A concert flavoured with traditional rendering

Chitraveena N Ravikiran, a celebrated prodigy who began playing the veena since the age of five gave a scintillating Chitra Veena performance at Keys Girls High School on the Thursday. The programme was in connection with the silver jubilee celebrations of Sharada Cultural Trust.

An instrumentalist and vocalist since the age of five, Ravikiran was trained by his father, Chitraveena Narasimhan. Ravikiran penned many articles on music in various journals and wrote a book on ‘Appreciating Carnatic Music’ which received laurels. He has 700 compositions to his credit. Besides he discovered new ragas like Choodamani, Kesavapriya, Snehapriya.

Ravikiran commenced his concert with “Era Naa Pie”, a Thodi raga varnam. Then he moved on to “Vinayakuni Ninu Vina” (Hamsadhwani) delineating raga flavour in ample measure and with a decent swarakalpana. He gave a straight rendition with “Manvyalakimpa Raadatey” (Nalinakanthi) showing instrumental beauty in tune to the tenor of the work of Thyagaraja.

It was in Simhendra Madhyamam raga krithi of KV Srinivasa Ayyer, “Needu Charanamuley”, that Ravikiran gave sumptuous ragalapana and a befitting swarakalpana. Padma Shankar on violin too demonstrated her strength on violin kaman. After dwelling on “Geetha Vadya Nataka Priya”, Natakapriya krithi, Ravikiran moved on to the main item “Enduku Peddala Vale” (Sankarabharanam). While extending a detailed ragalapana, Ravikiran majestically displayed his prowess in the “Veda Sastra Tatvardhamulu” charanam.

The swarakalpna too was very impressive. Thaniavarthanm by R Krishnan (mridangam) and Nemani Somayajulu (ghatam) contributed greatly to the success of the concert. Ravikiran concluded the concert with Sindhubhairavi krithi of Uthukkadu Venkata Subbiah to great applause.

A pleasing flute recital

Young flautist ES Poornima gave a pleasing recital recently. Commencing with Nata Raga varnam, she moved on to “Vinayakuni Ninu Vina” (Hasadhwani) with good delineation. Selecting Simhavahini Raga krtihi “Nena Runchira” as the sub-main item, she took “Maari Vairi Ramana” (Nasikabhushani) as the main item.

She presented both items with a detailed ragalapana and swaraprastharam. She concluded her programme with “Sankari Neevani” (Begada) of Subbaraya Sastri and “Ka Vaa Vaa” (Varali) of Papanasam Sivan. S Ayyappa (violin) and PS Mallikarjun (mridangam) gave good instrumental support. Sharada Krishnan and Ambuja Ramakrishnan co-ordinated the programme.

By:Chivukula Rama Mohan