Shanmukhananda Sangeetha Sabha in association with the India International Centre organised a Carnatic music vocal concert by the Chennai-based artiste Gayathri Girish at the latter’s auditorium, recently. Armed with a rich repertoire of compositions, the seasoned vocalist in her brief recital of about an hour-and-half delighted the music lovers with her musical talent. Despite her voice not being in a fine fettle that day, Gayathri’s intelligent structuring of the concert by taking up songs of a wide range of composers and interweaving these with her creative talent paid rich dividends and turned out to be an enriching evening of Carnatic music session.
Gayathri started her concert in an impressive manner with a popular Adi taal varnam of Patnam Subramania Iyer, “Evari bodhana” in raga Abhogi in two speeds. She then embarked on to take up Swathi Thirunal’s “Deva deva” in the raga Mayamalavagowla, suffixing it with detailed kalpanaswaras which flowed with rich creativity and was indicative of the depth of creative talent even at an early stage of her concert. Ramaswami Sivan’s “Kadaikan vaithennai alamma” in the raga Begada was handled in nice manner.
Sensing that it is time to take up a song for a detailed rendition, Gayathri sang Tyagaraja’s “Ennalu urake” in raga Subhapantuvarali. The detailed raga alpana that she prefixed was scintillating and the kalpanaswaras, including the finishing Korvai once again impressed.
While singing Papanasam Sivan’s composition ‘Nambikettavar’ in raga Hindolam, Gayathri brought out the emotive content of the lyrics to the fore. Gayathri’s choice of Tyagaraja’s “Sarasasamadana” in raga Kapi Narayani at that stage of her concert seemed to have been a well thought out one which kept the proceedings lively.
Gayathri’s central item was Muthuswami Dikshitar’s “Balagopala” in raga Bhairavi, which she sang in a detailed manner in a riveting tempo and doing adequate justice to this item. In an unhurried alpana of the raga, she brought out its features to the fore. She also took up the phrase “Nila nirada sarira dhiratara” from the anupallavi portion of the composition for neraval and sang the same and the subsequent kalpanaswaras in a delightful manner.
Gayathri’s short concluding session which included a ragamallika song and a tillanna too was enjoyable.
Delhi R. Sridhar on the violin and M.V. Chandersekhar on the mridangam, both Delhi-based artistes, provided good support to Gayathri Girish.
