“As an excellent vocalist himself, he knows to emote according to the raga and to highlight the kriti, neraval and swaram uniquely too,” say senior musician RK Shriramkumar and senior ghatam artiste N Guruprasad. Sangita Kalanidhi designate Dr. S Sowmya adds, “As a result, he does not look at percussion…
This is a detailed on-camera interview I did of Pandit Arijit Mahalanabis, Guru and Founder of the Society for Indian Music and Arts (SIMA), based in State College, Pennsylvania, USA. Before a live audience, Pandit Arijit expounds very candidly on all that is wrong about our classical arts, the state…
“Help me,” those big, innocent, liquid eyes had emoted, welling with tears. Unable to articulate in words but implicitly trusting you, the adult, to alleviate the pain. And you have no idea of what is going on – nothing hurts more. “It is unbearable, amma. Will it not just stop…
This year’s Sangita Kalanidhi designate, Dr. S. Sowmya, is a musician’s musician – at 50, the second youngest female recipient evokes the epithets ‘scholarly’, ‘erudite’, ‘cerebral’ etc. among fellow artistes, old or young. Given her long list of award winning academic and musical accomplishments, it is no wonder that many…
Every year, at around this time, my father’s death anniversary, the 15th this time, I am flooded with thoughts. His presence hovers over me constantly, no matter where I am, this towering light house of a beacon. This time, I wonder about how he would feel about the increasing frustration…
Anirudh Athreya, kanjira exponent, elicits copious appreciative comment from fellow artistes. Senior mridangam vidwan K. Arunprakash says, “He is a genuine team player, knowing how to enhance each of the other artistes on stage.” Vocalist and violinist Amritha Murali notes, “His sense of aesthetics, care and sensitivity towards his own…
Bubbly, enthusiastic, cheerful – these describe multi-faceted Sumesh Seshadri Nath Narayanan to a T. As a vibrant mridangist, he has accompanied Bombay Jayashri, Abhishek Raghuram, S Sowmya, Sikkil Gurucharan and more. A key member of the fusion bands IndoSoul and Sparsh, he has also acted in the recently released movie,…
Intuition coupled with rigorous practice has made the violinist a front line performer. Her silky smooth bowing, unhesitating fluency, thorough competence and immaculate accompanying skills make Charumathi Raghuraman a sought-after violinist for leading artistes in the Carnatic firmament such as Ranjani Gayatri, Sudha Ragunathan, Vijay Siva, Gayathri Venkataraghavan, Ramakrishnan Murthy…
Renowned vocalist Abhishek Raghuram put it perfectly when he called the Chennai Music Season (referred to as just ‘the season’ by aficionados) a huge cultural extravaganza. Indeed, heritage walks, lectures, lecture demonstrations, interesting combo events (such as sarees and music) etc. abound, besides music, dance and, well, food (but that…
I rounded off my intermittent attendance of this music season with my final concert for the year, yesterday, that of Sri. Abhishek Raghuram at the Music Academy. Driving in at about 6.10 pm for the 6.45 pm concert, I approached the valets. They told me unequivocally that there was no…