A politician with movie-star looks and hero of the legend of Camelot, John F Kennedy achieved much, before his assassination cruelly abbreviated his presidency. He is the only American President to date to have been awarded a Pulitzer Prize. He stood his ground in the Cuban crisis; faced flak for the Bay of Pigs invasion; pushed for a Nuclear Test Ban Treaty; created the Peace Corps and Navy SEALs; initiated the civil rights revolution and began the space race that put man on the moon in 1969.
To celebrate the man and his memory, Classical Movements, which works with some of the world’s great choruses and orchestras, recently hosted the Serenade Music Festival in Washington that brought together nearly 20 international choirs from various countries on the same stage; Madras Youth Choir (MYC), among them. The MYC, founded in 1971 and one of the oldest choral music groups in the country, brought to the festival songs set in the Indian classical and folk traditions based on complex Western harmony techniques. “Last year, Neeta Helms, the founder of Classical Movements, invited us to participate as she found our sound unique. The MYC was delighted to be part of the JFK centenary,” says S Ram, secretary, MYC.
Concerts were held at venues across the Washington metropolitan area and led to interactions with choirs from countries as far afield as Zimbabwe and Latvia, Mongolia and Spain. “MYC premiered a piece specially composed for the centenary. This was a medley of seven songs, comprising lyrics from a garland of Indian languages. They echoed the lofty ideals of JFK – universal brotherhood, peace, courage and unity, with lyrics by the great poets of India, and concluded with Martin Luther King’s famous ‘We Shall Overcome’,” adds Ram. The grand finale at the Kennedy Center saw MYC showcasing ‘Mazhai, the rain song’, a complex six-part harmony composed by the late MB Srinivasan, founder-director of the MYC, set to lyrics penned by Subramania Bharati. The evening came to an end with ‘Greensleeves’, a Kennedy favourite, sung by all choirs and by the audience, and the world premiere of the spirited French song ‘Ansanm Ansanm’ by Haitian composer Sydney Guillaume, conducted by Joshua Habermann.
Varied experiences
The MYC that was formed for a college student broadcast on AIR has grown to become a non-profit voluntary organisation that has as its members both the musically-trained as well as the musically-inclined. A recipient of an annual grant from the Sangeet Natak Akademi for its community singing programme, MYC reaches out to school children who are taught songs on national integration and social values — an activity that it decided to take to a world audience while at the festival.
Says PC Ramakrishna, executive committee member, “We conducted four workshops for the participating choirs, including a children’s choir. We demonstrated how techniques of counterpoint and counter melody, and layering of harmonic parts within specific compositions featured in our songs, by having our choir sing relevant parts from our repertoire. We also showed how vocal rhythmic cadences, such as those of boatmen, are built into our songs. The nearly-300 participants ended up learning a Bengali song by Tagore.”
MYC also performed a harmonised choral piece, ‘Kaavadi chindu’ at the Murugan temple in Maryland. Leela Natarajan, vice president, says, “It was a learning experience — of music, people and cultures.”
