Sowmya@BGS on Dec 5th,2006

rajeshnat · Post by **rajeshnat** » 06 Dec 2006, 18:23

Smt Sowmya in BrahmagAnaSabha was accompanied by RK SriramKumar - violin and ManOj Shiva - mridangam

1. karunimpa(varnam) - sahAna -Thiruvottiyur ThyagAyaa
2. sObillu sapthawara (N,S)- jaganmOhini - T
3. vazhi maraithirukkude(R) - nAttaikurinji -GKB
4. saraswati namOsthute sArada - saraswati - GNB
5. angAraka(R) - shuruTTi - MD

6. sAdachaleshwaram bhavAye - bhUpalAm - MD
7. evaricciriraa (R,N,S, T)- madhyamAvati - T

8. enna sOlli - kAnadA - Ambujam Krishna
9. smara sundarAnga - pharaz - Dharmapuri subbarAyar
10. enakkum unakkum isaindha pOruttam - senchuruTTi - rAmalinga swAmi
11. thirupugazh(had lines of kamala vimala .... pazhani azhagu mudaya perumAle) -?? -???
12. pavamAna

A nice and rare varnam atleast to me gave a good start for her concert . The next popular jaganmOhini was just good, however her voice did not have that much weight in the neraval punchline "dhara rksAmAdulalO". The same lack of voice weight also pushed her swarams bit ordinary.

nAttaikurinji alApanai was very good . The krithi was a surprise as I am more used to the tOdi version .She sang quite good here. saraswati was sung ok, looked more of hey prathi madhyama attendance rollcall. The surprise is her shuruTTi. IMHO,
There was a little excess rishabam dangling and stretching which morphed the shuruTTi more towards devagAndhAri atleast till 2/3rd of alApanai.The shuruTTi was distinct only after RKSK played. However the krithi was a perfect shuruTTi, though again the voice weight was lacking.

The best piece was her bhUpAlam .A little detour to clear my a decade of misunderstanding of bhUpAlam . For all I know about bhUpAlam,revagUpi and Bowli , I remember one of my accquintance telling me that revagupti and bowli are more close whereas bhoopAlam is always distinctly different from the other two . Possibly two reasons, in a popular rAgamaliga sArangan marugAne of Santhanam , he has misguided me by singing a line udaya BhoopAlane which is more revagUpti. Also I have never heard a bhUpalam other than a passing MD krithi of sri vishwanAtham .But Smt Sowmya sang the BhUpAlam which to me was more closer to be christened as subha pantuvarAli janya than the mm gowlai, which my relative told me that was the right one.Some one can throw more light. Nevertheless her swarams and presentation in this dikshitar piece was top class.

If a shaky shurUTTi was somewhat not that great, choosing a closer madhyamAvati was in my opinion not the best choice. alApanai was very nice, neraval and swaram lacking significant voice strength. The tukkadA of enna solli was excellent,pharaz
was below average. The ramAlinga swamigal's enakkum unAkkum was just average.

Another last surprise was the last thirupugazh . That just reminded me of yesteryears doordarshan madras where around 8:58 pm when tamil news is over, they would try to connect to doordarshan delhi ,so in that two minutes they will just put some slides . Same feeling with sowmya or for that matter many of the musicians who close their concert sharp at cinderalla time and maybe start worrying about next day sabha performance, usually the slides are generally the thirupugazh. I would prefer them to take it to a logical musical closure.

ManojShiva was very good throughout , nice play, tani was just good. RKSK really helped at the right time through out the concert.

Overall wish sowmya pays particular attention on her voice-stamina aspect(in tamil a better word is dhammu) which is getting somewhat noticably down in the last year where I have heard (about 4 concerts). Overall one has to give credit to her reportoire.

hindolam · Post by **hindolam** » 06 Dec 2006, 18:25

What is rare about the sahana varnam?. Almost every one sings it!

MaheshS · Post by **MaheshS** » 06 Dec 2006, 19:28

11. thirupugazh(had lines of kamala vimala .... pazhani azhagu mudaya perumAle) -?? -???

Are you sure it had Palani? Kamala vimala maragathamani appears in a song called Thamarumamaru ..it's a Pazhamuthircholai Thirupugazh normally sung in Hameer Kalyani. A very very beautiful one!

Lakshman · Post by **Lakshman** » 06 Dec 2006, 19:32

Here is the tiruppugazh.
tamarum amarum. rAgA: hamIrkalyANi. Adi tALA (tisra naDai).

1: tamarum amarum manaiyum iniyadanamum arasum ayalAgat-
2: taru kaN marali murugu kayiru talaiyai vaLaiya eriyAdE
3: kamala vimala marakata maNi kanaka maruvum irupAdam
4: karuda aruLi enadu tanimai kazhiya arivu taravENum
5: kumara camara muruga parama kulavu pazhani malaiyOnE
6: koDiya pagaDu muDiya muDugu kuravar sirumi maNavALA
7: amarar iDarum avuNar uDalum azhiya amar sheidaruLvOnE
8: aramu niramu mayilu mAyilum azhagum udaya perumALE

rajeshnat · Post by **rajeshnat** » 06 Dec 2006, 22:48

hindOlam,
The sahAna varnam was my first experience , though I have seen may be one or two posts by others .

maheshs/lakshman ji
It is hameerkalyAni thiruppugazh, I also have jotted the first word as tamarum in my notebook.I also forgot to put pazhani... udaya perumAle(the ... must make more sense now). I certainly did not get hameerkalyAni there in the concert.

ramakriya · Post by **ramakriya** » 06 Dec 2006, 23:06

rajeshnat wrote:Smt Sowmya sang the BhUpAlam which to me was more closer to be christened as subha pantuvarAli janya than the mm gowlai, which my relative told me that was the right one.Some one can throw more light. Nevertheless her swarams and presentation in this dikshitar piece was top class.

Now bhUpAla is empirically placed under mELa 8; SSP places it under 9 (dhunibhinnashaDja); This may be to indicate that bhUpAla does not take tIvra kampita svaras that tODi is known for.

An aside, SSP gives a suLAdi of Purandara dAsa in bhUpAla too. (I think one of the two suLAdis SD notates in SSP)

You are not off the track at all when you say that she sang it as a shubhapantuvarALi janya . In hindustAni scheme, it is indeed called bhUpAli tODi, (tODi being the same as our shubhapantuvarALi) since it has the tODi anga. Handling of bhUpAli tODi is very similar to bhUpala.

IIRC, Smt Sowmya has sung sadAcalEshwaram in a commercial release also quite in detail.

-Ramakriya

nadhasudha · Post by **nadhasudha** » 06 Dec 2006, 23:21

Rajeshnat,
Bhupalam is a janya of Hanumatodi while Bowli and Revagupti are janyas of MMGowlai.

Bhupalam and Bowli differ in their gandharams. In addition Bowli has a nishadam in the Avarohanam

Revagupti has the Shadjam,Rishabam,Panchamam,Dhaivatam as Bhupalam but the Gandharam is from MMGowlai.

SadhaChaleswaram is in Bhupalam
Meluko Vaiyya is in Bowli
Gopalaka Pahimam is in Revagupti

rajeshnat · Post by **rajeshnat** » 07 Dec 2006, 10:44

Tx ramakriya + nadhasudha. I did know bhoopAlam is janya of tOdi as per classification , it just slipped.

One quick question, usually you see a sunrise visual in films where there is a flute drop played, That bit of music is definitely not BhoopAlam , it is either bowli or revagupti right . Somehow we all have been conditioned wrongly to think that as bhoopAlam ??

Any comments on the above half baked theory???

MaheshS · Post by **MaheshS** » 07 Dec 2006, 22:51

Rajeshnat -

You can download an audio clip from the following link.

http://www.yousendit.com/download/mpbWo0uUz4N5TA%3D%3D

It's part of a lec dem by Dr S Ramanathan where he talks about Bhupalam-Bauli-Revagupti.

Hope this helps.

shripathi_g · Post by **shripathi_g** » 08 Dec 2006, 02:36

S.Ramanathan has sung a beautiful Bhupalam in one of the concerts uploaded on sangeethapriya.org - http://www.sangeethapriya.org/cgi-bin/g ... mp3&loc=sr

gundakriya · Post by **gundakriya** » 08 Dec 2006, 22:55

rajeshnat wrote:Any comments on the above half baked theory???

Unfortunately most of your comments and so-called reviews are half-baked, my friend!

:mad:

rajeshnat wrote:There was a little excess rishabam dangling and stretching which morphed the shuruTTi more towards devagAndhAri atleast till 2/3rd of alApanai.

An artiste of Sowmya's calibre morphing Surutti into Devagandhari??? Don't fellows like you pause for a moment to introspect on your own competence :rolleyes: before hitting the keyboard with your atrocious ideas?

chalanata · Post by **chalanata** » 09 Dec 2006, 19:22

most interestingly there is comment about morphing of hindolam and sudda dhanyasi in another post.

srinidhi · Post by **srinidhi** » 09 Dec 2006, 20:16

Hindolam and Suddha dhanyasi are pretty close. The former is SGMDN while the latter is SGMPN. They can be confusing esp when the alapana revolves around NSGM.

sindhu · Post by **sindhu** » 11 Dec 2006, 10:24

For Suddha Dhanyasi, while singing Sa Ga MA, Ga is oscilated (it will sound gama, gama) & for Hindolam Sa Ga Ma is flat. This really differentiates.

sb

rasam · Post by **rasam** » 11 Dec 2006, 10:46

[There was a little excess rishabam dangling and stretching which morphed the shuruTTi more towards devagAndhAri]

Yes, I was a bit suprised too at this comparison. Besides, one has quantify what one means by "dangling" and "stretching" especially since the gamakams in suruti are non-trivial. Rajeshnat, the easiest way to immediately identify suruti is the characteristic 'mgpmr~" phrase which most artists will throw in the first minute or so in the alapana.

Indeed the "mgpmr~" (and its variant) phrases are deceptively beautiful. If you have heard enough Suruti, one can intuitively sing it, but playing it with the same beauty on the violin (or any another instrument) is an altogether different ball game

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 11 Dec 2006, 11:14

rasam wrote:If you have heard enough Suruti, one can intuitively sing it, but playing it with the same beauty on the violin (or any another instrument) is an altogether different ball game

hear..hear..It can be quite discouraging...You think you have got the swaras and some idea on the gamaka but when played first n times, it does not even sound close.

People with a great voice and a natural singing ability are truly blessed.