Music Season 2008

Period taken into consideration: 29th November to 5th January
Number of concerts sampled ~ 50

i. Best Concerts (in no particular order)
Alamelu Mani at Raga Sudha
Mysore Balakrishna at Music Academy
R Vedavalli at Raga Sudha
Rama Ravi at Raga Sudha

ii. Best Singular Renditions (in no particular order)
1. nAgasvaram AlApanai of AbhOgi and a tAnam which followed, with the accompaniment of thavil at Nanganallur Anjaneyar Temple, on 2nd January preceeding the evening deeparadhanai.
2. chAyA ranjani RTP by D Vardhini for Chennai Fine Arts.
3. ravichandrikA AlApanai with niravati sukhadA by Chingleput Ranganathan at Raga Sudha Hall.

ii (b). Forgettable Renditions
many many...

iii. Best Violin Accompaniment (in no particular order)
Vittal Ramamurthy for Rama Ravi & Chingleput Ranganathan
RK Shriram Kumar for R Vedavalli & T K Govinda Rao
(all the above at Raga Sudha)
Ambika Prasad for D Vardhini for Chennai Fine Arts
N C Madhav for Manda Sudharani at Nanganallur Maruthi Bhaktha Samaj

iv. Best Mrudangam Accompaniment
Vellore Ramabadran for Rama Ravi at Nada Inbam

iv (c). Best tani: Guruvayur Dorai & Thirupunitura Radhakrishnan in the concert of Trivandrum Venkataraman at Raga Sudha Hall.

Special Recognition for Best Ghatam/ Khanjira Player:
KV Gopalakrishnan for the tani he played with Shertalai Anantakrishnan in the concert of Chingleput Ranganathan at Raga Sudha Hall

v. Congeniality Prize for Most Popular Ragam of the Season
pUrvikalyANi - 18 times. i m soon going to define carnatic music at 'pUrvikalyANi'
(accounted only if there was some manOdarmam part attached to the kriti. not included are tukkaDas and the number of times just a kriti in pUrvikalyANi rendered)

v (b). Raga I Missed the Most during the Season
shankarAbharaNam - heard it just twice
bhairavi

vi. Concerts I Wish I had Attended
TNS at Mudhra, for the Ahiri RTP he had sung there.

vi (c). People i wish i had heard atleast once during the season.
Sanjay, TNS, Sowmya, R K Srikantan, Parassala Ponnammal, Nedunuri Krishnamurthy

vii. Best Sabha Food
usili sEvai at Vani Mahal GnanambikA Stall.
ashOka halwa at MFAC canteen

viii. Best Listening Environment
First (tie): Raga Sudha Hall & Music Academy Main Hall (downstairs)
a distant Second: Tattvaloka

viii (b). Worst Listening Environment
MFAC (too noisy), German Hall - IFAS (acoustically not so great)

ix. Word/ Name of the Season:
pUrvikalyANi.


I pretty much ended up at Raga Sudha Hall on many days and enjoyed almost all the concerts there.


I cant take any more of pUrvikalyANi. Wherever i went, pUrvikalyANi chased me and hit me hard.