R Vedavalli, Nada Inbam

R Vedavalli - Usha Rajagopalan - Neyveli Narayanan - Madipakkam Murali

Nada Inbam, Raga Sudha Hall.
18th August 2006. 6 pm

viribhONi - bhairavi - aTa tALam - AdiyappaiyA
subramaNyEna - suddha dhanyAsi - Adi - MD (S)
karuNA samudra - dEvagAndAri - Adi - T (R)
mEru samAna - mAyAmALavagauLa - dEsAdi - T (RNS)
nIvADanE gAna - sArangA - kaNDa cApu - T
giripai nelakona - sahAnA - Adi - T (R)
nIkEla nAyeDa - dEvamanOhari - Adi - RSI
vAridhi nIku - tODi - misra cApu - T (RNS)
tani Avarththanam
OsOsi - mukhAri - misra cApu - muddu natEsa padam
nI mATalu E mAyanurA - pUrvikalyANi - Adi - paTTAbhirAmayya
nI nAma rUpamulaku - saurashTRam - Adi - T
svasthi prajApya - madhyamAvati

The concert started with the bhairavi varNam rendered with the 4 cittai svarams and the anubandam. The suddha dhanyAsi kriti was rendered with good svarams. The first AlApanai taken up was a short and crisp dEvagAndhAri, with the kriti to follow.

The mAyAmALavagauLa AlApanai was very good and kriti was rendered really well, with neraval and svarams at 'gaLamuna shObhillu kanaka bhUSaNamula', followed by the sArangA kriti.

The sAhanA AlApanai was done with full vigour and the kriti had some real vintage sangatis which are no longer rendered. The main tODi AlApanai begun on a nice note with not many known sancarams coming in for quite sometime. Starting at the pancamam the AlApanai went to the tAra sthAyi and then came to the lower part of the octave. The kriti couldnt get rarer. It seemed to be quite a tough and heavy kriti to render and was beautifully rendered, following which, Smt Vedavalli explained that it was part of the prahalAda caritram. The neraval and svarams at 'sAreku nI hrdayAravinda mu' were done beautifully. Some of the sancarams in the tODi kriti, for example there was one sangati which had a flat gAndhAram, were good and enjoyable. A different flavour of tODi was presented in the main piece. The mukhAri padam and the pUrvikalyANi jAvaLi were rendered very well.

Smt Vedavalli gave a good concert giving some vintage stuff and also keeping the regular concert attending rasika happy. A ragamalikA slOkam and/or viruttam, which is a regular feature in all her concerts, would have given complete satisfaction. The absence of which was felt. One also felt that she could have been better assisted by her accompanists.

Smt Usha Rajagopalan on the violin was quite off beat from the begining. Her dEvagAndhAri AlApanai was definetely far away from what the main artist sang. The mAyAmALavagauLa AlApanai in parts sounded like neraval done in popular kritis. The sahAnA AlApanai also was not upto the mark. By the time she presented her "usual" tODi reply one had made a resolution not to hear her solo versions. She was quite struggling in even keeping with the main artists in most parts of the concert.

Sri Narayanan on the Mrudangam was very monotonous throughout the concert. He was playing very similarly for all pieces being viLamba kAla or dhurita kAla krits. And also repeated the same things during the tani also. One could over hear a comment from the back rows "Yennathukku ipdi aadi maasam maariamman kovil tappu maadiri vaasikkaraan" (why is playing like the 'tappu' played at Mariamman Temple during ADi month?)

Sri Murali was rather better in being a more sensible accompanist to the concert, but all his efforts were over shadowed by the other two main accompanists.

bharath