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Vocal : Mavellikara Subramaniam
Violin : Vadakkanchery V Ravi (V V Ravi)
Mrudangam : Shertalai Ananthakrishnan
Morsing : AS Krishnan
Concert Type : Nirvana - no concert to follow / Free Concert
Day/Duration : Wednesday/ 2 hours and 40mins
Hall/Sabha : RAgasudha hall, nAdaInbam
01. vanajAkshA (varnam)(Ragasketch) - reetigowlai - Veenai Kuppaiyer
02. gaNapathE sugunAnidhE(R,CS,S) - janaranjani -HMB
- 3 mins alapana and 2 mins violin
- 6 mins swaras
- 9 mins alapana
- 6 mins violin return
- 6 mins swaras
- 5 mins alapana
- 3 mins violin return
- 2 mins swaras
06. mAmava meenAkshi (R) - varAli - MD
- 6 mins alapana
- 4 mins violin return
- 14 mins alapana
- 7 mins violin return
- 7 mins neraval in parama jnAnalatAlavAlam
- 7 mins swaras
08. anEnu VAtutEna???? venkataramana - bhageshri - PD
09. pavamana - mangalam -sowrashtram -T
Personally over a period of few years, I as a rasika have some unexplainable fondness to kerala based musicians (they need not be musicians with malayalam as mother tongue but just the domicile kerala).These musicians are more inside looking and I also have noticed a certain intensity that is deep and bit more sampradayam .They are more faithful to what they have learned with their gurus for bit longer time. Few years back when I heard one thamarakkad govindan nambuthiri in the same ragasudha, i just thought let me get a feel atleast once to hear Mavellikara Subramaniam. I was assuming he significantly learnt from semmangudi but almost the whole concert I hardly felt any semmangudi there
The start was clean with a slightly rough voice that did not appear well settled . That is where the raga devata reetigowlai helps , it has its own charm . The varnam in second speed was slightly jerky and bit off here and there but he managed it just well. Thanks to ragasudha sekar , no first half an hour sound aberration anomaly.
Mavellikara moved next to a brief sketch of alapana and followed with krithi of Mutthiah Bhagavathar - gaNapathE sugunAnidhE. With the alapana i was kind of 50 50 on poornacandirka and janaranjani and incidentally with the krithi he was just getting bit better . Voice throw was there but there was bit more roughness - no seasonitis problem there but it is WHAT IT IS . cittaswaras and kalpana swaras were bit measured in janaranjani , little more engagement in swarakalpana with fellow artist and chemistry would have helped .
What a joy to hear his vilambit in lalitha. Lalitha is serenity at its classical best, the raga contours by this vidwan was very watchful. He came up with lovely spread of muse and the krithi was well done . The way he started with lalitha... brovu lalitha ... nannu brovu lalitha had brought an approach that was bit unlike Mavellikara (What do i know about mavellikara vocalist , I am hearing and he was just 20 mins into my ears then ) but the vocalist had a vilambit typecast which was more like another dead vidwan Manjapra Devesa Bhagavathar. Neraval and swaras were well done , he kept up his creativity and he did not sag at all .
Post vilambit till main shankarabharanam it was bit of SO SO. The Arabi he tried channelizing bit more drive to give more power but the krithi with alapana was not that great . Shree ranjani was perhaps used as a quick filler but he did not impress me that well.
THis vidwan again showed class not that high as lalita but for a significant part in the main krithi shankarabharanam , there was class. Alapana appeared bit still but he raised his voice to create nice curves for melakartha #29. ShankarAcharyam had a nice distilled rasa of shankarabharanam , it is a difficult krithi and he managed it well with an appealing combination of Abharana neraval with a nice sAhitya plead to Shankara. Swaras were strictly in madhyakAla , I felt he made attempts here and there towards Srinivasan of Semmangudi but NO LUCK there on melakartha #29
The preceding varAli had a heavy duty alapana start.The very abrasive rasa of varAli which is the defining swaroopam of this beautiful raga was touch and go . He went into a nice krithi mAmava meenakshi and showed a little higher shade of W(un?)anted intellectual choice .Shankarabharanam was following varAli and with two back to back heavy krithi choices of mAmava meenAkshi and Shankaracharyam, I did miss a change of tempo in between there.
The last krithi, I am assuming was bhageshri and had the Purandara dasa mudhra , few words like venkataramana that he stressed , he appeared that he was part of the team that tuned the Annamacharya krithi from the copper plates.The krithi was annamAcharyaish purandaradasa krithi. I missed atleast one or two thukkadas from ente keralam land but unfortunately none of them came.
V V Ravi was showing his experience and for these kind of voclist and more importantly choice of ragas his bowing was clean with right bhavam. I especially liked his slow and careful bhavam of shankarabharanam he just brought in measured and distilled essence of shankarabharanam. There is this V V S or V V R bow where they spend bit more time for few ragas without rushing to give a more divine tone , Ravi was there in the league of his annA for spA aranam.
With vadakkancheri supporting mavellikara , shertalai did not let down vadakkancheri and mavellikara.Ananthakrishnan played very appropriately .He also gave a a little more contrasting drive which was very well registered with me where he pushed the vocalist subtly more drive. Ananthakrishan from shertalai is a great team player and knows to callibrate well with musicians . AS krishnan gave MoreSing time , i was thinking when spA aranam as main ,AS Krishna may get into thamizh isai seergazhi govindarajan mode for a shankaracharyam krithi , but that did not happen . All said all the three team members gave more impetus to Mavellikara. Special thanks to Jaya Balakrishnan, patron of NaadaInbam to feature this artist.
We all can crib why there is 3000 concerts in the season ,but assuming if there is 2999 concerts that one extra concert that was dropped may just have been vidwan Mavellikara Subramaniam. Looking at the crowd for this whole concert I am just wondering if facebook is working in Kerala .
Overall a very good concert for 2 hours and 40 mins.