Suryaprakash@MFAC On Dec 18th,2021

[rajeshnat]

Suryaprakash@MFAC On Dec 18th,2021
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Vocal: Suryaprakash
Violin : B Ananthakrishnan
Mrudangam : Melakaveri Balaji
Kanjira: Sunil Kumar
Tambura : Sishya of Suryaprakash

Concert Type : Ticketed Combo -Non Nirvana - another concert to follow
Day/Duration : Saturday/ 16: 00 to 18 :10 pm
Hall : Mylapore Fine Arts Club
Caterers : Saastha Caterers

MFAC is an age old sabha that has retained and preserved their steady charm.Very recently in last 3 years or so they had airconditoned and made it surely more sound proof . It was one sabha like Brahma gana sabha where usually they have only one ticketed concert and they start at 6pm - no split of two evening slots. Slowly they have also morphed like NGS and Music Academy where they have made it two evening 1 and 2 concerts . Like Academy there is combo pricing for both concerts . This concert was a ticketed but since evening II follows it is understandable that they give 20 mins break or so betwen two concerts concerts.I could see more festivity for sure as the saastha caterers were catering to far wider audience . Dec festival main aathara sruti and layam is surely these caterers , quite frankly unless you have that ,audience will not make it that much. Possibly after 2 years of gap i also enjoyed the caterers bit more than say last few decades. Hopefully as life moves on , i keep my first interest in only CM , who knows ??

When 130 mins is given , i guess the team of musicians have to work backwards and present content rich as though it is a near 3 hour concert. Suryaprakash surely is a master to present more content in a limited timeset and he did that for sure.There was an approach of swaras with very longish patterns like say a TRS mama almost anchoring with one big go, aided by say a violinist teamplayer who played in essence the return and the team did keep me far more engaged with classical intensity.

In a concert mainly 3 numbers matters . They are submain with R N S no fracture and omission there with R S or N S , R N S T main where no touch and go for either N or S and one has to have a RTP. I got that , classicism is about continued intensity where you break the barrier of just not the touch up of rasa of say raga-tala bhavam, but a bit more of putting in a zone where you learn something and it goes bit deeper where you only discover much later what you have learnt . That is the joy of the greatest music ever in the world - that is carnatic music.

Review of What Matters Most
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03. kani KarumbuthO (R N S) - bhavani - Kalyani Varadarajan
9 mins alapana and 6 mins violin return
neraval in dhurita dhArini dhukka vAhini for 3 mins
swaras for 3 mins

04A. Thookiya thiruvadi (R N S T) - shankarabharanam - Suddananda bharathi
15 mins alapana and 6 mins violin return
neraval for 8 mins ethanaiyO ethanaiyO ethanaiyO ...................piravi edhuthEduthu ilaithen
swaras 10 mins
04B. tani for 16 mins

05. RTP in keeravani for 26 mins
Pallavi line -->> raghuvaram raghavam bhajEham seethA maNOharam
Swaras in keeravani + Gopriya + brindavani

Year on Year Dec season is some times a chase in every rasikas head of something that you have forgotten and start to recollect the forgotten.This happens as and when the singer sings, you know this is some raga around some cluster but you are not sure what the ragam is. Submain started with a brillant raga alapana , with few touchpoints in initiation with more kaarvais and melancholy rasa, i recognized the subhapantuvarali cluster .Then after few seconds ,I was assuming as he was singing it was bhavapriya . I completely forgot the bhavani ragam - possibly the first covid effect for me. What a ragam is bhavani, the singer announced the raga bhavani.

Bhavani raga alapana was well done as the alapana had a sharp kaarvai centric sangathis with more pointed brigas not just the singer even the crisp violinist who had a azhuttam like Prof TNK did that . Violinist can take the carnaticness and take it bit filmy but BAK refused to do that even for one note - more power to Ananthakrishnan . With bhavani raga .i thought when kani karumbuthO when it was on and i was thinking about a fairly brilliant composer kalyani varadarajan. Kalyani varadarajan may have tuned this krithi herself or did she take the help of say S kalyanaraman or TRS sir , i just dont know.These composers like kalyani varadarajan and say this year departed Tanjore Sankara iyers have cherry picked some ragas and they have given their understanding with trinities and papanasam sivan and created these master pieces. Kalyani varadarajan is a phenom vaggeyakkara for sure and thanks to few mahavidwans like SKR and TRS who bought into concert circuit with their musical conviction.

Some krithis like say a patnam subramania Iyer , they are so close to Thyagaraja krithi till the mudhra comes out you just are not sure who the composer only the keyword venkatesha or thyagaraja shows the difference. This bhavani krithi is one of a kind , lot of scope of adding lot of kaarvais with shorter phrases sequenced with fairly equi distance is a key to bringing more rasa for the singer to emote with more muse . The neraval was well done bit short but overall the song was sung was such high finesse as the voice opened out very well. Swaras were measured with fantastic anticipation by balaji, the melacauvery touch was gentle mela tapping of mrudhu without an iota of overbanging with his angam.

Main was shankarabharanam. The raga alapana was weighty with more semmangudi typecast assisted with sharpness of brigas. Shankarabharanam and his sister kalyani is a tricky raga to impress and keep me as a rasika as engaged say a KHP or bhairavi or todi . Usually sbharanam gives a lot of scope to squat and many times little mel kAla sangathis are generally passed and is given more to bit more boisterous step brother kambOdhi. Suryaprakash voice is showing far more strength in lower to middle register and melakartha 29 is a good example that his sangathi weight in alapana has moved distinctly with more quality in recent years. With the krithi on he sang very well.

Ganakaladhara school generally just takes one word and swings so distinctly - raga anubhavam embedded with so many laya patterns in neraval .Atleast two of ganakaladhara school come out more prominently with just one word out of the world neraval pattern . They are ithavu (of kapinarayani - sarasa samadhana fame), cheluvu (of charukEsi - adamodi galathE fame ). I had the same effect with ethanayO (of Shankarabharanam -Thookiya thiruvadi), so many ethanayO ethanayO ethanayO patterns with the same word ethanayO. Swaras came out of squat zone. Msamma , MMI and SSI generally sing very distinctly mel kaala sangathis so well in shankarabharanam . Suryaprakash adopted those typecasts and the swara pattern was lovely especially after kuraippu part when he went in one go like a taala raaga swaroopan TRS.

With roughly 30 mins post tani , i knew there will be RTP as evidently he saved time by not singing any fast filler.I was expecting bit shorter pallavi in cameo ragas like say revati or hamsanandi. But out came a lovely keeravani ragam, Suryaprakash will be known for keeravani for sure. The thyagi was B Ananthakrishnan who just nodded and skipped his ragam play and suryaprakash just sang the second half of ragam and went to a lovely crisp taanam. This pallavi line was nice , trikalam was done and the words were spaced right , some times too much of balti with way too many words in pallavi

Suryaprakash is one of the most organic swara singer and absolutely manodharmic .Particularly how does one sing swaras in full note ragas like Gopriya is a revelation of the skill of the vocalist . Gopriya i came to know thru him few years back where he said it is a full tone raga where there was some social media post where he sang in ladakh .He said then , the notes interval of gopriya is just the same between every note. It is so difficult to get the aadhara shadjam ,so you will fall easily when you sing as you lose your frame of reference . To compose a krithi is one thing , but how does a musician take a risk to sing gopriya in a ragamaliga pattern and that too sing bit as long as say a 80 percentile range of hamsanandi or a kapi ragamaliga with the decision appearing impromptu. The organic addition went from unknown gopriya to bit known brindavani and he did very well.

For this Gopriya and possibly 2 alapanas ,2 neravals and for all swaras almost every where excepting the first naatai , the concert was very high in aesthetics. For submain, main and RTP the team of BAK with such azhuttam and crisp proportion, the sarvalaghu mrudu taps of melacauvery along with sunil was excellent . Sunil joins a team of well set great kanjira artists of today.

[rajeshnat]

01. mahaganapathim(R,S) - nAttai - MD
brief ragasketch with swaras for 5 mins
02. lavanya rAmA - poornashadjam - T
<<What matters most>>

06. sangeetha sowbhagyamE - garland of ragamaligas - Suryaprakash
Check this viewtopic.php?p=348226#p348226 for more details
07. kandan karunai - bhimplas - Guhan

For the first song the volume or mrudangam especially left was bit high. I would have loved if SuryaPrakash had skipped the lavanya rama and possibly gone for a slokham/viruththam.No point just singing a shorter krithi without R or N or S . His garland of ragamaliga in sangeetha sowbhagyame has lot of contemporary socially relevant lines and he did well. The last song kandan karunai was sung with the MMI school gusto. The violinist B Ananthakrishnan is a team player , crisp returns and he is just giving great space with great azhuttam. BAK realizing vocalist needs more time and he skipping keervani alapanai in RTP was the greatest move . The play during songs by melakavery balaji had lot of great right left balance , he was responsive with the organic flow of songs. A bit more reduced first round of tani would have been better (that part appeared as a 3 hour concert). All said melacauvery balaji is surely getting into zone of excellence for krithi play. Sunil played very well and i liked his play in tookiya tiruvadi the most.

Season produces few first time rarities . It was the first time the joy of hearing gopriya as swaras and the caterer serving sapota kesari which i did not know . Sapota kesari was mostly rava kesari with a layer of sapota being added at last minute .Bhavani is just like some sapota peel over the bhavapriya which is rava kesari . If you ever goto MFAC in the next 10 days ,first order Sapota kesari.

All said "Goto LIve Concert Show PAtronage Without Excuses Series" (GLICSPAWES 2021 for short) concert #4 is done , 4 more to go.

Overall an excellent concert for 2 hours and 10 mins, packed as though it is 2 hour 40 mins concert