Here is the first days write-up on Sri Sanjay Subrahmanyans concert at the Kuthiramalika, by our dear Music Lover from Trivandrum. Read on ... Today was very beautiful as expected. Sanjay Subramanyan sir sang, with Varadarajan, Neyveli Venkatesh and Alathur Rajaganesh. The Kuthiramalika palace with its soft, cool, green grass, full moon, sound of birds, the very beautiful lighting and decoration, perfect sound system. It is too beautiful to describe, really. Thamburatti spoke at first as usual and then Prince introduced the artists. I liked his last years introduction more, but this was very nice too. Sanjay Subramanyan started with a varnam in Kalyani. I forgot the first word, but it comes Kamini and many times Ni comes in the song. I have never heard this song before and I heard many others say the same thing too. Today I went in a car with some friends. So I could stay for some time after the concert instead of running away quickly to catch bus. So I could hear many people talking about the concert afterwards. It is a totally different atmosphere from navarathri mandapam and I love both. Though I have not been to music festivals in other places, I heard people say again and again that this is the nicest and most beautifully organized festival they have seen. Many people had come from other places just for this festival and many people had come for the first time. So I was enjoying listening to them talk and say how amazing the experience was. After the rare kalyani varnam, Sanjay Subramanyam sang Jaya Jaya Padmanabha in sarasangi. He made some nice variations in the line Nalina ruchiradala. It was really beautiful. The swarams were very nice too. But when Varadarajan played, I went on remembering how Prince introduced him last year. https://youtube/watch?v=sFvMZ_R6nbc The sweetness, the weight, the speed, the clarity. Everything in Varadarajan is superior to everybody else, I think. I have always liked Varadarajan and Vinu playing very much. But today it was just unbelievable! Even when Sanjay Subramanyam sang very long rounds of ragam or swaram, Varadarajan would remember everything and play it back perfectly, even more nicely than the singing. After Jaya Jaya, it was a raga alapana in durbar and then a rare song Shaure. I have never heard this before. No swarams. Then he sang one more raga alapana. This time Saraswathymanohari and then the song Mamava Jagadeeshwara. I liked this song the most and the varnam too. The song has very cute and playful chittaswarams. Then it was a long session of Shanmukhapriya, with Mamava Karunaya. This was nice too. By this time the full moon had come out and it was so beautiful! After Shanmukhapriya was the main piece Jagadeesha in nattakurinji. This was very beautiful and dignified. I liked very much. This is a video of him singing it in navarathri mandapam. https://youtube/watch?v=zvbJSThQaTM I felt the mridangam and kanjira were nice, but I like many others more than them. There is a game where two teams of people stand on two sides and pull a thick rope in their direction and try to win by pulling the opposite team people also to this side. During the thaniyavarthanam, two or three times, I felt like that kind of pulling between Sanjay Subramanyan putting thaalam and the mridangam playing. After thaniyavarthanam came Sees Ganga Bhasma Anga, very beautiful Hindusthani song on Shiva. Then Kalaye Sri in Chenchuruti. The last song was Reenamadanutha in Behag. https://youtube/watch?v=IB5rY9aDURM
Posted on: Sun, 04 Jan 2015 19:28:09 +0000