Sixty minutes of glory

T.M. Krishna’s recital at the recent Akashvani Sangeet Sammelan was a memorable affair.

T. M. Krishna.

Not many artistes would venture for a ragam-taanam-pallavi session during a short duration concert of an hour. To do proper justice, RTP session itself requires at least that much time. Not many rasikas would consider it an intelligent decision on the part of the artistes to take up RTP, considered to be highly manodharmic (creative aspects in concert singing), showcasing their (artistes’) skills and mastery over the art, under such a time schedule. But T.M. Krishna plunged in to present RTP and sandwiched it between his opening piece and the finishing javali (in raga Kanada), during the one hour concert for the Akashwani Sangeet Sammelan 2009 festival.

The concert was organised by All India Radio, before an invited audience in the Capital, this past weekend. The net result — Krishna left an indelible impression, despite rushing through with the pallavi presentation and the conspicuous absence of the ragamalika swaraprastaras.

The presentation was ‘action packed’ too (literally, as he was moving in all directions before his microphone to present the complex phrases and brigaa-s). Krishna presented the pallavi “Kailasapate Pasupate Umapate Namostute” in raga Begada and set to Adi tala. Krishna spent considerable time delineating the raga. It was an outstanding delineation, in which Krishna brought out the complete features of the melody, which is a janya raga of the 29th melakarta, “Dheera Shankarabharanam”.

Melodious

Similarly, the taanam presentation was very melodious when Krishna traversed the three octaves (the mandra, madhya and the tara sthai).

By now, Krishna had very little time left. He had already received a chit, presumably, about the time at his disposal. Krishna had to rush with the pallavi presentation, with not enough justice being done, as he did for the ragam and taanam. The subsequent swaraprastaras (in Begada raga only) were highly creative and indicative of his prowess in this area. One could see Krishna’s total involvement during his recital, which contributed substantially to the quality of his concert.

V. Sanjeev on the violin and Poongulam S. Subramanian on the mridangam provided excellent support to Krishna. While Sanjeev closely followed Krishna and his delineation of Begada was delightful, Subramanian’s support was captivating both during Krishna’s pallavi presentation and his own tani avartanam (percussion solo) session.

Since the concert was held before an invited audience, many rasikas would have missed this concert. Nevertheless, they can look forward to listening to the recordings of this ‘Little Master of Carnatic Music’ which would be broadcast by All India Radio in early November, sans the ‘action’.