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Vocal: Vishnudev Namboothiri
Violin : Parur Ananthakrishnan ,son of Parur MA Sundareswaran
Mrudangam : Tanjore Praveen kumar, grandson of Late Tanjore Upendran
Ghatam : DV Venkatasubramaniam
Tambura Support : ??
Concert Type : Nirvana - no concert to follow / Free Concert
Day/Duration : Sunday/ 2 hours
Hall/sabha : BVB Mini Hall , Mylapore/ Karthik Fine Arts
01. inta mOdi- saranga - Thiruvottiyur Thyagaraja
02. nAdhasudha rasa (S) - Arabi - T
- 4 mins swaras
- 7 mins alapana and 5 mins violin return
- 5 mins swaras
- AajAnu bhagu shree janaki pathi for 6 mins
- 15 mins alapana and 10 mins violin return
- 9 mins neraval in shree padmanAbha sarasijalOchanA
- 13 mins swaras
06. AAdum chidambaramO - behag - GKB
07. dheem tada dhAni... neevE nannu..mahadeva - rAgeshri - LGJ
This is the first occassion I am hearing Vishnudev Nambhoothiri in a live concert . Though the concert was an evening II concert but it was exactly boxed for 120 minutes. Sabhas like BVB are holding day long events so to an extent this is the norm. I found vishnudev extremely competent in giving a rich classical music.I would like to put vishnu in few bracketed musicians where even for 2 hours they are able to give great content with charge and drive.
Vishnu started with sAranga , there was bit of sound imbalance but still a great delivery. Arabi is one of the finest #2 drops to me and he presented with a focus where voice was driving with brigas . Even if I did not know that he is from Semmangudi (which any way I knew because i am reading reviews in internet) it was dead easy to spot semmangudi school in his arabi. There are some ragas like dhanyasi where it is easy to squat and take voice rest . I loved his throw in dhanyasi , definitely this dhanyasi showed how one has to concentrate on atleast two fundamentals - drive with sruthisuddham and also let voice lead without excess hangover with violin return.Dhanyasi alapana with swaras and rare sivan krithi gave a lot of cerebral pluses in my head.Madhyamavati with a quick neraval again brought in srinivasa Higher especially with his neraval AjAnu bhAghu he indeed had a style strictly as semmangudi-psn way
While most of his numbers did have a great drive with voice and shruthi , I heard and spotted vishnudev slightly moving from semmangudi land to a KVN land with his charukesi. Nice sowkhyam as the voice was beaten well . Charukesi alapana with the expected swathi krithi -kripAlaya shourE . Swati krithi kripAlaya shourE is only taken as main not AdamOdi but he did give a fresh quote of exuberance for me. Neraval bit reminded of early days narayanaswamy, swaras came out very well with nice patterns .
Time was short but he did not show signs that he was winding for the sake of OC audience . The drive of Aadum chidambarAmO in behag was clean . Mylapore had a closure with Lalgudi rAkeshri thillana for this evening II concert, incidentally few hours back in an evening I concert sudha closed with the same Rakeshri thillana in another popular mylapore sabha that i did not attend. Bottomline both evening I and evening II had a great M(L)AlgoodyPour rAkeshri closure.
parur Ananthakrishan , I am chasing him in quick succession played quite like his father prior to main, quick returns in swaras in dhanyasi was nice. His returns in alapana in charukesi was way too long and did eat up possibly bit more drive of charukesi from vishnu . The man of the match was for sure Tanjore Praveen kumar . This musician Praveen is grand son of Tanjore Upendran. I think he was only born after Upendran Sir passed away, Upendran comes from palakkad mani school. Praveen has learnt primarily from Pazhani school, i think he majorly learnt from guruvayur dorai .
We talk how Palakkad Raghu blended both Pazhani and Palakkad Mani Iyer schools, are we in the process of repeat of history where Tanjore Praveen Kumar will give a great blend of both pazhani and Palakkad schools. Not even one HIT but still a blend of great patterns with lovely sunaadham like Palani. Praveen Sparsh felt the volume was low for ghatam and with sound engineer not being there, he even gave his right microphone to ghatam artist. Then when Praveen joined the tani for rest of the tani, he either forgot to take the microphone back or decided purposefully not to take it back. We all heard in BVB mini hall praveen tani even without the microphone with wonderful clarity. That was a great proof after many many years of theory - Palakkad mani iyer is right that mrudangam does not need microphone.That tani without microphone was a palakkad mani iyer school showcase by Praveen.
Vishnudev brings in abundance his paramaguru semmangudi in his approach , be it krithi or alapana or neraval or swaras ,Vishnu was adequately in the zone of his parama guru Srinivasa Higher. Praveen has mrudanga Sparshtam and I will watch Praveen for his future mrudu angam exuberance. Personally I am glad that vishnudev has moved to chennai and not stayed in kerala.
Overall an excellent concert for 2 exact hours.