Went to attend Sanjay Subrahmanyam’s carnatic vocal concert at Keyes High School, Secunderabad. The concert was organized by Kalasagaram as a part of its 38th Annual Cultural Festival of Music, Dance and Drama. Details of the concert are as follows:
Accompaniment:
Violin: M.R. Gopinath
Mridangam: Neyveli B. Venkatesh
Ghatam: Trichy K. Murali
List of songs:
1) varnam (vanajAkshA) – rItigowla – kanda ata – veena kuppaiyer
2) nenaruncharA – simhavAhini – Adi – thyAgarAja
3) siva siva – pantuvarAli – Adi – thyAgarAja
4) mallAri – gambhiranAttai – kanda triputa
5) mAmavasadA – kAnadA – rUpakam – swAti tirunAl
6) shankarAchAryam – shankarAbharanam – Adi – subbarAma dIkshitar
Had to leave at this point of time to get back to ISB. Sanjay was singing rAga varAli when I was coming out. I think he was planning to sing a “rAgam tAnam pallavi” in that rAga.
Sanjay, as usual, sang well though I felt he had a real sore throat today and looked struggling with his voice at times. The concert was organized in a “pandal” (big tent) in the school grounds. I was sitting in one of the last few rows and the audio system used was so bad that whenever Sanjay tried to do voice modulation and lowered the volume of his voice, people lost him completely. The worst part was when the mridangist tried to just play the left side of his instrument for some time and the mic was not picking up anything at all. Only the people in the first few rows could hear what was being played. For about 30-40 seconds, all we could see (and hear) was just the mridangist shaking his head as though he was playing something really good without the audio part coming through. It was like watching a bollywood song on TV with mute on. Suddenly the people in few of the front rows started clapping and all the people at the back also chipped in without the slightest idea as to what was going on. It would have been really helpful had the organizers kept at least one speaker near one of the rows at the back.
The festival continues till 4th Dec 2005. Apart from schedule for music concerts that I mentioned in my last post, there are two dramas scheduled on the 3rd and 4th of Dec.
Ramkumar R 