Two young musicians, Dharini Veeraraghavan from Mumbai and Tejas Mallela from Hyderabad, were chosen as the voices of the year at the fifth edition of The Hindu Saregama M.S. Subbulakshmi award 2016 on Sunday.
The two singers will get an opportunity to cut a record with Saregama. The event, held at The Music Academy here, commemorated the centenary celebrations of legendary Carnatic musician M.S. Subbulakshmi.
Mr. Mallela, who performs and is currently training under violin virtuoso Kanyakumari, said he was happy, especially since the award made his mother happy. “She is the one who took me to classes. I learnt under Seshachari Sir of Hyderabad Brothers,” he said. Ms. Veeraraghavan, a second year student of accounting, said she began singing when she was about five. “I am a huge fan of M.S. Amma and I really look up to her perfection in singing.” she said.
Each artist chosen from the regional finals held at Kochi, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Chennai, presented a 25-minute recital with three numbers each. The three other artists who made it to the finals were R. Karthik from Chennai, Sriram Sastry from Bengaluru and K.S. Harisankar from Kochi.
The participants were accompanied by senior vidwans V.V. Srinivasa Rao (violin), K.V. Prasad (mridangam) and S.V. Ramani (ghatam).
‘Idiom of music’After each performance, the youngsters were quizzed on various aspects by the panel of eminent judges comprising mridangam maestro Karaikudi Mani and vocalists S. Rajeshwari, O.S. Arun, K. Krishnakumar and Rajkumar Bharathi. “This year, since we were impressed by two of them, the award was given to both. We looked at the idiom of Carnatic music, how they approached the raga and kriti, their presentation,” explained Mr. Arun.
Earlier, Mr. Mani said M.S. Subbulakshmi’s sincerity, hard work and presentation were characteristics that young artists should imbibe.
Saregama Managing Director Vikram Mehra said his firm was very proud of the partnership with The Hindu. Saregama would continue to promote both Carnatic and Hindustani classical music. Mallika Ravi, CEO, Lancor Holdings, said mornings in many homes in south India began with M.S. Amma’s slokas .
The five finalists each got a gift coupon worth Rs.10,000 from RmKV and a 4 GB drive containing 150 songs of M.S. Subbulakshmi from Saregama.
The title sponsor for the awards event was Lancor Holdings, co-powered by RmKV Silks, Dheepam Lamp Oil and jewellery partner GRT Thangamaligai. Regional sponsors were Indian Oil Corporation Limited and JFA Modfurn, and media partner was Sri Sankara TV.
