Weekend Update

Hello there!

As I mentioned yesterday, I’m currently in the midst of preparing for my final exams, as I have a plethora of essays, projects, assignments, and proposals that are all due this week. This semester, however, has been kinder to me in comparison to past semester in terms of how spaced out exams have been. Plus, I am excited to plan and start my senior thesis over the summmer, as I’ll be submitting my proposal later this week!

Aside from all the academic stresses mentioned, I was able to go to a Indian classical music concert, after a gap of few months. As much I love to perform concerts myself and interact with the audience, it is even more inspiring to listen to others. Being a keen listener, in my opinion, is arguably one of the most important parts of developing and refining one’s craft, regardless of the genre of music. I snidely pride myself on having an “eclectic taste”, as much as I hate that saying.

This concert was by the husband-and-wife duo, Carnatic violinist Charumathi Raghuaraman and mridangist Anantha R. Krishnan. I’ve listened to numerous recordings of them online, specifically the former’s rendition of different thillanas composed by the maestro Lalgudi Jayaraman, but this was the first in-person violin concert that I had gone to in over 7-8 years.

It was held at Columbia, and kudos to the students there for re-starting up their on-campus Indian classical arts club and taking initiative to bring on different artists and conduct student concerts periodically throughout the school year. I also got to listen to the concert with one of my closest friends there as well, Aditya Phatak, who is a fantastic tabla player and musician in his own right.

Throughout the concert, Aditya and I played our own game of trying to guess the ragas that were being played on the violin, while simultaneously trying to keep tala during the brilliant thaniavarthanam. The concert, to put it simply, was absolutely splendid. Every single piece, from the opening kAmbOji varnam to the behAg thillana, had its own identity, beauty, and panache with which it was played. The main piece that Charumathi-ji played was the KalyANi masterpiece Ethavunara composed by Tyagaraja. I’ve heard numerous brilliant renditions of this kriti by different vidwans and vidushis, but this was sublime. The improvisations in the alapana were marvelous, and the kalpanaswaras were innovative and in perfect alignment with the mridangam.

Ultimately, I’m glad that I was able to carve out time last Sunday to go and listen to the both of them. For now, that is all, but I have to go back to actually working on my assignments!

Till next time.