Ganesh Seva Samaj organised a vocal concert of Chennai-based Carnatic artiste Neyveli Santhanagopalan last weekend at the Karunya Mahaganapati Temple complex in New Delhi’s Mayur Vihar. Santhanagopalan, a popular and veteran musician in the field, got connected to the knowledgeable music lovers in this area of East Delhi no sooner than he started his concert. Indeed, it turned out to be a delightful evening of Carnatic music, both for the audience as well as the artistes.
Santhanagopalan started his concert with the Adi Tala Varnam “Inta Chalamu” in the raga Begada in two speeds in a befitting manner. The invocation song on Lord Ganesha was Muthuswami Dikshitar’s “Panchamatanga” in raga Malahari. The song was suffixed with detailed kalpanaswaras. For the Tyagaraja’s composition “Telisi Ramachintanato” in raga Poornachandrika, which Santhanagopalan took up subsequently, he introduced neraval and kalpanaswaras.
Santhanagopalan also sang Tyagaraja’s “Eti jenmamidi” in raga Varali and “Bagayanayya” in raga Chandrajyoti in an emotive manner bringing out the emotive contents of the lyrics to the fore. He also sang the slow pace Muthuswami Dikshitar’s “Ranganayakam” to a riveting tempo and in a delightful manner.
Being in the midst of Navratri festival, as expected, Santhanagopalan’s central item of recital was on Goddess Devi. The choice of Muthuswami Dikshitar’s navavarana kriti “Kamalambam Bhajare” in raga Kalyani was thoughtful. Till then, though there was a sumptuous quota of compositions, the raga alapanas were not. The only raga alapana that came in for detailed delineation was Kalyani. Sadly, many phrases in the delineation were a mere swara combinations and these did not quite help in bringing out the complete features of the raga to the fore.
Delhi R. Sridhar on the violin, Kumbakonam N. Padmanabhan on the mridangam rose to the occasion and provided good support. N. Harinarayanan who provided his support on the ghatam needs to walk that extra mile. The percussion duo, however, put up a fine tani avartanam in Adi tala.
