Akkarai Subbalakshmi: Violin
Arunprakash: Mridangam
Guruprasad: Ghatam
date: sept. 25th 2008
venue: asthika samaajam tiruvanmiyur chennai
Vanajaksha - ritigowla - khanda ata - tiruvottriyur tyagayyar
manasu karuga - hamsadhwani - rupaka - patnam subramania iyer (R, S)
vinatasuta vahana - jayantasena - adi - tyagaraja (R)
needu charanamule - simhendramadhyamam - mishrachappu - tyagaraja(k v srinivasa iyengar) (R, N, S)
manasuloni marmamulu - shuddhahindolam - desadi - tyagaraja
sarasijabhava jaye - kalyani - adi (thishra gati) - oothukaadu venkata kavi
praana sakhi - chenchurutti - adi - dharmapuri subbarayayar
dhavalarupa saraswati - anandabhairavi - adi - turuppugazh arunagirinathar
nee namarupa - adi - tyagaraja
I usually refrain from writing reviews of maestro Ravikiran's concerts for fear of sounding too partisan, bordering on hero-worship. However, it is a story that bears telling from time to time
.Few among us, most certainly not me, are qualified to comment on the extrordinary versatility of Ravikiran and his music. But we can try, in the manner of sanjaya trying to describe the viswarupa to dhritrashtra and the world.
Ravikiran comes to us not to entertain but to reveal the very essence of Carnatic music. Truly he is one of the maha vakyas of Indian music. What started as a fertile ground carefully and lovingly tended by his father Shri Narasimhan into a wonderful garden of flowers, herbs and fruits has now grown into this huge and uncontainable vana of music that pours out its riches to all. This artist and his music is so many things to so many people. So each person walks away taking those things that please him/her most. So to some folks he is the king of raga bhava, to others he is laya brahmam personified, to others he is the person who brings the purity of sahitya to the instrument, to others he is the presenter of authentic, balanced sangatis, to others he is the one-stop musical encyclopedia, to others he is the person who revealed the genius of OVK to the world in a substantial way for the first time, to others he is jugalbandist par excellence who brings pride to the Carnatic name, to others he is a leader of international collaborative efforts and fusion music that bring pride to the Indian name ...the list is endless.
The wall behind the stage was adorned with pictures of gods and sankaracharyas and I made a wish that they shower their blessings on the artistes on stage. Musicians bring something beyond value to the world.
This was an excellent concert. Ravikiran played his older 5.5 kattai instrument which has a more "traditional" tonality than the lower (actually higher
) pitched 1.5 kattai navachitravina that he sometimes plays.The ritigowla varnam started off on a nice brisk and precise kaalapramanam and Arunprakash revealed his intimate familiarity with the varnam in his crisp accompaniment.
The hamsadhwani kriti I haven't heard before and it was refreshing. I wonder if I've heard some koteeswara iyer song in a similar tune.
The alapana of jayatasena was masterful and memorable. Shri Narasimhan of Astika Samajam in his characteristically entertaining summing up speech at the end of the concert recalled that he has had three great jayantasena experiences in his life, one of them by hearsay and two actual experience that involved the stalwarts of the old including TNR. He added that this is the next great jayantasena experience. He also evoked a grain-silo analogy about Ravikiran's music. Subbalakshmi is clearly such a dyed-in-the-wool accompanist for Ravikiran and played a nice short alapana herself.
Then came simhendramadhyamam. The alapana was masterful in a way that is so characteristic of Ravikiran. Simhendramadhyamam is a raga that lends itself to quickly devolving into a scalar prattle, even to careful artistes. Ravikiran kept it grounded, deep and classical throughout. Even the shruti-bhedam phrases were brief and completely aesthetic. For example, the brief bouli image with panchama tonic and nishada varjya (i.e., SM's PDNRGR can be viewed as bouli's SRGPDP). Those not tuned into the shruti-bhedam that was going on still continued to experience SM in a deep way. This is the artful way of doing shruti bhedam. Not with a silly sledgehammer to show off "look, how clever this is". The neraval (I am not familiar with the sahitya line) was very good and the swara sequence had some awesome laya manipulations. I must mention that Akkarai Subbalakshmi played a very good alapana and there was sheer joy on her face when she came up with such smart replies to Ravikiran during the swaraprasthara.
The brisk-paced manasulonima was the perfect interlude before another big piece. It gave us a taste of the jugalbandi-fusion end of Ravikiran. The syncopated beats and notes during the swaraprasthara were woven into a terrific climax. The laya vidwans thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity and drummed up a good beat. Very exciting.
Then came the awesome kalyani. We were taken on a guided tour of the main pathways as well as myriad bylanes of Kalyani which we never suspected existed. The old timers in the audience were in tears. Here too the shruti bhedams were aethetic and understated (for example a brief invocation of mohanam in the sequence with panchama varjya RGMDNR can be viewed as SRGPDS) and many people only had an unbroken experience of kalyani. Subbalakshmi again delivered very well. Ravikiran checked with Arunprakash (or so I think) if it was OK for him to play the tani after the thishra gati kriti that he wanted to present. The OVK masterpiece is not familiar to me but it was quite good and the thishra gati added some excitement. I had to briefly miss the swaraprasthara but came back for the tani that followed.
Arunprakash and Guruprasad played a short and sweet tani. Thishra gati dominated but it was punctuated by some sankeerna and then some really nice exchanges during the kuraippu and korvai in thishra.
There was an audience request for a chenchurutti alapana. I learned a bit about how the delightful raga chenchurutti really works, and it ain't all jhinjhoti
.And there was a request from ravikiran's guru shri gotuvadyam narasimhan for the delightful anandhabhairavi piece dhvalrupa saraswati and he complied.
If there's was one thing I could remark about that could have been different it is the choice of simhendramadhyam and kalyani as the two major pieces in the same concert. Both have a preponderance of S-P varjya phrases. Not that I was all NRGMDNR 'd out at the end. Far from it. But I might have liked to hear a varjya-free sampura raga like Bhairavi or kamboji. On second thoughts I recall that Ravikiran announced that Kalyani was requested and whether anybody had any objections. I should have objected
.(edited for some typos; also added composer for dhavalarupa after reading malavi's post below).
. I have been a sporadic student but really more of an ardent fan and keen observer. And there's always the hope of becoming a "regular" student sometime, no matter how old