It was a patriotic moment, when the entire congregation joined the Vice President, Mr. Venkaiah Naidu, in singing the National Anthem at the 102nd birth anniversary celebrations of M.S. Subbulakshmi, at Sri Shanmukhananda Fine Arts and Sangeetha Sabha.
It was a moment of consummate pride for the 50 awardees, including the 24 first-time awardees of the ‘Sri Shanmukhananda Vijaya Bank Dr. M.S. Subbulakshmi Fellowship in Music’ from the Vice President. It was landmark for Shanmukhananda to bestow this award on the candidates in 13 different disciplines in the field of music.
Post anthem, prayer and Veda chanting by the students of Nerul Veda Patashala, V. Shankar, president of the sabha, presented his welcome address. He lauded MSS as a repository of musical heritage.
“We must imbibe her seven great qualities — sangeetha shraddha, Isha bhakti, guru bhakti, desh bhakti, her compassion towards co-artistes, her respect for rasikas, and above all her charity,” added V. Shankar. He acknowledged the gracious presence of Mr. Venkaiah Naidu, Governor Vidyasagar Rao, Prakash Mehta, Minister for Housing, Health, and R.A. Sankaranarayanan, CEO of Vijaya Bank, the sponsors of the award.
Venkaiah Naidu greeted the audience in Marathi and soon switched to English. “Good music gives solace, happiness and equilibrium to the mind. It has timeless relevance, melody and message, rhythm and reason, sound and spirituality. Art unites hearts,” he averred. The Vice President also congratulated sabhas such as Shanmukhananda that are involved in promoting the classical art.
He lauded V. Shankar and his team and felicitated the awardees — Vidhya Raghavan, Shreya Devnath, Rahul Vellal and Anirban Roy.
Amarnath Sury, vice president of the sabha thanked Mr. Venkaiah Naidu for his inspiring address. The programme, anchored by Gayatri, included ‘Maithreem Bhajatha,’ a Bharatanatyam ensemble by Shobhana Bhalchandra , which was a compilation of songs popularised by MS.
Digital recording of crisp nattuvangam by Shobhana, melodic voice of Radha Badri, mridangam by Vijayaraghavan, violin by T.K. Padmanabhan, flute by T. Sasidhar and voice over by P.C. Ramakrishna, offered a rich aural treat. The script credited to Shruti Swaminathan was a sequence of anecdotes from the life and musical journey of the legendary musician.
Opening with Ganesha Pancharatnam of Adi Sankara, the dancers executed the lyrics and jatis with well-coordinated movements. Annamacharya’s ‘Alarulu’ came next depicting Alarmelmanga, with a veil, dancing behind golden cloth propped by other dancer friends.
Songs of Mira
Information on how MS popularised the music of Mira, how she travelled to the temples that Mira visited and how she took the bhajans to the common man, preceded the Mira segment that moved seamlessly from one song to another. ‘Leelaigal seyvane,’ Tamil lyrics to Mira bhajan ‘Chakar Rakhoji,’ explicated the antics of Little Krishna. Starting with a kolattam to lilting rhythm, ten dancers depicted butter churning, Kalinga’s hood, Krishna’s flute, cattle horns and so on. ‘Enadu ullame’ highlighted the bonding of Mira with Krishna.
‘Katrinile varum geetam,’ immortalised by Kalki’s lyrics and MS’s singing, was depicted by Shobhana in a solo. Adhbuta rasa was evident in ‘sunai vandu’ humming, ‘solai kuyil’ singing, slowly moving to bhakti towards the blue-hued flautist.
‘Aranga un mahimayai’ was presented by Shobana and group with episodes of Vishnu saving Gajendra, Draupadi and Prahlada. ‘Yadu Nandana Gopala’ was set to Kummi with sprightly steps, slowing to a tangible silence in ‘Jaya Mira Prabhu.’ ‘Bhavayami Gopala Balam’ endearingly enlisted the attributes of the Paramapurusham. ‘Malai Pozhudinile’ in ragamalika, presented by Shobana was a visual poetry, the music, lyrics and dance vying with each other. The presentation concluded with Swati Tirunal’s brisk Dhanashree thillana.
