Malladi Brothers @ Nadasurabhi Annual Festival , 20 Nov 2022

Vocal : Vid. Malladi Brothers

Violin : Vittalarangan

Mrudangam : H S Sudhindra

Ghatam : G Omkar Rao

List

01 E paNikO janmincitani – asAvEri – Adi – Thyagaraja ( O , S )

02 gattigANu nannu – bEgaDa – Adi – Thyagaraja ( O )

03 mrudubhASana naTa vibhISaNa – mAruvadhanyAsi – Adi – Thyagaraja

04 ranganAyakam – nAyaki – Adi – Dikshitar ( A, S )

05 kAyArOhaNEsham bhajarE – karNATaka dEvagAndhAri – rUpakam – Dikshitar ( N,S )

neraval @ nIlAyadAkSi manOllAsa kAraNam

06 mari mari vacunA – kAmbOji – Adi – Mysore Vasudevachar ( A,N,S,T )

neraval &swarams @ rAmunI mahima nEnEmani pogaduDu

07 RTP – bhairavi – khaNDa tripuTa , khaNDa naDai , samam eDuppu ?

pallavi line : nIlasharIra bAlagOpAla pAlayAshumAm ; gAnalOla karuNAlavAla

ragamalika swaras in bhairavi, pUrvi kalyANi? , mOhanam, kApi, nATakurinji

08 madhukara vrtti – chenchurutti – Adi – Purandara Dasa

09 thillAna – pahADi – Adi – Lalgudi Jayaraman

10 shLOkam ( manOjapam mArutatulyavEgam ) – kalyANi

andarilOna ekkudu hanumanthuDu ? – kalyANi – Annamacharya

11 shLOkam ( shrIyay kAntAya ) – suruTTi

Very interesting selection of kritis, not often heard these days. Asaveri is a favourite for mine and I do request artist to take it up to a better treatment, with no much luck. As you can see most of the initial pieces were of a different trip. Nayaki alapana by Ravikumar, first for the evening, was very very good, slow melodious phrases as the raga and the composition demanded. Leisurely elaborated, evoking those ‘aha’ moments as it progressed. Kriti started a bit ‘loud’, if I may say so, not entirely in line with the mood the alapana created. Swarams were also in the first speed. Kayarohanesham was also a pleasant surprise, with a short neraval at neelayadakshi.

Kamboji alapana, by Sriram Prasad , was mostly sung in the lower/middle octaves. Fairly elaborate, typical kamboji phrases. Vittalarangan, in his turn, brought some nice takes to the fore. He was enhancing the vocalists alapana with his impressive follow and highlights. It was , yet again, mari mari vacuna of Mysore Vasudevachar, which I predicted when the alapana started. As much as I like this composition, I would love to listen to them singing other kamboji compositions. There was detailed neraval and swaram singing before a fine tani avartanam by Sudhindra and Omkar.

They started the pallavi well past 8:30. Alapana was really good. By the time, they got into the tanam, the ‘time pressure’ was evident. They had ‘rushed through’ or cut short the tanam, or it would have been 3 super tanams in a 3 days. Pallavi in khanda triputa in khanda nadai was with trikalam and ragamalika swarams. Concert concluded with a dasar pada, annamayya keerthana on Hanuman and pahadi thillana, just enough time for me to rush back for the first match of the Worldcup.

 

Malladi Brothers @ Sankranti Music Festival , Sri Rama Lalitha Kala Mandira, 06 Jan 2019

Vocal : Malladi Brothers

Violin : Embar S Kannan

Mrudangam : Trichy Sankaran

Ganjira : K V Gopalakrishnan

List

01 calamEla jEsE (varNam ) – shankarAbharaNam – aTa – Swathi Thirunal

02 manasu nilpa – AbhOgi – Adi – Thyagaraja ( O, S )

03 Ananda naTEsha – thODi – Roopakam – Ramaswamy Sivan

04 rAma ninnu namminA – mOhanam – Adi – Thyagaraja ( S )

05 nIdu caraNamulE – simhEndramadhyamam – Mishra Chap – Thyagaraja ? ( A,N,S,T )

neraval & swara @ ‘vEda vEdAnta vidituDani velayu shrI sarvEsha rAmA’

06 ninnu pogaDa taramA – kuntaLavarALi – Adi – GNB

07 ranganAyakam bhAvayE – nAyaki – Adi – Dikshitar ( A-vocal )

08 RTP – nAtakurinji – chaturashra triputa , tisra gati, 2 aksharam ( +2/3) eDuppu

pallavi line ‘ koniyADa taramA rAmA nI mahima’

ragamalika swaras in ‘ sAma, kalAvati? , rAgEshrI , sudha sAvEri

09 sadA enna hrdayadalli – behAg – Roopakam – Vijaya Vittala Dasa

10 mAyA mOhamu – jOg – Adi – Annamacharya ( set to tune by Malladi SuriBabu)

11 shLOkam ( shrIyay kAntAya ) – madhyamAvati

—-

* Trichy Sankaran – Wow.  Every thing was super class. Tani Avartanam, included.

* Brilliant abhOgi swaras. Very refreshing approach.

*GNB tribute ( on his birth anniversary) by singing Ananda Natesa on thOdi and his composition in kuntalavarali ( too much of khamas shades, in their singing)

*Compelling neraval for simhendra madhyamam. Another impressive kalpana swara. Some innovative take, possibly by omitting sa and pa ( ?? ) which gave a very different experience. I was pretty sure, that was not a grahabhedam they tried, but I could be wrong.

*Natakurinji alapana, especially the initial phrases were beautiful. Tanam accompanied by percussion, but at most places it was like an extension of the alapana. Again, very sensitive and sensible approach by Sri Trichy Sankaran.

 

Malladi Brothers, Nadasurabhi Annual Festival , 03 Nov 2018

Vocal : Malladi Brothers ( Sriram Prasad & Ravikumar)

Violin : Nishant Chandran

Mrudangam : Tumkur Ravishankar

Ghatam : S N Narayana Murthy

List :

01 taruNi ninnu (varNam ) – kAmbOji – Adi – Fiddle Ponnuswamy ( O )

02 nArada gurusvAmi – darbAr – Adi – Thyagaraja ( A,S )

03 entani nE varNintunu – mukhAri – rUpakam – Thyagaraja ( N,S )

neraval & svara @ ‘ kanulAra sEvinci kammani phalamula nosagi’

04 shLOkam ( shrIman nrusimha vibhavE garuDa dhwajAya ) – mohanam

narasimha AgacchA – mOhanam – mishrachap – Dikshitar ( S @murahara nagadhara)

05 dhyAnamE varamaina – dhanyAsi – Adi x 2 – Thyagaraja ( A,N,S,T )

neraval & svara @ ‘dhyAnamE varamaina gangAsnAnamE rAma-‘

06 sharavaNabhava ennum – SaNmukhapriya – Adi – Papanasam Sivan

07 RTP – nATakurinji – khaNDa tripuTa, pUrvAngam in tisra naDai & uttarAngam in chaturashra nAdai , samam eDuppu

pallavi line ‘ sadA gOpAlakrSNam bhajEham, sAmaja vara gamanam’

rAgamAlika svaras in ‘AbhOgi, saraswati, vasanta, vAsanti, sAma, hindOlam, nATakurinji

08 bhAvamulOna bAhyamunandunu – shudha dhanyAsi – Adi – Annamacharya

09 sadA enna hrdayadalli – behAg – rUpakam – Vijaya Vittala Dasa ( short sketch )

10 pUraya mama kAmam – bilahari – Adi – Narayana Theertha

11 antA rAma mayam – varALi – Adi – Bhadrachala Ramadas

12 shLOkams – madhyamAvati

Very fulfilling concert. It is one of such days when everything fallen in line. There was very good coordination among all the artists, the sound levels were comfortable and Tumkur Ravishankar was fantastic. Nice selection of ragas and compositions to add to the overall good feeling.

Started 10 min late due to the late arrival of the percussion artist, who was delayed due to the Saturday evening traffic. A brisk varnam(  repeat of last year ) in kAmbOji.  Short alapana in darbar by the senior of the duo, no violin return, moved on to a beautiful rendition of nArada guruswami. Of all the darbar compositions of Thyagara, this has a different feel. They sang it brilliantly , the kriti as well as the swaras that followed. A moving mukhAri, in entani nE. Fabulous neraval and kanulara sevinci. Both the singers worked around the ‘karunala sevinci’ words with some impressive takes. The words and lines are very clear when they sing, the meaning stands out. Fitting swaras too.

A shlokam ( lakshmi narasimha strotram) before narasimha Agaccha. I thought, they sing it a notch faster than usual, or it felt so probably because the other two prior to this were slower. Swara was sung at the madhyamakala sahityam, with some quick wordplay around murahara nagadhara. Dhanyasi main with a detailed long alapana by Ravikumar. Very classy, most of the phrases were in the higher octaves, typical progression. A minute or two to explain the composition before dhyaname varamaina.  Going with the earlier explanations, they decided to do the neraval at the pallavi line, executed commendably.  Two speed swaras with some good phrases. Tumkur Ravishankar and S N Narayanaswamy played a very good tani avartanam, I am becoming a fan of Narayana Murthy now. The percussion duo played brilliantly through out the evening.

A pallavi was sure to come and he announced it on Krishna on the occasion of upcoming deepavali. Good natakurinji alapana shared between both the singers. Nishant Chandran played an outstanding alapana in his turn. Good tanam, slow, leisurely sung to maximize the impact and well received. Pallavi with trikalam was executed well , long chain of ragamalika swaras alternated between one of the singers and repeated by violin. The concluding part of the swaras , back in nAtakurinji, wasn’t done well,  as Ravikumar slipped , stopped, regrouped a couple of times. He was referring to some written notes ( surprising) and he seemed to have missed the footing and struggled a bit, before landing it perfectly.

Post main was , as expected, consisted of compositions of Annamacharya, Bhadrachala Ramadas and Narayana Theertha apart from a devarnama. They were all sung well, a short alapana of behag was nice. A very balanced and well executed concert.

 

 

Malladi Brothers @ Nadasurabhi Annual Festival , 04 Nov 2017

Vocal : Malladi Brothers ( Sriram Prasad&Ravikumar)

Violin : Nishant Chandran

Mrudangam : Tumkur Ravishankar

Ghatam : S N Narayana Murthy

List:

01 ninnE kOriyunnAdE (varNam) – kAnaDa – Adi – Pallavi Gopala Iyer ( A,S )

02 pancamAtangamukha – malahari – rUpakam – Dikshitar  ( O,S )

03 adE cUDare mOhana rUpam – mOhanam – Adi – Annamacharya ( A,S )

04 nADaDina mATa – janaranjani – Mishra Chap – Thyagaraja  ( N,S )

neraval & swara @ talaku vaccina bAdha talapAgaku sEtu’

05 ninna nODi dhanyanAdenO – pUrvikalyANi-rUpakam- Purandara Dasa ( A,N,S )

neraval & swara @ ninna nODi dhanyanAdenO hE shrInivAsa

06 shLOkam ( gAngEyam vahnigarbham) – mukhAri  ( O )

kaNNAra kaNDEnE kadirvElanai – mukhAri – Adi – Neelakanta Sivan

07 mahitA pravrddhA shrImati – kAmbOji – tishra triputa – Thyagaraja (A,N,S,T)

neraval & swara @’ mahita pravrdhha shrImati guha gaNapati janani’

08 jAnaki ramaNa – kApi – Adi – Vanamala jIyar ( O )

09 bhaja bhagavantam ramaNam kAntam – rAgamAlika – Lakshmana Kavi ( O-dEsh)

10 shrIrAma jayarAma shrngArarAma- yadukulakAmbOji – Khandachap – Thyagaraja

11 shiva shiva bhava sharaNam – saurAStram – Adi -Narayana Theertha

12 shLOkam ( mangaLam kOsalEndrAya) – madhyamAvati

Impeccably planned and executed concert by the pair. Whole variety of composers and ragam , cleverly chosen. Full marks to them for that. Also, almost everything was ‘baroque’d with an alapana here, swara prasthara or neraval. One get a wholesome feeling, despite the missing RTP. Very well done.

These days, new varnams are being pushed back in circulation. Sanjay is paioneering that effort and it is heartening to see Malladi Brothers sing an Adi Tala varnam in Kanada. There was a 2-3 minute alapana in kAnaDa and I was almost humming nera nammiti. Pallavi Gopala Iyer’s varnam was not heard in concert. There was few rounds of kalpana swaras at the end. Malahari kriti was ok, so was the short mOhanam alapana. Annamacharya composition tuned by Nedunuri garu ( the clue could be from the pallavi line) was nice.

Janaranjani was brilliantly sung, with a good neraval and decent kalpana swaras and that also helped in lifting the concert to the next level. Sriram Prasad, spoke on the importance of the composition’s bhava and the importance of lyrics. Purvikalyani alapana was fairly lengthy and very well sung. Nishant Chandran, I thought was very good in his return. Purandara Dasa devarnama was a surprise. There was an elaborate neraval at the pallavi line, with some emphasis on ‘he shrInivAsa’. Again, another detailed swaraprasthara.

They started a slow mukhari alapana and suddenly the hopes were raise for a muripemu. But that was short lived as he started a shLoka on Subramanya. Soon, we were scratching our head on a ‘Subramanya kriti’ in mukhAri, and we could not come up with one. Neelakanta Sivan’s kriti was again a pleasant surprise. Interestingly, this time they decided not sing any swaras ( all the previous 5 including the varnam was followed up with swaras).

Ravikumar started kAmbOji alapana. A wonderful effort, brilliantly portrayed the kAmbOji in its full. Nishant Chandran played good return. Lalgudi pancharatna kriti of Thyagaraja was again a welcome change. There was some hiccup in the middle but had a wonderful neraval , yet again at the pallavi line. Kalpana swaras started well in slow speed and progressed to second speed. Ravikuar had a couple of missteps in his calculation and had got it right after a couple of attempts. Tumkur Ravishankar and Narayana Murthy played an impressive tani avartanam. They percussion team was very good through out the evening. I usually like Ravishankar’s accompaniment.

Of course, there was no time for a pallavi. However, they sang some good post main kritis, starting with their schools staple, jAnaki Ramana. A kriti of Lakshmana kavi was set to tune by their father Malladi SuruBabu garu, featured next after a sweet little desh sketch. Thyagaraja kriti in Yadukulakamboji and Narayana Theertha’s saurAshtram concluded the concert with the mangala shlokam. Again, probably for the first time, I am listening to the mangalam kOsalendraya shlokam in full. Very good concert by the Brothers yesterday.

 

Malladi Brothers, Nadasurabhi Annual Festival 4th Nov 2016

Vocal : Malladi Brothers

Violin : Chrulatha Ramanujam

Mrudamgam : Tumkur Ravishankar

Morsing : B Rajasekhar

List:

01 sAmi daya jUDa (varNam) – kEdAragauLa – Thiruvottiyur Thyagayya

02 paramEshvara jagadIshvara shankara – nATa – Dikshitar ( S )

03 lEkanA ninnu – asAvEri – Thyagaraja ( A )

04 kAshi vishAlAkSim bhajEham – gamakakriya(purvikalyANi) – Dikshitar ( A,N,S )

neraval & swara @ kAshipuranivAsinIm kAmita phaladAyinIm’

05 shrI kAmAkSi – dEvagAndhAri – Spencer R Venugopal

06 chalamElarA sAkEtarAmA – mArgahindOLam – Thyagaraja

07 tanayuni brOva – bhairavi –  Thyagaraja ( A,N,S,T )

neraval & swara @ ‘ vatsamu veNTa dhEnuvu chAnunO vAridamunu gani pairulu chUnunO’

08 RTP – valachi –  khaNDa triputa x 2 kaLai , +1 eDuppu

pallavi line ” shivadhyAnam gAnam abhiSEchanam, parama pada sAdhanam sadA-‘

rAgamAlika swaras in shrIranjani, shankarAbharaNam, jog?

09 dharma shravaNa vidatakE – durga – Purandara Dasa

10 navanIta hOrA namO namO – chenchurutti – Annamacharya

11  sadA enaa hrdayadalli – behAg – Vijaya Vittala Dasa

12 maraLi maraLi jaya mangaLAm – madhyamAvati – Annamacharya

shLOkam ( shrI rAmachandrAha ) – surutti

I have been missing concerts for a while and could not make it to the first three concert of this annual fare. Varnam was concluding as I entered, but my better half was there to tell me it was kEdAragaula.

Concert in all was good with very innovative selection of kritis and raga. And for the fat,it did not have the long chain post pallavi. Though I liked the overall concert, few areas weren’t smooth for me. But first what was good.

Natta kriti , it has a very nice structural construct to it and sound very refreshing. Not the typical nATa drags. A very similar kalpana swara takes were impressive. But  the transition from Sriram to Ravi wasn’t great. Some thing was amiss there. Some of the swara phrases were brilliant, though.

Whenever I have a chance to discuss possible choices of raga in a concert, I always put forward an asAvEri and gauLa for some detailed treatment. So, when I heard the start of an asaveri alapana, it gave me goosebumps. It was short and pretty nice, with an ever shorter return from Charulatha. Lekana was a nice, and to my dismay there was no swaras ( leave alone neraval) here.

Poorvikalyani alapana from Ravi was pretty impressive, some of the higher octave alapanas were awesome. Charulatha did a commendable job in her turn too. To make it a grand affair, kAi vishlakshi ( choice for the day) had a classy neraval and some detailed kalpana swaras.

Two small pieces before the main. The devagandhari kriti of Spencer Venugopal was very good. I liked the way it was composed and sung. Pallavi line structure  was brilliant. Some thing like 1-3-9 concept. Chalamelara was dud.

Sriram started bhairavi alapana. He, possibly, was having some difficulties with his throat, hence sang most of his part in lower , small phrases. Ravi took it over singing the longish, higher octave parts. Overall not very impressive. I expected them to sing, upacharamu jese, but tanayuni brova was brilliant choice. I haven’t heard it concert for a long long time. Neraval was done at the complete line, so was the kalpana swaras. They were good, but nothing of a grand affair. Tani avartanam followed. Tumkur Ravishankar in his typical style and Rajashekhar impressed the audience with his tiny instrument and some clever sounds.

A pallavi was sure to make an appearance. Valachi/valaji was the choice and this was far better. Both alapana and tanam were top class , again Ravikumar stole the vocal part. Charulatha had a field day. Her alapana and tanam received enthusiastic responses. Tanam was mesmerising from her. I loved the pallavi line. Not sure if it is created by them or inherited from their Guru. Pallavi itself was very very good. Trikalam was done with such good control. The kalpana swaras as well asthe ragamalika swaras were good. And most importantly, they gave it ample time and did not rush it through.

Charulatha was in supreme form. I liked almost every thing she did last evening. Not sure if it was because of the effect in the hall; there was a little reverb for the violin, creating an awesome effect. Ravishankar and Rajashekhar were pretty decent through out.

Post main , luckily, wasn’t a long and never ending. Couple of Annamayya compositions and a devarnama constituted the most of it.  Good concert, loved for some refreshing list of ragas and kritis.