Music Review...

Mechanical rendering

Sri Ramakrishna Bhajana Sabha Trust conducted the 62nd annual Mahashivarathri Utsav with music, dance, bhajan, unchavrithi and other rituals customarily, for 15 days. P Unnikrishnan who gave a vocal recital, is a familiar vocalist and a popular artiste. In his concert, Kharahara Priya was the major item of the recital. Though alapana was on pedestrian lines, the thana was rendered to the accompaniment of Mridanga. Pallavi was set to Khanda Triputa and the swara prasthara lacked the usual flourish.

Earlier, saint Tyagaraja’s Dhenuka krithi ‘Teliyaleru Rama Bhakti Margamunu’ was chosen by Unnikrishnan. Tyagaraja’s creation ‘Mokshamugalada’ in Saramathi had a special lyrical mood, which he tried to bring out in its presentation. In between he sang few Tamil songs like Shivaloka Nathane, Karpaga Manohara, etc. Overall there was an impression of mechanical rendering. The Astapadi ‘Nathahare Jaganatha’ came as one of the concluding item. But Embar Kannan impressed in both Saramathi and Kharaharapriya and K V Prasad on mridanga, gave lively support but nothing to write on the Ghata (Shivaramakrishnan).

Vasantha Nrithyotsava

The Sumana Charitable Trust conducted a dance festival called ‘Vasantha Nrithyotsava’ at Nayana Auditorium on Friday. There was variety and colour as three different styles were presented by three dancers.

Dharini Kashyap who opened the programme is a disciple of Sunanda Devi and Rajeswari and has learnt Bharathanatya and Kathak also. She performed her Ranga Pravesha in 1983 itself. She is teaching at ‘Natya Ninada’ of Bangalore and has performed in many places.

Dharini Kashyap opened her Kuchipudi programme with an invocatory piece on Ganesha and continued with a Bhadrachala Ramadas krithi (Idigo Bhadradi Gowtami), in which the (recorded) music was too loud. After the Annamachar’s composition (Muddugari Yashoda) she moved to the Taranga. But she was not feeling comfortable with the pot on the head and was adjusting the pot throughout. May be she is performing after long time gap and needs more practice.

Vidya Shimladka, student of Narmada and Ullal Mohan is known in the field both as a performer, teacher and journalist. She also opened her programme with a Ganapathi stuthi (Mahaganapathim Manasa) customarily. Commencing with a ‘Surya Namaskara’ she performed the ‘Surya Kautvam’, in which she could have made the ‘Ashwa Gathi’ more interesting. The ‘Jagan Mohana Rajasabha’  is very popular among dancers. For Vidya portraying ‘Navarasa’ was not a new thing. Her Abhinaya was good while depicting ‘Shringara, Hasya’. But with some more experience she may portray Bheebatsa and Rudra impactfully. She also presented a Ashtapadi (Radhika Tava Virahe) and for a welcome change a vachana too. She concluded with an item on ‘Desi Karna’, in which she is doing research.

The last programme of the evening was a Kathak recital by Sankhya Gopal. She is a student of Dr Maya Rao and is running a dance school, ‘Nritya Loka’. After the ‘Shiva stuthi’, the opening piece, Sankhya took a popular Tulasidas composition. Geet (Madhuvanti) and the ‘Main To Khelu’ provided sufficient opportunities for Abhinay, dramatising the situations. But the best part of he programme was a Tarana in jinjoti. With some more experience she can reach great heights.

All the three dancers used recorded music.