TM Krishna @ Gayana Samaja

On 19th Jan attended a concert of TMK at Gayana Samaja, Bangalore as part of the 3rd edition of Aanandaa Cultural festival. Aanandaa is a non-profit foundation that helps promote Indian Classical Performing Arts globally. The theme for the day was "Compositions of Muthuswamy Deekshitar". TMK was accompanied by HK Venkatram on the violin, Shri Trichy Shankaran on the mrudangam and Shri B S Purushottaman on the Khanjira.

The concert commenced with a brief presentation on 'Muthusawmy Deekshitar' by a sprightly and enthusiastic young lady called Priyanka Prakash. It included information regarding his ancestors, his contribution to Carnatic classical music, various features of his compositions, differences between the ragams he has composed on, etc.

TMK began his performance at 18.30 sharp, as planned. During his first song, his throat seemed to be in some discomfort as he was frequently clearing it. It seemed to us as though it was one of his off days. But much to our (and probably his as well) relief, our apprehension was short lived. From the very next rendition, he hit top form. In the main piece "Shree Subramanyaya Namaste" in Kamboji, he struck a purple patch. He took the audience from unfathomable depths to dizzy heights with his expansive exploration of this majestic ragam. HK Venkatram beautifully matched him phrase for phrase. Trichy Sankaran and Purushottaman played a mesmeresing and resounding thani avartanam that had the packed audience asking for more, so much so that TMK had to wait for the claps to die down before he could resume with the closing phrase.

His performance included the following:-

01.) dakSiNAmUrttE vidaLita dAsArttE - shankarAbharaNaM/mishra jhampa
02.) paHncabhUta kiraNAvaLiM candra mauLiM - kiraNAvaLi/khaNDa EkaM
03.) kamalAmbAM bhajarE rE mAnasa - kalyANi/Adi (2 kaLai)
04.) vINApustaka dhAriNIMAshrayE - vEgavAhini/mishra jhampa
05.) vAtApi gaNapatiM bhajEhaM - hamsadhvani/Adi
06.) vINAbhEri vENuvAdyAdi - AbhEri/Adi
07.) rAmacandrabhaktaM bhaja mAnasa - gEya hEjjajji/Adi
08.) shrI subrahmaNyAya namastE namastE - *kAmbhOji/tishra EkaM


All in all, a fantastic concert that I shall cherish for a long time

Happy New Year 2008 !!

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Blooming with
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