Music and dance reviews

A pleasant dance recital
ICCR in collaboration with Bharatiya Vidya Bavan presented a dance recital, in the ‘Horizon’ series, on Saturday. Yamini Muthanna, is not only a Bharathanatya exponent but also an Astanga Yoga expert. She is a disciple of Dr Vasundhara Doraswamy and B N S Iyengar in yoga. Being a senior dancer, she has performed in many parts of the world including USA, UK, Fiji, New Zealand, Malaysia and Australia. In the “Kalasinchanam Yogasthala Ancient Arts Trust” she is training young aspirants in both dance and yoga. She is also a recipient of few titles and honours like “Shringaramani”.

In the current programme, Yamini Muthanna performed few popular items, along with her students. She opened her programme with a Pushpanjali (Kadyothkanti raga) followed by a Ganesha vandana. The story of Ganesha, his ‘Vahana’ Mushika and the curse to moon – is well known. It was continued with Shankaracharya’s sloka ‘Mudakaratha Modakam’. It looked as if it is overstretched slightly, though the students performed with practised ease. The next item was a Shivastuthi – ‘Mahadevashiva Shambho’ and Natesha Kautuvam (Revathi raga). The ‘Sanchari’ comprised of two stories – Ravana lifting the Kailasa mountain and Ganga and Bhagiratha’s story. Any how, the main item of the evening was the popular daru ‘Mathe’ of Dr Muthaiah Bhagawathar. As usual Yamini’s performance was proof of her talent and expertise. Though her students performed with ease and assurance, it will be better impactful with some more training and stage experience.

The Tulasi Das Bhajan (Sri Ramachandra Kripalu) had few episodes from Ramayana, while the ‘Adu Pambe’ had popular appeal. After the Sumanesharanjini thillana, they concluded with the ‘Vande Matharam’.
Vasudha Balakrishna (vocal), D V Prasanna Kumar (Natuvanga), S V Balakrishna (mridanga), Raghunandan (Flute) and Ganesh Kumar (violin) – gave good support from the wings.

24 hours of music
H H Sri Abhinava Vidyashankara Bharathi Maha Swamiji of Avani Sringeri Shankaracharya Mutt observed the “Kojagari Vratha” with a continuous 24-hour cultural programmes including Bhajans and music recitals by a number of artistes. R N Tyagarajan and R N Tharanathan, known as Rudrapattana Brothers chose compositions on Devi, of different composers.

For instance “Hiranmayeem” was a good choice. It was rendered in chaste classicism with evocative alapana and meaningful nerval. With spacious preamble of raga “Sri Kamalambike” was dealt in detail.

The swara was sung by turns, to make it wholesome. Three seasoned instrumentalists – Nalina Mohan on violin, Anoor Ananthakrishna Sharma on mridanga and B Rajashekhar on morching – suited the needs of the occasion.

Delightful vocal recital
“Chala Mela”, the familiar varna gave M S Sheela a bright start and it was followed by “Sri Shankara Guru”, which had attractive chitte swara also. ‘Amba Brova’ was also a fine keerthane which was followed by “Nanu Dhanya Thalli”. Any how, she elaborated “Palinchu Kamakshi” in a splendid manner. The raga with lilting melody was a good preamble for the composition. Here Dikshitar says – “Oh Goddess Kamakshi! Protect me.
You are the eternal purifier and annihilator of sins. Amba! … you have the charming reputation of being the embodiment of compassion on this earth”. After a brief nerval (Karunya Moorthy) she started the swara in a slow gait and gradually moved to ‘Drutha kaala’, which was enjoyable. Sheela’s concert was melodious and pleasing.
C N Chandrashekhar, Prof V Krishna and S N Narayana Murthy supported on violin, mridanga and ghata, respectively.