Ram is the LA resident, Lalitha Ram is not related to him. Lalitha Ram is not a lady. Its a pseudonym used by a friend of mine Mr. Ramachandran who works in Bangalore. He gave me a complimentary copy of his new book this morning.

It's in Tamil, so it may not be readable by all of us, but it contains a lot of memorable information and anecdotes which the author has taken pains to collect from first hand sources. 176 pages.

Hi folks,

Can any of you provide details on how I can purchase these books and DVD from the US.

Thanks,
K. Kumar.

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It's great to see GNB at the intro page.

Never realized I share my birthday with this great maestro! (I guess it's time for me to move out of the bathroom singing stage and try out some brisk brigas...

Btw, srkris: GNB's death-date is 1 May 1965.

Thanks for the information, I also replaced the image with a better one.

srkris - GNB looks a bit tired in this photo. I liked the previous one better.

Btw, is there some place we can access the earlier images (of other musicians)?

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Deleted

What a nice op-ed piece!

I am coming to this page, after travelling with the admirers of MDR, whom i worshipped, though i am one of the cousins of great GNB. I dint have much time to hear any music till abt 68-69. I was drawn to music
much later when there was not so much of tapes etc (were costly too) available and I was going to concerts
when i cud spare time. once when i heard MDR i could not come out, I became his parama rasika. Like me, there were many.
i wud share some of my knowledge on shri GNB and his "style".

Flg are found as GNB"s in a book in tamil "an index on compositions of carnatic music" compiled by mr p.v.gopalakrishna Iyer - Gitanjali art printers ,santhome, in addn. to what is stated in this page 1.
bhava padula-kamboji-adi
indha thamasa-kannada-rupakam
indha parakela-janaranjani-rupakam
innamum eno-denuka-aadhi
un puhazhai naan-yadukula kamboji-adi
eththanai naal indha- -do-
kurai theerkha-vardhani-adi
nannu brocheva-sahana-adi
mamava maathanghi-reetigowla-rupakam
maa ramanan-thodi-adi
nayeda-begada-chapu
ninnadi-kaanada-rupakam
ninne nambi-mukhari-adi
nee paadamulanu-sahana adi
perumaiyai-hindola vasantham-adi
padha saarasamulu-kamboji-adi
sri vijaya-vijaya nagari-adi
thaaladuva-bairavi-rupakam
raja rajeswari-bairavi-adi
vihasite poorna-poorna chandrika-adi
sarangadhara-sarnga-rupakam
yaar yennai-danyasi-adi
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in addn to abv, i hv in my note one "nandheesam vandhe-rishabappriya"
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pls check/guide
luvs/rgs

Unfortunately P.V.Gopalakrishna Iyer does not provide references for any of the entries in his Index book.
He does mention the help he received from S.Kalyanaraman and D.Krishnaswami.
Also mentioned are SKR's disciples Smt.Leela, Smt.Brinda Venkataraman, Selvi Kulabhushani etc.

Lakshman- when i was talking to mr kalyanaraman during 87 or 88, (he wasone of my good friends in those
days) he said the details are correct.
to all: once mr s kalyanaraman sang a very nice aarabi/naadasudaarasa and its neraval "veda puraanaagama" i said it was the best i hv heard so far and he said "you are unlucky- you should hv heard from
my master this song"
in a.vikatan abt 50 yrs before they were writing "Ivargal sandhithaal" - how the discn wud be .... I remember 3 articles.
shri
ariyakkudi and maharajapuram viswanaatha iyer
gnb and madhurai mani iyer
sivaji ganesan and mgr
-- abt GNB i wont forget one thing.
around 1955 he came to my native place (mannargudi) to gv a marriage concert. i was around 16 then. my
mother was telling me that gnb is his cousin visalam's son. it was enough. i went to the house where he was
resting and introdued myself. he first offered me the tiffin and said "it is longtime since i saw yr mother. will
you bring her to the concert". my mother generally wont go out and i said i wud be there with my father,as he
had already recd the invitation. we attended the concert. (a nice kamboji - i remember). before he was driven to kumbakonam to catch the train he came to our house and was sitting with my mother for a very longtime and chatting abt the old days and the accompanying artists (I think shri lalgudi & shri u.sivaraman) were
seeing their watches !. if i had known their greatness, i wud hv prostrated them min 3/4 times. i was a good singer (no learning sono sa pa sa). when they were leaving my mother asked him ifhe would take me (oh
poor mothers) and keep me as his sishya "ivanai un sishyanaa eduthukkiriya"?. he said that it is very competitive field, there are mny who are suffering in this field,let him qualify and get into some job and then
think of music field.
--
frm a sabha secretary i heard that once for a concert he was approached by someone, 1500 for him, 1000. gn for both violin and mridagam. gnb replied "give me 1000, give PMI 1000 and LJ 500. whn askd abt it he replied
PMI is a great artist, he deserves more and he wil make the concert a success. No wonder they just loved him.
-
Many a time, i cud see GNB in shri sanjay subramanyam.
--
Krishna gana sabha organised a send off party to GNB when he was to leave for Trivandrum (abt 63/64) many artists came and i remember shri veena balachander said "the gain to trivandrum is a loss to madras"
it was the last time we saw him in mds.
----

Great New Bhani (GNB)!! I have heard this from one of the most acclaimed musician.

Coming back to his compositions, I have seen a documentary in Doordarshan where Shri Semmangudi (SSI) talks for a few mins about Shri GNB.
Some of the excerpts from the documentary are as below:
1) GNB was an educated and intelligent man
2) GNB used to use variety of taalams in his concert
3) GNB used his education effectively to kindle creativity and innovation in his music
4) GNB never used to sing his own compositions in his concerts etc etc..
Finally SSI commented on GNB's compositions: Once SSI asked GNB as to why isn’t he singing his own compositions.GNB's response was "if the compositions had life, then they will be popularised by his sishyas and their sishyas".Today GNB's compositions are being sung by many many musicians and are popular. Thanks to GNB's family for publishing the compositions and making it available for the public.

Another amazing quality of GNB was not to leave any mudhra on his compositions. This shows his self confidence and selflessness.

However there was one exception of GNB NOT rendering his own composition: GNB once rendered the kriti - paramakripa sagari - yadukulakambodhi in one of his concerts. I have heard this song and it is a very good one .

GNB was one of the most successful concert musicians and I used to ponder on the influences of a composer (vagayakarar) in his concert delivery. I consider there were quite a few influences of a composer in his concerts especially in making many kritis looking stunningly brilliant, attractive & popular. GNB's pronuniciation when he delivered the kritis was amazing.
GNB has also introduced many new kritis all through his career and popularized many rare ragas (malavi, dhenuka, dakka etc). I believe GNB was the one who had set the chittaswarams for Swaminatha Paripalayamam - Nattai - Dikshitar.I also heard that GNB was responsible for the chittaswarams for sobillu - jaganmohini . Can anyone confirm the sobillu sapthaswara part please.

On the other hand GNB's compositions are so elegant because of his hands on experience in kriti delivery and handling so many kritis. The compositions bring out clearly the characteristics of the raga and the kritis are so meaningful. I heard from someone that he was not telugu literate , but has composed so many songs in telugu. I think Goddess Saraswati has blessed GNB with such great skills/talents.GNB is really a prodigy, genius etc etc..(may be we will run out of words here!).

I also believe that GNB used to scribble the verses/his thoughts in pieces of paper in the night and the next day the same will be compiled by his illustrious sishyas as a composition and they would do the notation for these compositions.
Can I request GBR to confirm this please?


Any comments on the vagayakarar's influences in his concert delivery and vice versa?

gnb composed many songs including few new innovations but there is no MUDHRA for each songs.He did not note down the compositins with him, but taught to their deciples on that day itself.He is to put the notations in one raga and thala simeltaniously.he never changed them from one to another. the first form itself will be fine.

according to his close associates, the number goes nearly 100 plus. but only 80 compositions are published and released so far.all the 3 books are available in Karnataka Book House in Chennai. if you want i can give all contact details. they are sending to overseas also.

The Karnataka Book center,No.14,Sripuram 1st. Street,Near Ajantha Hotel, Royapettah,Chennai. 600014,India. further inf. will be sent later.

gbb sir:
Did tanjAvUr ShrI S kalyANarAman publish a book by himself other than the one he co-edited w/ ShrI TVR sir? The reason I ask is that Smt. S Bhagyalekshmy in her Index of 4000 Songs in Karnatic Music has mentioned some songs not published before and she credits ShrI kalyANaraman as the source for the info. Are the lyrics/audio for these available?

I did see the books on one shelf on my recent visit there about a month-and-a-half ago. They have quite a decent number of copies. Yes, they do ship internationally.

Thanks for Meena for the article about Sri.GNB and also for 2 others appeared about him. I would like to add some thing about one RTP in the raga SAHANA sung by him.The details are:
-GNB with Sri Lalgudi and Sri Mosaiah- a local Mrindangam player.
-Place- Nanjancode=a marriage concert.
-Tape used-a old one- the tapes were costly and not freely available at that time and they used to record again and again on it.May be the reason for the quality of the tape.
-the quality is very below average-with lot of disturbances and volume variations.Except for the Pallavi-it is audible.The Raga alapana,swaras and ragamaliga swaras were excellent.
-it was up loaded in Rasigapriya web site some time ago.
-I thought it was omitted to mention in the article.May be it was written long time ago.
This is for Sri GNBs rasikas information.
I would like to add some interesting things happend in his concerts for the sake of his rasikas interst some time later if they like to know.Awaiting for the response.

gbb
GB Bhuvaneswaran ??
if yes , Welcome Sir !!
Welcome to the elder brother of GB Rajasekhar.
We all owe a lot to you and your family for the wonderful gifts of your fathers music, which we play here in this forum.We would be delighted to meet you at our next rasikas meet scheduled for March 18th.
We just fixed up the artist yesterday - more on that in the general section-GS Mani.
While describing a rare moment with Bade Ghulam Ali Khan and GNB , GS Mani recollected a 5 minute alapana of Andolika , sung for Bade saab, who was to sing a 40 minute version later in the evening.
" Ennamo Theriyale Appa, I have Listened to lots of masters in my day - many of them at close quarters- but somehow GNB used to make our blood race through our veins.this 5-minute alapana, as though he conjured up a diamond from his sleeve-like a magician-he effortlessly put it up for all of us to admire.
It was beyond description."
More on that story in the general section.
Welcome aboard !

Dear All,
Only 3 books were published-one by Sri GNB himself under the name Gana Bhaskara Manimali-notations checked by late.Sri T R Balasubramaniam (i956) Second by late Sri G.B.Doraiswamy-notations by late Sri T S Kalyanaraman and Sri V Ramachandran (1971) 3rd by GNB Foundation 92005) along with re publications of book 1 & 2.I do not know about the other books.For your information Sri T S K is also a good composer. He had composed one Thillana in the Raga Ghavathi also.( I saw some one was asking about the thillana in ghavathy raga) Few days ago, I was requesting Ms. Bhushany Kalyanaraman to publish his compositions soon.i will also will be too happy to know the details of other books on this subject.Pl. share the information to us to verify the correcness of the information.If it is correct , we will try to get the full details and publish them also.
I am delighted to go through this web site and along with my brother GBR I will share all interesting news about our father Sri GNB with you all.Sri GBR is activly participating in all the discussions and I will also share what little I know.Hope Sri Coolkarny will help me if I need any tech. help me to up load certain audios etc.I will be in touch with him soon.
To start with,I will try to up load fathers-compositions-6 varnams -except Varali varnam-,new innovations(according to our knowledge) and Tamil songs ( up dated up to 30/09/06) compiled by Sri GBR and myself.( of course with Mr coolkarnis help). Best wishes to all of you.

Sri GBB,
Welcome, and thank you for your generosity!

@srinivasasarma, I believe nandIsham vandE in rishabhapriyA is a composition of Dr.M.Balamuralikrishna, not G.N.B.