The 33rd ‘Cleveland Tyagaraja Aradhana’ was inaugurated by Sri Ganapati Sachchidananda Swami on April 3, at the Waetjen Auditorium, Cleveland State University (CSU). This year's festival celebrates the Centenary Year of G.N. Balasubramaniam.
On the occasion, the Bhairavi Fine Arts Society conferred upon vocalist Sudha Ragunathan the title of ‘Sangeetha Rathnakara’ for her contribution to Carnatic music. Sri Ganapati Sachchidananda Swami presided over the function and conferred the title.
Various awards in different categories were given away. Some prominent recipients were Radha Viswanathan-Kala Chandrika; K. Kalyanasundaram-Nritya Ratnakara; D. Pasupati - Acharya Ratnakara; Charumathi Ramachandran - Sangeeta Kala Sagaram; Vaidyanatha Krishnan (Coimbatore) - Seva Ratna; Prema Kumar (Jacksonville, FL) - Kala Seva Mani; Sudha D. Chandrasekhar (Oak Park, MI) - Nritya Seva Mani; Roopa Mahadevan (San Jose, CA) - Kala Ratna; Anuradha Sridhar's Trinity Centre for Music, Saratoga, CA - Best Music School, Toronto; and B. Gowrishankar - Best Teacher.
Sudha Ragunathan performed to a packed auditorium on Sunday morning. She said, “It was gratifying to receive the award and to be a part of the Aradhana this year, as it also happens to be my guru, M.L. Vasanthakumari's 80th year. I always want to contribute in a personal way to the success and growth of the festival.”
