Sri Guruguha Gana saba, Srirangam, organised a vocal concert by Vidya Subramanian, disciple of Lalgudi Jayaraman, at the Sri Raghavendra Mutt, Srirangam, Tiruchi.
Vidya, a Chartered Accountant and an MBA, has spent about eight years in the U.S., where she was involved in spreading the knowledge of Carnatic music using the medium of Internet, apart from giving concerts. After returning to Chennai two years ago, she is now busy in the concert circuit.
Vidya started her concert with a pada varnam of Lalgudi Jayaraman in Shanmukhapriya. She then rendered Muthuswami Dikshitar’s ‘Sri Mahaganapathim’ (Gowla) followed by Tyagaraja’s ‘Joothamurare’ (Aarabhi). Sri Purandaradasa’s ‘Narayana’ (Suddha Dhanyasi) was the next piece taken up. At the request of the audience, she took up ‘Kana Kana Ruchi’ (Varali - Pancharatnam of Tyagaraja). Arunachala Kavi’s composition ‘En Pallikondeer Iyya’ (Mohanam) was sung with bhakti. The main piece of the concert was Dikshitar’s ‘Balagopala’ (Bhairavi), after an elaborate raga alapana bringing out the beauty of the raga. This was followed by the tani avartanam, where Sri Koppu Nagarajan (mridangam) and Ranganathan (ghatam) exhibited their talents fully. A paasuram by Thiruppanazhwar in Sahana and Brindavani ragas followed by a Lalgudi Thillana again in ragam Brindavani marked the end of the concert. Sri Govindarajan, the violinist, gave able support and his raga alapana and swara exchanges enhanced the concert value.
The notable feature was that Vidya, did not refer to any written material. Her confidence, born out of her excellent grooming, and ‘saadaka’ was so high that she had no hesitation while rendering the Pancharatnam piece in Varali, which most artists are not comfortable with. Vidya explained the salient features of the kritis and the ragas and it was educative and well appreciated by the audience.
