She wears different hats, that of a Carnatic vocalist, musicologist, teacher, journalist and a cultural organiser. Loving all these roles, she feels that each one is unique medium of sharing the nuances of music with music lovers. “But, doing lecture-demonstrations gives me a special satisfaction as it enlightens and enriches the audience,” says Dr. Radha Bhaskar, who conducted a workshop on appreciating Carnatic music recently in the Capital under the aegis of Sangeet Natak Akademi.
Born and brought up in Kolkata, Radha started learning Carnatic music from a tender age of four. Keen to pursue music in academic front too, she moved to Chennai and did her graduation, post graduation and later on doctorate in music. Radha says it was Jaya Shankar, her first guru, who unfolded the beautiful world of Carnatic music to her. She also considers herself fortunate to have been under the tutelage of renowned Vairamangalam Lakshminarayan and P.S. Narayanswamy.
Holistic perspective
On performing different roles, Radha explains that she had always wanted to have a holistic approach to music and not just be a performer. Besides, she aspires to share her knowledge with music lovers. She adds, being an organiser gives her an opportunity to explore new areas in musical presentation and also enlighten and enrich music lovers on many aspects. Through her magazine on fine arts Samudhra , she shares many things about the performing arts.
Radha’s week long music appreciation programmes are aimed at educating music lovers about the nuances of Carnatic music. She says these have been going on for 15 years now. Narrating an interesting episode, she says that in her first session, she had an 80-year-old man registered for the programme. After paying the fees, he had told her that if he could not attend on all the days, she could keep the fees as a donation. But, he attended on all the seven days. During the valedictory function, he shed tears and said that for almost 50 years he had wasted his time listening to music without knowing its nuances. He wished that he had attended the course earlier, so that he could have been a more enlightened music lover. “This really moved me and I have been continuing this mission ever since as a humble service to music,” says Radha.
Radha considers that the theoretical aspects of music are very important to understand music in a wholesome manner. She adds that the motto of her organization Mudhra is “blending education and entertainment in music.” She says the organisation has introduced many novel and meaningful concepts in music and has chosen artists who are able to do justice to it. “We always make quality our first priority rather than just popularity,” she avers.
Radha tends to agree that there is a decline in the audience at the Carnatic music concerts these days. She notes that it is a great challenge for artists and organisers to draw audience to the concerts, especially when technology brings music within the comfort of homes. “But live music has its own charm. The rapport and aesthetic experience of listening live is absolutely unique,” concludes Radha.
