The highlight of the five-day Vaggeyakara festival organised by Andhra Music Academy last week at Kalabharathi was the Hindustani vocal presented by Pandit Ganapathi Bhatt on the third day.
Elatedly emanating the naada, he seemed to be materialising refulgent revelations of the traditions of sadarang, adarang, ramrang and Pandit Bhatkhande besides Pandit C.R. Vyas, his guru in particular. Accompanied with equally empathetic alacrity on tabla by Gopalakrishna Hegde, he sang (compositions mainly in Rag Yaman and Bhoopali in Ek-Tal in Madhyam laya) mellifluously.
Malladi Suribabu from Vijayawada who rendered compositions of Mysore Vasudevachar, Lambodaramaavalambe (Kambhoji - Roopakam), Mamahridaye (Reethigowla-Khandatriputa) and Sreemadadi Tyagaraja Guruvaram elaborately (Kalyani - Roopakam) all with preludes of explicative analysis, sustained audience interest all through.
He sang first on the second day in the excellent company of Dwaram Satyanarayana Rao on violin and P.S. Phalgun on mridangam. Almost equally interesting was the vocal rendering of compositions of Syamasastry first on the fourth day by Kasturi Kamaladeepthi. P. Gnanadev on violin and M. Sridhar on mridangam kept good company.
Giving explicative analysis of all the four keertans — Karunachoodu (Sri), Ninuvinaaga (Poorvikalyani), Mariveregathi Evvaramma (Anandha Bhairavi) and Devi Neepadasaarasamule (Kambhoji) very elaborately she rendered, she evoked hearty and reverberating applause instantly. The other recital that went well with the audience even sans any such analysis, was the vocal by Nityasree Mahadevan on the last day in the company of M.A. Krishnaswamy on violin, S. Anantha Krishna on mridangam and H. Sivaramakrishnan on ghatam, all from Chennai.
