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MADRAS MUSIC MELA 2001

    

Mandolin Srinivas and Rajesh - Instrumental virtuosity

    
The Mandolin, with Srinivas’s adaptation of it for Carnatic music, has come to stay, much as the violin did a couple of centuries ago. Belying all skeptics, Srinivas has repeatedly proved his detractors wrong, by providing quality instrumental music, riding on his sheer genius. However, his concert at the Music Academy, in tandem with his brother, U Rajesh, on December 23, 2001, was beset with problems of sound balance. For a substantial time into the concert, the sound levels were extremely poor, and the Mandolins were barely audible above their accompaniments. Of course, the artistes could not be blamed for this, as they must have got just enough time to get their instruments and sit on stage, before beginning the concert. There was clearly no time to do even a rudimentary sound check in advance.

    
The Mandolin duo began with a rare Adi tala varnam in Nata. From then on it was a series of popular items, like Vatapi (Hamsadhwani), Ksheerasagara (Devagandhari), Paraloka sadhaname (Purvikalyani), Sogasuga (Sriranjani), Aparadhamula (Rasali), Nadatanumanisam (Chittaranjani) and Edutanilachite (Sankarabharanam). From a connoisseur’s perspective, this offered little variety, as it was a flow of Tyagaraja kriti-s, except for Vatapi early in the concert. There was not much contrast in Tala either, with everything being set in Adi, but for the Sriranjani kriti.
     

Over the last few years, one had gained the impression that Srinivas was maturing as a musician. However, this was once again in question during this concert, which was primarily a glitzy affair, as Srinivas chose to play to the gallery. The choice of sangati-s in the kritis and the kalpanaswara segments in each item seemed to be designed with this end in view. It did not fail to elicit the audience’s applause either.

Rajesh’s sound quality seemed better than that of Srinivas, but if one had listened with eyes closed, one could not have made out any difference between the two brothers. Srinivas’s Sankarabharanam alapana was pretty good. Rajesh’s Sriranjani alapana was an equal match - indeed, it was vintage Srinivas! However, the rendition of all the kriti-s seemed to ignore sahitya, as the instrumental technique was based primarily on swara patterns. This was noticed particularly in the opening Varnam and in the slow paced Ksheerasagara.

     

S D Sridhar’s violin accompaniment was quite poor, especially in bowing technique. At no point of time could he match up with the main artistes, either musically or in creating an aura of glamour. Vellore Ramabhadran (Mridangam), along with T V Vasan (Ghatam) and Selvaganesh (Khanjira) provided very lively and bright percussive support.

      

General remarks:

Instrumental sound was basically electronically synthesized, as the mandolin’s output is inherently not very high. Srinivas’s playing style is dynamic, while also allowing for production of characteristically Carnatic gamaka-s.

Ratings: 

Sruti - 80 % (at some points, the two mandolins sounded out of sync)
Kalapramanam - 75% (lively tempo)
Rendering of Compositions - 55%
Sahitya - 50% (plucking didn’t gel with the sahitya)
Raga alapana - 65%
Kalpanaswara - 60% (Lots of pointless drifting, especially in the climactic finishes)
Sowkhyam – 60%

Overall Concert - 60%

Estimated audience ratings:

Audience in hall - 65% (downstairs), 70% (balcony)
Response - Good

- Nisshanka

              

Posted on December 27, 2001

   
   

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