Ranjani & Gayatri for Arun Excello on 1st Oct 2011

Ranjani & Gayatri- Vocal
Charulata Ramanuja-Violin
Arun Prakash- Mridangam
K.V.Gopalakrishnan-Ganjira

Date-1st October 2011.

VENUE & OCCASION – Arun Excello, a Corporate giant is coming out with Real Estate construction activities in the outskirts of Chennai and in order to promote this, they had a 3 day programme coupled with Navrathri Celebrations. Friday night, TM Krishna was performing and Saturday was R&G and Sunday it was Sanjay.

Lady AndAl School-Harrington Road-Venkata subba rao hAll.

The list goes like this:

1.SorasUda- sAveri-Kothavasal V Iyer

2. saraseeruha(S) - nAttai -puliyUr duraiswami Iyer

3.HarikAmobdi-Alapana for 3 minutes followed by “enadu manam karuNai”- Papanasam Sivan

4.Amma rAvamma-Kalyani-Thiagarajar- Neraval and swaram in “sAmarasa dala netru, thyagarajuni mitru”

5.Hindolam Alapana by Ranjani followed by “nErajakshi kAmakshi”- MD

6.marive rekkava-mAlavi-GNB – (a brilliant mAlavi and well rendered by R&G)

7.Main- Bilahari followed by “ChAmundeswari pAlayamAm”- Mysore vAsudevachar
Neraval in “rAkA nishAkara sannibha vadanE rAjIva lOcanE” and swaram

8.Tani

9.“Tunga uttunga panirangame” – vasantA followed by “ninRum irundum kidandum”-a verse, from Abirami andhadhi in kApi, sindu bhairavi followed by “karunai deivame
kaRpagame”-P.Sivan“

10.Abhang-rAgam not known.

Mangalam

Excellent auditorium, acoustics and background settings and being a corporate show, extra lightings focusing the artists-it was a true class and R&G was in fine form on that day.

Being navratri, they took Goddess kritis from all composers and rendered with perfection. Started with Alatur style varNam, they immediately into the business, nAttai was presented with aplomb. Neraval in “sAmarasa” was truly outstanding and the exchange of neravals and swarams was well crafted.

The Hindolam rAga by by Ranjani or Bilahari by Gayatri was master-class. Each and every phrase was rendered with perfection. They have truly mesmarised the rasikas. They had the energy till the last Abhang. Breath taking “pudis” in abhang….no way to express the class. I have attended many concerts of R&G. Easily, this will be in my memory for long time.

Good sangatis in almost all the compositions, evenly paced. The rAga selection was likeable and kudos to R&G.

mAlavi I rememberd SSI’s “nenarunji” with LGJ- the breath taking way of rendering kritis and swarams- R&G tried and failed in between, missed the speed. !!

Charulata in violin was a big let down. Follow up of swaras, she could not bring out the speed or repeat the pattern. Sort of mixed bag. If she wants to perform better, she had to listen more and try to show the speed in her violin. Her performance was mediocre though she justified in her return, especially in Bilahari.

Tani-Arun does not bang or even shake his head while playing Tani. Bringing “sunAdam in his Mridangam by gentle tapping”-he is expert. Never failed to impress. Tani was good with KVG.