Sahana Samraj@NGS(Mini) on June 28th,2014
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Vocal : Sahana Samraj
Violin : Nishant chandran
Mrudangam : B Ganapathyraman
Kanjira : some one can help, young vidwan - I dont know his name.
Concert duration/Day : 1hour and 50 minutes /Saturday
Concert Type : Nirvana (prime evening concert , no concert to follow)
Sabha/Hall : Charsur Foundation/NGS Mini
Crowd/Ticket : ~20
1. maatE malayadhwaja(varnam) - kamas - hmb
2. thanigai valar (S) - tOdi -Psivan
swaras for 3 mins
3. vinathA suta rArA - huseni - T
4. satileni guruguha(R N S) - poorvikalyani - ponniah pillai
6 mins alapana and 4 mins violin return
6 mins neraval in kOTi manmatha rUpuDE sadguNa sAgara candruDE
11 mins swaras
5A. cakkani rAja (R S T) - kharaharapriya - T
2 mins alapana and 6 mins violin return
swaras fo 12 mins
5B.tani for 3 mins
6. tOm tOm ...needu mahima (thillana)- poornachandrika - poochi
Charsur Foundation conducts at times in NGS mini where they give oppourtunities to many musicians to perform where in they also record the concert and commercially sell those as labels. I knew about sahana samraj when there was a mention in our forum of her recent concert at cleveland . Also she being a student of vidushi suguna varadachari was indeed a pull. The audience was less as there was quite a bit of rain and as i entered i was also given a slip by charsur which had an interesting mention. vidushi sahana is also grand daughter of nadaswara vidwan sempanarkoil srd vaidyanathan who has given advanced training to aruna sayeeram and sanjay subrahmanyan.
This young vidushi did come prepared but however did have a real uncooperative throat. As the concert moved on , the thondaiyilE kichu kichu (throat problems) did play spoil sport . However my first impression atleast till first half kept me glued ,as there was enough of paddantara and/or creative spark that came with the concert .
THe kamas varnam was nice and she did have a slight fluctuation of shruthi but overall was ok. Her grandfather must have mastered todi and I could get that nAgaswara piDi sangathis in her todi , her swaras were bit short but did showcase overall her classical depth . Huseni is a great raga as a filler she could have gone with a dose of swaras but she just singing the krithi was a bit of letdown.
The day's best was indeed her poorvikalyani . There was a noticable power in her sangathis and with few sangathis in madhyamakAla , her voice did shape well . She sang the krithi well was bit circuitous in neraval , however her swaras were well done especially the second half . Overall poorvikalyani did come out well. Till then her throat was bit non cooperative but she kept adjusting a bit only during the gaps and violin return.
In kharaharapriya , she got a lot of karakarappu and she was smart to just sing few sangathis as alapana and took rest in violin return. The grand krithi cakkani raja turned out a bit more troublesome , she also did few swara bedhams (I thought there was mohanam and may be bilahari), but as krithi moved on she could not even aurally hide her uncooperative throat. She rushed with a thillana and the young half sari visushi closed with a buggy thillana .
THe accompanist were just good . Nishant did play well in kharaharapriya but i felt his role was minimal. Ganapathi was slow during songs however he gathered more pace towards kharaharapriya which i liked. His tani was too concise , I guess being a recording concert perhaps he did the right thing.
Sahana indeed has a paddantaram and there was depth in few songs especially in poorvikalyani . While paddantaram representing suguna varadachari was indeed there, I could also get a bit of intense creativity in poorvikalyani swaras . I think since it was a recording concert , she perhaps wanted to showcase lot of brighas and swara bedham in kharaharapriya ,I am pretty sure she would have done better - but for her incidental throat issue.
Looking forward for a better second impression . Overall a good to very good concert.