‘Neelaayadaakshi! Neevay Jagatrakshaki!’ (Syama Sastri) ‘Maragatha-mani-vanna!’ (Tyagaraja, ‘Maragatha-mani’)
‘Mangalakara Mandahaasa’ (Dikshitar, ‘Chintaya...’)
Beautiful lyrics of the Trinity in Paras, Varali and Bhairavi! It offered scope for colourful, melodic improvisation, with Geetha Raja’s special flair for neraval and articulated swara sequences.
These numbers figured successively in the middle of Geetha’s concert at the Music Academy on Brinda Day recently. Had it been some other occasion, and not the birthday of her guru, she might have done justice to the lyrics and given us a memorable aesthetic experience. But the specific context called for restraint in this regard, because the singer apparently had a compelling inclination to line up several songs from Brindamma’s repertoire, including three kritis before the mid-section, and a couple of padams, a javali, and some Tamil verses. All the compositions were rendered with clarity and devotion. In achieving a meditative mood -- which was shared by the fairly large audience, and was so reminiscent of Brindamma's style of singing -- the vocalist had excellent support from the accompanists K.P. Nandini (violin) and Thanjavur Kumar (mridangam).
Given Geetha Raja's commitment to disseminate her legendary guru’s music and repertoire — and her concern as a teacher herself, with several promising young disciples in the audience — this was indeed a substantial recital, in spite of the restrained main number in Bhairavi.
