Malladi Brothers @ CNB - Workshop and Concert
November 6th to 8th, 2011 at Sandeepany Sadhanalaya, Powai
November 6, 7 & 8, 2011, were days to be marked in bold, for Chinmaya Naada Bindu. The well-renowned Malladi Brothers – Sreeramprasad & Ravikumar – spared a total of over 8 hours to teach a select group of music enthusiasts and performers, some rare compositions by Narayana Teertha and Bhadrachala Ramadasu. The songs were mostly tuned by their Guru, Sangeeta Kalanidhi, Nedinuri Krishnamurthy.
The workshop was held in Geeta Mandir at Sandeepany Sadhanalaya, Powai, a venue where spiritual culture is in abundance, with the 2-year Vedanta course being conducted for the 15th batch now. Being associated with the Bala Vihar and Yuva Kendra of the Chinmaya Mission from their childhood, the Malladis have great regard for Swami Chinmayananda, the founder, who they have met and sung for.
Besides being outstanding performers, the brothers exhibited their excellent teaching ability with extreme patience, too. They hold as their moral responsibility the honour of spreading the rare compositions to as many artists as possible, so that they can fall back on these for variety in presentation rather than adopting from other genres.
On the final day, they offered to perform for the Ashramites, and the concert was opened to outsiders, too, many being members of Powai Fine Arts Society. The brothers started with a Varnam in Mohana Ragam, followed by Kritis by Thyagaraja, Annamacharya, Narayana Teertha and bhajans by Meerabai and others. They were accompanied on the Violin by Shivkumar Anantharaman, on the Mrdangam by Shankar Lakshmanan and on Harmonium by Pramodini Rao. The offering was done with great devotion and love, which percolated down to the audience.
Mangalam Krishnamurthy, one of the participants and herself a good singer, had this to say about the camp and the performance to the brothers: “From (Gambhiramaana) Naattai, the first composition taught to us, to the soulful Sindhu Bhairavi slokam rendered at the end of the concert, it was simply a wonderful spiritual musical journey with an emotional Aananda Bhairavi, a bhava laden Syama, a lilting Saalakabhairavi, a racy Ravichandrika, a sweet Saaranga, an enjoyable Bilahari, an emotional Neelaambari, do we anything more to Unite Human beings than that One and Only meaningful Brahmam Okate?...We are indebted to you respected Sirs...Thank you - these two words are TOO SMALL ..May HE bestow us with more and more such opportunities to try and possibly aspire for Moksha through such journeys with you...”
The divine concert was blessed by Swami Advayanandaji, the Acharya of the 15th Vedanta course. He reiterated that music is the way to reach the goal of self-realization, and that the brothers took the audience on a fruitful ride on that path!
- Pramodini Rao
Below are some glimpses from this amazing workshop and concert:
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Programme Highlights
