At Kalakshetra on 2nd December

This concert was on the occasion of the launch of the DVD of his guru Bhagavatulu Seetharama Sharma. The DVD was on naTTuvAngams. Dr. M. Balamuralikrishna was the chief guest. While speaking on the occasion, he said that TMK is the seventh descendant of the guru-sishya parampara of Tyagaraja. While the programme itself started at 6:30 pm, by the time the concert started after all the speeches, it was already 8:05 pm! But the concert that followed made it worth the wait! It was a classic TMK’s concert every moment of which was absolute bliss!

The last time (& incidentally, the first time too!) I had been to Koothambalam, Kalakshetra was for Sikkil Gurucharan & Anil Srinivasan’s concert in July. Summer had still not left Chennai and the stuffy atmosphere and the mosquitoes in the venue did not let me completely enjoy the aesthetic beauty of the auditorium. But this time, with a pleasant weather, no mosquitoes and a less crowd too had me taking an instant liking to the auditorium.

Accompanists:
R.K.Shriramkumar – Violin
Arunprakash – Mridangam

Concert Duration: 1.5 hrs

List of Songs:
1. SrI guruguhamUrtE – udayaravicandrikA – rAgA outline; swarams at SrI guruguha
2. dakshiNAmUrtE – SankarAbharaNam – a very brief AlApanA; swarams at sadA
3. RTP – kIravANI – tripuTa
pallavi: bramhaivAhamkila sadguru krpayA
swarams in sAmA, varALi, madhyamAvati
tani Avartanam
4. tandai tAyum nI (viruttam) – danyAsi, kalyANi, kApi, behAg
idudAnO tillai stalam – behAg
5. krSnam kalayasakhi – mukhAri
6. mangaLam kOsalEndrAya – mukhAri

I guess since the concert was on the occasion of TMK’s guru’s DVD launch, major part of the songs performed was on Guru. The first song, SrI guruguhamUrtE, was rendered in a slow pace making you instantly get soaked in the beauty of the composition and TMK’s singing. A good mix of slow and fast-paced kalpanaswarams in the end only added more grandeur to the rendition of the song. When TMK started the SankarAbharaNam AlApana, I thought that would be the main piece. But I was proved wrong when the AlApana concluded and another Dikshitar kriti followed it. This again was rendered in a leisurely pace and concluded with some nice rounds of swarams in the end. By then, I liked TMK’s singing on that day so much that I wouldn’t have minded even if tODi had been the main. 😉 But luck seemed to be completely on my side and it wasn’t tODi.

With an excellent AlApana (liked Shriramkumar’s too very much) and an out of the world tAnam which had Arun Prakash too joining in for the last few rounds of it, the entire RTP was excellent, with the rAgamalikA swarams in the end giving the RTP a fitting finale! After one round of swarams in sAmA, varALi and madhyamAvati, Shriramkumar & TMK continuously sang/played multiple rounds of swarams in each of those raagams, with beautiful transition from one rAgam to another, before coming back to kIravaNi swarams and ending with the pallavi line.

After such a great performance till then, it is needless to say that the concluding pieces, the classics of TMK that those are, were excellent too.

With the concert providing a great start to December, the month of music, it was a contented-me who left the auditorium. 🙂