The charm of her velvety voice
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Ashwini Bhide Deshpande enthralled connoisseurs at a recent concert in Varanasi.
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CHARMER Ashwini Bhide.
To touch the note correctly is difficult in classical singing and to utter the correct note beautifully is rare. Recently, vocalist Ashwini Bhide Deshpande was in Varanasi to register such rare notes with caring listeners. She was here to give two concerts organised by Kala Prakash, a local music organisation.
Deshpande enunciated the beauty of the Jaipur-Atrauli gharana with raga Khem Kalyan and brought out the the hidden splendour of the prominent notes where lay the essential nature (swaroopa) of the raga. Bandishes like “Balama Tum Bin” in vilambit and “Piherwa Mo Ko” in drut in Addha and Teen tala completed the exquisite musical evening. The ace vocalist then shifted into raga Bageshri, with madhya laya in nine-and-a-half matra-s with the bandish “Manmohan Shyam”. She ended with the drut bandish “Chhedo Na Mohe Shyam” in Teen tala.
Deshpande closed the recital with some light classical songs in ragas like Bhimpalasi, Gara and Bhairavi to establish the folk touch of Jhula, Dadra and a bhajan. Ram Kumar Mishra on the tabla and Vinay Kumar Mishra on the harmonium accompanied her appropriately. They displayed an understanding of how to beautify a concert by imposing minimum individual presence. One felt that instead of displaying memory and taiyari in nuances like badhat and vistaar, Deshpande is now much more interested in improvisation.
Young talents
The evening before Deshpande's laudable recital, the audience was impressed by the talent of a young vocalist from Dharwad, Somnath Murdur. His dedication to music was apparent in his singing of raga Durga. Even though it was a bhajan, one noticed his capacity to present the entire structure of a raga in a melodious and independent way. Rajnish Tiwari accompanied him on the tabla.
Kala Prakash, in collaboration with the Indian Council for Cultural Relations, also introduced Dhananjay Hegde in the same series of classical concerts in Varanasi. A young talent who sings Khayal of the Gwalior and Kirana gharanas with equal grace, the Mumbai-based Dhananjay started his concert with raga Puriya. He then went on to Bageshri and Gaud Malhar. His sense of aesthetics and ability to invoke the true notes of these ragas was evident. He ended his recital with two fine bhajans. Pundalik Krishna Bhagwat accompanied him on the tabla.
GAUTAM CHATTERJEE
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