Friday, August 08, 2008

A departure of sorts...

The last one year has been quite fulfilling, musically- two live shows; Blogswara V4; recording/ blogging of course; the senior grade exam in Carnatic music; some gyan in Musicology; attending concerts; some interesting interactions with Jessica Keyes for her MA thesis on Indian Audioblogging; and most importantly, I had the good fortune of receiving tutelage from the renowned violinist Smt Lalgudi Rajalakshmi, sister of the legendary Padmabhushan Sri Lalgudi Jayaraman.
As things turn out, it is at this juncture that I have to leave India to pursue my academic interests. I hope to take with me all these years of formal music training and continue to make the best of it. After all, its this training that's been pivotal to most of my musical endeavors.
Music has been the second tongue at home and I am so grateful to my parents for that. Many thanks to my sister too, who's been quite a big influence.

So today, I'm posting for the first time, a full classical piece- an aalaapana, krithi and kalpana swaram in Raagam Simhendramadhyamam- one of my favourites; dedicated first to my guru due to whom this was possible; and to all those who have helped me shape my Classical music skills over the years- my family and all my other gurus so far- Smt. Bhagyalakshmi, Smt. Ranganayaki Sridharan, Smt. Lakshmi Raghavan. I owe it all to them and I still have miles to go!

Song: Ninne Nammithi
Composer: Mysore Vasudevachar
Ragam: Simhendramadhyamam
Thalam: Mishra Chaapu



Download here.

Do drop in your comments on this one. The discerning ear will find some off notes, pitching lapses and so on- but I hope those are excusable in the larger picture :P

Its quite hard to believe that Octaves has nearly completed two years. Seems like I started blogging yesterday! It could be a while before I blog again and I sincerely thank the ones who pushed me to start a blog (Pradipji/Meera/Murali), and everyone who's kept this blog going so far- fellow bloggers, friends, well-wishers and visitors for the constant encouragement and support. I've totally enjoyed and learned a whole lot of things from the blogging experience! Hope to be back in sometime with more music!