Music Concert

Last week I had guests from India. It was Ms. Vasudha who is Bamini manni's niece. She is a Carnatic Music Vocalist and she had been invited to Singapore to perform in Shree Sivan temple. We wanted her to sing here in KL too and invited her over. She came with her dad.
I have heard her sing before in Chennai in Sabhas as well as at home when ever I happen to be in my brother's place and she visited.
I knew she could sing well, but I never knew she could sing this well. It was an experience to hear her sing. She is a young woman in her early twenties and is doing her MBA in human resources in Loyala college Chennai and she is like any other youngster, enthusiastic and cheerful and excited about her first visit to a foreign country. But once she is on stage she is completely transformed.
I never saw her practice or doing her sadhana early in the morning. She was just quite casual about singing. One local artist was to perform with her as the violinst as the pakka vadhayam. Since the violinist was not very experienced we were asked to meet up with her in the organizer's house. I was just watching their interlude and how Vasudha was asking what Ragas that girl will be comfortable with, so that she will do her alapanas in those ragas. Since my mother had also done the duty of a tamilian mom of putting me in music classes when I was young and the concerts I have heard though not many, I am quite aware of the kutchery format of Raga alapana, swaras and neravals and thukkada and all that even though I can not recognise any ragas. Vasudha told us later that she will decide the songs she is going to sing depending on the audience and she will roughly have a list in her mind.
Here I have to mention that my hubby dear loves carnatic music and I am no music buff.
On the kutchery day she started in a slow tempo and slowly the tempo increased. I could see that she was singing a lengthy song and then a smaller faster song followed. I could see that she was by far better than the accompaniments of mridangam and also gangira who just managed to follow her. She was all the time encouraging the Violinist and was smiling at her all the time. After the kutchery every body was praising her choice of songs she sang.
In the next place she chose songs which were completely different and the theme was 'muruga' songs even though it was a Devi temple. Here a srilankan tamil (of course malaysian) music teacher attended the concert. She teaches some of my friends devotional songs and they sing in murugan temple every sashti day. That teacher is not keeping very good health but she sat through the 2 hours and I could see she was moved almost to tears. The songs really moved the audience. One of the songs was my husband's favourite 'kanda va va'
I had arranged only these two kutcheries and after hearing her, she was invited to sing in another temple. Here she simply excelled herself and we could see that she was doing complicated thalas and while doing swaras she was excelling in her thala control. This I could understand as she did it on purpose and told us before how it is all mathematical calculations and how she is going to go about them. Anand had also once told me that the percussion instrument is just mathematical abilities when he learned tabla for 2 months in India and still he is at it when ever it pleases him.
She is good at purandara dasa kruthis and all these three concerts she could not sing that, she wanted to sing them for me alone. I wanted her to sing for my friends too and so off we went to my friends place where few music lovers had come and it became a chamber concert. (This word I am hearing for first time. may be that is what they do in America where lots of artists from India go, Invite all your friends for grub and then have the kutchery at home) . Here she sang purandara dasa and also kanaka dasa and also basaveswara vachana all in kannada. Her diction was so perfect. It is no wonder as her teacher is Dr. Manjula who is a kannadiga. There were lot of 'neyar viruppam' (audience request) she sang them too. Of course there was no pakkavadyam for her here. She ended her kutchery with a tillana every time. Every time I hear the tillana I can visualize some body dancing nicely to the tillana. Every where she sang she did not have any note or book and just sang from her memory and each time she did not repeat a song sang earlier.
I really wonder why she has not become quite famous as yet in Chennai. Is it that she has no God Father or Mother to support her. Is it that she is not a child of a famous artist or a 'sisya of a famous artist.
She does sing in the music season but not at the prime time of 6.p.m or 7p.m. slot.
I am convinced that with her caliber of music she will be one of the great singers in Chennai if not in India.
She wants to take up a job with her MBA and does not want to depend on music as her profession as she feels she does not want to get desperate and it will affect the way in which she sings. She loves to sing rare thyagaraja kruthis which are not that famous but which are very good.
We want to organize a real big concert for her here and may be we will be able to do it some time.

Fitness Run

There was a Fitness Run organized in Tejas's school here in the nearby lake garden. I had heard about the fitness run through Ayeysha my friend who is from Maldives and whose daughter is in the 9th grade in the same school. So I kind of made my routine walking to jogging for the past month or so. I never knew jogging will be tough. Usually I can walk many rounds around our condominium which is approximately 650 meters. But Jogging I found is quite tough. Even one round I could not jog continuously and had to walk in between. It is another matter that Tejas used to beat me walking while I was jogging. My aim was to complete the run whether walking or jogging.
Finally the D day arrived which was this Saturday. There was this continuous rain from morning 5.30 a.m. The irony was there was practically no rain at all for almost a month here and rain Gods had to see us running and arrived on time on this day. We all reached the venue on time at 7.30 with all proper running gear with hubby dear with a camera to shoot all of us. It started pouring. we were all standing under the tents erected for the purpose of the run. Finally they announced that the run will start as per schedule. It was class wise for the students and there was separate race for girls and boys. Tejas's class had to go 3.2 kms which was two rounds around the lake. First round he did quite well and was in 3rd place but once he started second round I could see him walking talking to his friends!! If I had a mega phone I would have shouted to him to run. It was quite a tough run for the kids (4th ,5th and 6th boys and Tejas is in 4th) and Tejas was able to finish the run in 6th place. I was quite happy that he did that and came within 10 places. But poor kid did not get a medal as only first five places were given medals.
In the Category of 9th , 10th 11th girls who also ran 3.2 kms., Ayeysha's daughter Noor came first. She was way ahead of all the other competitors. We were all very happy.
All this happened amidst drizzling rain.
Finally it was the run for parents and teachers (women). It was 1.6 kms that is just one round around the lake. I started and completed and am happy that I completed within first 10 ladies and also I never walked and jogged the whole round. Ayeysha came 3rd. So mother and daughter both got medals and it was really great.
Tejas was disappointed that I did not get any medal. When I told him that I was the only grandma who ran and he should tell his friends that, he said ' why would I tell that you are my grandma?' That it self was like getting a medal for me. Only few of my friends knew that a grandma was running but I felt elated and told Tejas that I would run a fitness run with his kid too.
All this was made possible because of Anand. One of his dreams is that we should be running the small charity runs with him and he bought me a running shoes when I visited USA last time. So I have made a beginning and has run with the shoes he bought for me. Now I will run better and has decided to practice in the lake garden which we never knew existed so near our house.
Hubby dear did not run as he is not practicing and without practice it is not advisable to run at our age.