Malladi Brothers , Kalotsav @ Odukathur Mutt 19th Feb 2012

Vocal: Malladi Brothers

Violin : M A Sundareswaran

Mrudangam : Kamalakar Rao

Ghatam: Dr.S.Karthik

List:

01  vanajAkshirO ( varNam) – kalyANi – Ramanathapuram Srinivasa Iyengar ( O )

02  tyAgarAja pAlayASumam – gauLa – Dikshitar ( A-short, S )

03  dinamaNi vamSa- harikAmbOji – Thyagaraja ( A,S )

04  SambhO mahAdEva – pantuvarALi – Thyagaraja ( A,N,S )

       neraval & swara @ ‘ SambhO mahAdEva SaraNAgata jana rakshaka’

05  sadAmatin – gambhIravANi – Thyagaraja  ( O )

06  Emani nE – mukhAri – Subbaraya Shastry ( A,N,S,,T )

        neraval & swara @ ‘ sAmaja gAmini sArasa lOchani -amba’

07  smarisO sarvadA hariya – hamIr kalyANi – Purandara Dasa ( O )

08  jaya jaya durgE – durga – Narayana Thirthar

09  itaDE nA ee lOkamulOgala – sALaga bhairavi – Bhadrachala Ramadas

10  kASi kASi gangA sankaTa vAraNAsi – nAthanAmakriya – Ganapati Satchidananda

11  SaraNu SaraNu surEndra sannuta – chenchurutti – Annamacharya

12 mangaLam – saurAshtram – Thyagaraja

The concert season at the Shivarathri Kalotsav held at Odukathur Mutt concluded with a bang ! A phenomenal concert to finsh the series, which started off with a beautiful concert. Except for a slightly high amplification ( for the vocals), every thing else fell in place, to provide an outstanding concert.

It did take a while to settle things. Sri Kamalakar Rao had his issues with the tuning of mrudangam, so much so that the desciple sitting next to him had to carry the instrument back tothe green room during the pantuvarali alapana to set this back to perfection ( well to an extend). From there on, the concert was at a different level. Every piece renderd yesterday was measured to the optimum.  The initial varnam and gaula kriti came and went as the things were taking shape. Short harikamboji alapana and the dinamani vamsa set the tempo. However, it was from the pantuvarali alapana ,things elevated to different level. Shambho mahadeva came with all its majestic form. Beautiful neraval at the pallavi line, some brilliant kalpanaswaras added to the overal effect.

After a short filler of gambhiravani, Ravikumar started the alapana of mukhari. What a treat. It was splendid and beautifully ‘choreographed’ if I may use the term. Progressed meticulously, with some innovative display of skills at the higher octaves, the smooth descent … it was fabulous. So, was the violin play be M A Sundareswaran. Being the Shivrathri eve, I was expecting ‘Inraikku Shivakripai’ to follow, but the choice was ‘Emani nE’ , a grand piece by Subbaraya Shastry. The good work with alapana continued through out the main , with some great neraval and swara singing, with the rest of the accompaniments chipping in.

After the re-tuning of mrudangam, veteran Kamalakar Rao was a different persona. He , aptly supported and ‘nudged’ by Kartick, was producing some brilliant percussion support. He seems to be never satisfied with the perfection of his intrument, often making minor adjustment. This, however, never dithered him from producing an outstanding tani avartanam with enthusiastic Karthick. This alone, was worth my time at the concert.

Post main saw a string of kritis , typical of them, from Purandara Dasa to Annamacharya. Durga and salagabhairavi kritis were especially beautiful. Whole lot of happy faces at the end of one fabulous concert. 

 

Abhishek Raghuram , Kalotsav @ Odukathur Mutt 12 Feb 2012

Vocal : Abhishek Raghuram

Violin : Akkarai Subbulakshmi

Mrudangam : Ananth R Krishnan

Ganjira : Guruprasanna

List:

01 sAmi ninnE kOri ( varNam) – Sri – Karur Devudu Iyer  ( O )

02  chAla kallalADu – Arabhi – Thyagaraja  ( N )

         neraval @ ‘iLalO sari vAralalO ‘

03  appa rAma bhakti – pantuvarALi - Thyagaraja  ( A,N,S )

        neraval & swaras @ ‘ trippaTalanu dIrci kaNTi reppavalEnu gAcu mA ‘

04  kArtikEya gAngEya – thODi – Papanasam Sivan ( A,S,T )

05  thillAna ( tana tadana dhim) – mOhanakalyANi – Lalgudi Jayaraman

06 mangaLam – saurAshtram – Thyagaraja

It was a near three hour concert.. only 3 kritis ( apart from the varnam and thillana).  Every thing was long , loud, chaotic and fast. Too many things tried at once , too much to my comfort.

Started 15 min late, he started off with a short sketch of Sri before getting on with the varNam in two speed.  Arabhi kriti started soon ( well, after a change of microphone) and he did an elaborate neraval at iLalo, with varying speed. Pantuvarali alapana was long and pretty decent.  Apparama bhakti also was sung pretty well. Somewhere it got into the high octane mode from the neraval. It was an overall noise since then. In the melee , some of the good shcemes and phrases might have lost its beauty.  Make no mistake, the swara singing was fabulous and he was on a roll with nothing seems to stop him flow of imagination.

Thodi alapana was very long ( but it is normal for his concerts) lasting 30 mins. All that could possibly have done was done there. As the alapana progressed,  he too swayed high and low, left and right , up and down both physically and through kala pramana and octaves. It was intersting to watch him and (than!) listen.  His effort did receive enthusiastic response from the crowd. Akkarai Subbulakshmi, did the same with a 15 odd minute of alapana from her side, more or less followingthe same path. Karthikeya Gangeya was sung well with some intersting sangatis and improvisations from his side. There was no neraval , but had elaborated swaras again, mostly done in second speed. 

Percussion support in general was loud through out. Ananth R Krishnan and Guruprasanna continued their run with a spirited tani avartanam. I liked the way Guruprasanna supported through out the day.  Post main was limited to a thillana in Mohana Kalyani before closing with the mangalam.

 

T N Seshagopalan at Odukathur Mutt, Kalotsav 2011, 13 Feb 2011

Vocal : T N Seshagopalan

Violin : M Chandrasekharan

Mrudangam :  Mannargudi Easwaran

Ghatam : Giridhar Udupa

List:

01   nAda tanumaniSam – chittaranjani – Thyagaraj  ( S )

02   nAdalOluDai – kalyANavasantam – Thyagaraja

03   Siva Siva Siva enarAdA – pantuvarALi – Thyagaraja ( A,N,S )

neraval & swara @ ‘ Agamamula nutiyinchi’

04   Ananda naTana prakASam – kEdAram – Dikshitar ( A , S )

05   ennEramum undan – dEvagAndhAri – Gopalakrishna Bharati

06   tiruvaDi sharaNam -  kAmbOji – Gopalakrishna Bharati ( A,N,S,T )

neraval & swara @ ‘ aDuttu vanda ennai taLLalAgAdu ara-harAvenru chonnAlum pOdAdO’

07   RTP – shaNmukhapriya – khanda jati triputa , 2 kaLai

pallavi line ‘ takadhimi tadhIm yenni sadA shivuDu ninai-  ??

no rAgamalika swaram

08    viruttam  ( taditha or maganai ?)- darbAri kAnaDa – Gopalakrishna Bharati ??

chandrachUDa – darbAri kAnaDa – Purandara Dasa

09   mangaLam – saurAshtram – ThyagarAja

Slokam ( SrIyay kAnthAya ) -  madhyamAvati

What an awesome concert ! Everything except the mike setting was perfect. One could not ask for more auspicious occasion, the inagural concert at this years Shivarathri Kalotsav. The best supporting artists on stage accompanying him , his voice was in clear fine form, the master himself seems to be in the mood, and prepared ( look at the list !).

concert started only by 7:00 after a delayed inaugural function, at which sri TNS spoke briefly but very well. He started with nAda tanum anisam in soft sublime voice and with some fantastic swaras to complete. Nadaloludai was submerged in the melee of mike-mans incompetence.  Every time he stars the anupallavi line, ‘svAdu phalaprada’ there wsa a big hooting form the mike,  irritating him to the core. to the displeasure of all , this continued 5-6 times, before the mike-man allowed him to complete the anupalavi with ‘sapta swara rAga’. Even at this time, the mrudangam wasn’t set properly. Sri Mannargudi Easwaran did bring it to the notice of the amplification team with some funny sound at the ‘thoppi’ side. However, through out the concert this wasn’t improved greatly.

Leaving aside all the unpleasant things, the concert was fabulous from there. An outstanding pantuvarali to come. He was traversing across all octaves at ease and was producing some beautiful phrases in alapana. Neraval and swara singing continued the same form superbly accompanied by Sri M Chandrasekharan.  Kedaram came in soon with a brief alapana and short sets of swara for Ananda natana prakasham.

Living upto the theme on shiva, it was sure to have thiruvadi sharanam, as soon as he started the kAmboji alapana. To be truthful, this isn’t one of the best thiruvadi sharanam I have listened. However, there was a 3 minute phrase during the kamboji alapana that gave my goosebumps and will remain fore ever in memory. That and the short neraval ( one always wanted more especialy for this kriti), where he used the  ‘AkAthu’, ‘thaLLalAkAthu’ ,’ennai thaLLalAkAthu’  words at one point and ‘ennai’ ‘vanda ennai’ , ‘aDuthu vanda enai’ words at the second time and similarly the ‘pOdAdO’, ‘chonalum pOdAdO’,  ‘ara harA ennu chonnAlum pOdAdO’  words in the neraval with some marvelous and innovative way.  Swara singing was also rather short for his standard ( hence I said, this wasn’t one of the best thiruvaDi sharaNam), but very good as ever.

Tani Avartanam was short, probably to accommodate a short Pallavi. Amidst the improper mike settings, they duo gave a decent tani avartanam. Sri Mannargudi Easwaran was otherwise in his usual self, adding to the overall effect of the concert.

Pallavi was there to come. Albeit short alapana of 7-8 minutes in shanmukhapriya, he did all that is possible during that time. A grahabhadam to ‘nAtakurinji’ , outstanding alapana moving into all 3 octaves with some instant applauses from the audience and multiple ‘aha’s from MC on the dais.  On his turn, MC remarked his need to catch a train back , hence reduced his play to mere 1 minute.  The rest was shortened by the time pressure. Tanam was very good, so was the pallai with trikalam and few rounds of swaras. There was no ragamalika swarams.

It had been long since I heard one such concert from Sri TNS and this made amends to all that was missed over last couple of years. This would have been a 4 hr concert had the concert been started on time.