An amazing music season

The spring of 2024 had an amazing line of up music concerts across the bay area. There are only so many weekends availble to attend 3 to 3 1/2 hour concerts. Made the most of the chances presented.

There is still one concert over the long weekend from Bharat Sundar which will be missed. So posting this as my spring attendance has already come to a close.

There was an amazing start from Ramakrishnan Murthy. He did a one hour piece on one of my favorite ragas, Kharaharapriya with Pakkala Nilabadi which we all loved. We also got to meet and talk to him for a few minutes after the concert, thanks to our friend who is related to him. Ram is going to be the Sanjay for the coming generation. His music is moving!

The next concert we attended (we go as a group from Cupertino) was a "curated" concert titled Krishnam Vande Jagatgurum by Gayathri Girish. She is a great singer and is a very traditional singer with no gimmiks but the beauty was in the way she tied every song to the theme, irrespective of the diverse composers and languages she chose the compositions from. Krishna is a pan-Indian god, guess he has a fan following across the globe. Short of singing a Krishna Bhajan in English, she covered the spectrum!

The week after, we were going to be dropping our daughter in Santa Barbara. Kid had come for the weekend and had to be in college a day early, so I was originally going to miss the concert to do the one day road trip. Was literally driving back non stop from UCSB when my friends were audio calling me from the concert hall to show how good the artist was. My music teacher had also told me not to miss NJ Nandini. So raced to the concert hall and could barely walk from the parking lot to the seat. Enjoyed the last hour of Nandini's concert. Have become a fan now. She is one amazing talent. The gambeeravani she sang with so much energy stayed in my head for a good week to the point that I tried learning it. There are no renditions out there with that energy level. Every piece she sang was brilliant! Will try not to miss her concert next time she comes!

This was followed by a Jugalbandhi Flute concert by Sashank and Ronu Majumdar (Ronu-da) that was just out of the world. The boy wonder and the bansuriwala were just teeing off of each other and we walked out feeling that this could have been a longer concert. 3 hours went by too fast. Just amazing. They picked pieces in Aboghi, Kalyani- Yaman, Megh-Madhyamavathi, Maand- Misra Maand, and that just went on to other things to conclude. We got a flavor for pitch shifting with both of them playing flutes in different pitches which were harmonic. The mridhangam and tabla were supposed to go with the Carnatic and Hindustani sections, but they switched seamlessly to support the other style in two of the pieces in the most brilliant way. 

Then I went by myself to see Vijay Siva in concert. Still remember going to a private concert in someones basement in Philadelphia suburbs as a grad student on his first tour to US (if I remember right) in 1993. Some kind lady had offered to pick up me and my housemate from college campus and give us a ride oneway. We were to take the train back. It was 50 or so people listening to him in a basement turned stage! Vijay Siva stuck to basics and showed how purity in music and simplicity can still work in a concert. The music was pristine for lack of a better word! An added bonus, yet along hour long piece on Kharaharapriya, this time it was Chakkaniraja. He also sang the thiruppugazh Nada vindu kaladi, which I love. 

The other interesting thing in this concert was the teacher allowing two of his students stage time and showing them how to take over and sing with him.. this was tradition in the old days when the star musicians would introduce their students to the audience.. he was the only one in recent time who has followed this tradition. It is good to see this guru parampara also being alive and well in this day and age!

Then there was a week of music that had three concerts. On a Saturday we went to see Sikkil Gurucharan perform for a fund raising event for MA foundation. This was not exactly a Carnatic music concert. It was more of a "musical evening" where he sang everything with a motherhood theme in many different styles. There was cine music mixed into Carnatic and Hindustani music, with a violin duo and a keyboard accompanying the second half the concert. The music was enjoyable and there was a lot of time spent on introducing the pieces because the large crowd was very diverse. 

The very next day we got treated to what was undeniably the best concert we attended this season. Sanjay Subrahmanyan was in town for his "Tamizhum Naanum" concert where he did the entire concert with songs in Tamil. Last year I missed his concert inspite of having tickets because we had to drop the kids off in college that very weekend. This year thankfully, got to attend what was an amazing concert.

Every song he sang was spell binding. At one point when he was singing Keeravani, I started crying uncontrollably. Was suddenly reminded of my grandmother who passed recently. Never got to grieve her the way the rest of the family did. Sanjay broke some emotional dam and all that pent up grief just came pouring out. Took me a good five minutes to compose myself again and get back to focusing on the music and just then he was playing with the notes and ending every line in his aalapanai with a smile on his face... knew there was some familiarity there and sure enough when the violinst played the whole thing at a stretch, it was S. Janaki's aalap from Kaatre endhan geetham from Johnny! Ilayaraja magic showed up!

As usual, he picked some rare pieces. His RTP in Brindavana Saranga was mesmerizing. Came out wiping my eyes after that concert. The purpose of music is to move. Hope he shows up again next year and I get to attend his concert. 

The week of music was not over as on Friday, got to attend an amazing Hindustani- Carnatic jugalbandhi vocal concert by Nachiketa Yakkundi and Asha Ramesh in Cupertino for a Ram Navami house concert that had been delayed from the original date. That delay was my fortune. Two local artists who are amazing musicians who do sold out concerts, performing in a house for family and friends. It was an amazing experience just sitting 5 feet away and listening to these two show their mastery over their art forms. Got to learn about Behag vs. Bihag among other things. Ther was an amazing piece in Pantuvarali and Poorya Dhanashree (they are close but not the same) and the artist showed us what was close and what was not for an hour long piece that was brilliant. Just came out thinking "must have done some good in the previous birth" to get this kind of music experience over a 7 day period! 

The regular sponsored community concerts will be done by next weeked and things will resume in Fall. Maybe will get to attend some one off events over summer.

This time San came with me to a lot more concerts than she usually does. Made me very happy!

Fortunate to have a bunch of friends who are like minded with whom I can go and enjoy music this way!d

Sometimes all you have to do... is listen!

One of the advantages of living in the bay area is the significant local population that is interested in South Indian Classical music. 

We have two organizations that have memberships and have a concert(Kutchery) series announced early enough. The main one is SIFA or South India Fine Arts and the other one is Sankrirthi Laya. Then there are the other one off concerts where you buy direct tickets for artists who do just one or two concerts!

This spring concert season in bay area starts when all the artists have done performing in Chennai and Mumbai and they migrate to the bay area when the temperatures just start to be manageable compared to Chennai. They end up starting in California and go east as the weather warms up there. 

Have been treated to a wonderful concert list. Most of these concerts are on Sunday, some being on Saturday. It is almost a concert every weekend for 12 weeks. Made it a point to attend almost all of the vocal or instrumental ones. Skipped the dance programs. 

Given my knee was already hurting and inflamed for most of spring, sitting in one place for 4 hours for each concert, not to mention the lines to get seated.. the carpooling with friends back and forth to venue, each concert was a 5 1/2 to 6 hour commit. Given the interest with my friends, we went as a group! The group is 5 ladies and me. Apparently only one person in each of those families manages to sit in one place for 4 hours! Given the ladies color coordinated their Sari's for every concert, they would even publish the color in our whatsapp group and where possible I would even wear a T-shirt in their color of choice. All said and done, I had a lot of fun attending the concerts. 

Most of them were amazing, some were like "meh" and one we left 30 minutes before concert ended as one of the carpoolers had to take care of an urgent issue at home. Somehow we were all okay leaving that one early. 

Here is the list that I attended in the order

Violin concert by Lalgudi siblings

Vocal by Kalyanapuram S. Aravind

Vocal by Sudha Raghunathan (this was not through the memberships but a concert organized for fund raising for OPEN education).. she did more of a lec dem than a traditional concert

Vocal by Saketaraman

Vocal by Abhishek Raghuram 

Vocal by Malladi Brothers

A special "carnatic'y concert based on Ilayaraja songs by RaGa (Ranjani Gaythri) which had discounted tickets thanks to SIFA! Added bonus was that I got to take Jr. who had just landed from college the previous day!

Vocal by Amrutha Venkatesh

Vocal by Gayathri Venkataraghavan 

This pretty much wrapped up Spring season. Fall season begins in September!

When you get to listen to all these artists and their accompaniment artiss on voilin, mrudhangam, tabla, ghatam, kanjira .. you are in for a treat in every concert. 

Listening to the different styles, the way the artists express themselves in each piece, their mastery of their craft and in some cases the amazing syncronization between two artists, gives you a subconsicous understanding of what these ragas make you feel. Going to concerts is also a good learning experience, when you and your friends are chatting on the whatsapp group trying to race to identify the raga for the song or the concept being tried. We discuss the concert on the way home! Sometimes my friends and the jokes pre or post concert add more to the experience than the concert itself. 

When I get to write more, will key in my thoughts on each of these concerts and the special lightbulb moments!

The good thing in these concerts was the number of parents who managed to get their kids to sit and listen. Sometimes it is tough to keep them in one place. For the most part the kids sat, listened, guessed ragams, sang along in places and their smiling faces in the audience made it all the more interesting. Carnatic music wil definitely survive another generation at least based on the audience stats!

The regular memberships for SIFA is 160 USD for a year and Sankritilaya is 75 USD. You get ~12 and ~8 concerts for that a year! If you get to attend most of the concerts, you get your monies worth! Trick is in clearing your weekend calendar and prioritizing this over other events.  My family has been extremely supportive in letting me disappear all evening for this many days! They do it because I come home with a song on my lips and have a happy high for a day or two post concert! That means they have to deal with regular me only for 5 days a week.. Given a choice they would send to a concert every three days. 

They say "katradhu kai mann alavu, kallaadhadhu ulagalavu!" (what you have learned so far is comparable to a fist full of sand, what you are yet to learn is as vast as the earth). Even though we familiarize ourselves with as many ragas as possible, in every concert we learned a new ragam and what it sounds and feels like! 

The listening continues, as does the learning!

If you are a bay area parent trying to get your kids interested in learning Carnatic or South Indian classical music, do avail yourself of these memberships in the organizations and give your kids a chance to hear these wonderful artists. They will definitely enjoy and take an interest!

My film song singing definitely improves over time as my Carnatic singing progresses. Given time constraints and the knee issues, have not been singing movie songs to the extent I used to. That will pick up in the next three months!

Here's to more music listening!