri MDR left almost nothing when he left this world.

[Rsachi]

Bollywood has a few Khans, Kapoors and Kumars and Singhs. Carnatic=Chennai classical music has its stars. It is the same 80:20 rule. A few stars hog 80% of the concert fee income distributed to all musicians.

Some of them are wise enough not to expose their intellectual capabilities on random subjects. Let Arnab grapple with those hot subjects and let our stars figure the next hyperthreaded multi-raga pallavi.

[pattamaa]

topic is deviating as usual !!

Let me ask advisory.... few rasikas are asking me whether it safe to travel to chennai, these are not NRI, from folks form kerala and karnataka... It is going to be challenge for someone to come for 2 weeks to this city now, and eat outside and virtually live in concert halls 12 hours a day...

Some of regular visitors from other cities i know, are cancelling their trip, and some other friends are requesting for inputs and reviewing...

How clean are sabhas now? Is fumigation done effectively? How about toilets (which usually stink)... any first hand information?

[pattamaa]

The fear is two fold - food safety... and epidemics spreading...

[PKSundar]

I too feel that nothing can be achieved by cancelling concerts. If a person is personally affected by the floods - like Vijay Siva - it is a different matter. Otherwise, it would be better to hold the concert, may be on a later date and donate the proceeds to a charity for re-building work.

[rajeshnat]

Let me ask advisory.... few rasikas are asking me whether it safe to travel to chennai, these are not NRI, from folks form kerala and karnataka... It is going to be challenge for someone to come for 2 weeks to this city now, and eat outside and virtually live in concert halls 12 hours a day...

Some of regular visitors from other cities i know, are cancelling their trip, and some other friends are requesting for inputs and reviewing...

How clean are sabhas now? Is fumigation done effectively? How about toilets (which usually stink)... any first hand information?

Patttamma
Since you asked i am writing the below post

# I have been to three sabhas BGS, Sastri hall in mylapore pockets and mudhra in T Nagar Pocket . Well sastri hall taking loo break no one would dare - the regular visitors from other cities can try and let us know. But for sure other two sabhas BGS and Mudhra did take special precautions to keep it more clean. For sure there was lot of water logging in Mudhra - RKM school till few days back .Yesterday when I went to hear Vidwan Namboothiri , the place is as good as last year . With far less crowd the toilets can appear more clean.I did not cross check BGS and Mudhra for canteen etc

# As such I donot think any one should panic in coming to chennai for the season . Chennai is surely putting the dec 01-02 floods behind . Surely there are three kinds of crowds one the resident chennai who come to festival , second who are others from rest of india and the third from rest of the world , I think if you have problems of accommodation sorted out , you should not hesitate to come to chennai to participate in the music season. Of course I dont know about future el nino plans.

[MV]

Music as prayer- Of the Navavidha Bhakti, in Kaliyuga it is said that Man can only reach God through Shravanam and Kirtanam - listening and singing
Music as profession - If you look at non-core services like say Accounting or Architecture, when the place of work is damaged/destroyed, one can argue that it is best to wait till the upheavals are settled before returning to work but the professional is more likely to set up shop immediately to cut his losses.
Musicians as a group- are helping each other in their time of crisis. This helps not just them but the flow-on effect will be felt in the wider community as well.

So, whichever way you look at it, the Music must go on. Don't call it Festival (if that offends) but it is the best thing that could happen to Chennai. What is to stop an enterprising caterer or hotelier to address the concerns of public safety in pattama's (and everyone) mind. How long is a piece of string?

[margazhi]

http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/cont ... -un-report

[VK RAMAN]

for those planning to wade through water or uncleaned areas in chennai during music season, please read this:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid ... 068&type=3

[pattamaa]

There is no water stagnation now, but, general,hiegine is concern... When Sabha secretary said about season is on, they also should have mentioned about what steps they are taking to,make sure their premise is safe.

I might attend mostly music academy concerts, hoping that they are most safe...

[varsha]

to,make sure their premise is safe.

To make sure , keep humming the track I have posted for you in thread on MSS

[sureshvv]

I might attend mostly music academy concerts, hoping that they are most safe...

Yeah...just stay far south of the transformer.

[Nick H]

Narada. Gana. Sacha has completely rebuilt it's gents' toilet. It is now probably one of the cleanest places to be this December

[kvchellappa]

An article in The Hindu on 'To perform or not to perform':
http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp ... 001404.ece