Maharajapuram Ramachandran

Sep 9, 2007
Shiva Vishnu Temple of South Florida

We all grow up to become our parents. This was a scary thought when we were young and it is even scarier for our kids! There are three stages to becoming our parents. First stage is, NEVER! The second stage is one of SHOCK – oh my God, I am becoming more like my parents. It creeps up on you and the realization is sudden. The final stage is to ENJOY or ACCEPT becoming our parents. Personally, I am somewhere between the “shock” and “enjoy” stages of becoming my father.

Sitting in Sri Maharajapuram Ramachandran’s concert, my thoughts drifted to the many car rides I have taken with my father whenever he would visit us. We would always play Carnatic music and over 80% of the time it would be the songs of Sri Maharajapuram Santhanam, who is Sri Ramachandran’s father. Every time, after listening for a long time my father would let out a sigh followed by an inevitable lament, “I wish we had such excellent recordings of Sri Maharajapuram Vishwanatha Iyer”, who is Santhanam’s father! He would share stories from the times when he was a boy scout in Thiruvaiyar during the Thayagaraja Aradahana working as crowd control (and crowd!). He would describe how he enjoyed those concerts and especially one of the Pancha Rathna Krithis in Varali “Kana kana ruchira” rendered by Sri Vishwanatha Iyer. Here I am, talking to my daughter, Deepa, about how I enjoyed the few times I have listened to Sri Santhanam live in concert. I lament that I should have listened to a lot more of Sri Santhanam’s live concerts. The most striking qualities of Sri Santhanam are his shruthi suddham (perfect pitch), ability to bring out the emotions of the song through his voice and his extraordinary musical talent.

It seems like Sri Ramachandran is finding himself in the same ‘predicament’ of becoming his father. WOW! What a blessing! Some places during the concert, I closed my eyes and actually listened to Sri Santhanam! This experience was shared by many who were privileged to attend the concert. The voice, intonation, the bhavam in those songs were exactly the same as his father. Even the body language and hand gestures shown were getting close to Sri Santhanam. The songs selected for the concert were also the ones that were made popular by his father.

“Mahaganapathim Manasa Smarami” in the uplifting ragam of Nattai set the stage for the entire concert to follow. He then sang the song on Adithya, the Sun God, as it was a Sunday concert in the ragam Hamsadhwani. It was one of the songs from the Navagraha CD that was released on the same day.

At the beginning of the next song, I joined the long line of Carnatic music rasikas who have difficulty differentiating between Purvi Kalyani and Panthuvarali. I was corrected by Madhu, the resident singer of South Florida, who was sitting behind me that the Kannada song was in fact in Panthuvarali. It was later confirmed by Dr. Ramakrishnan, the resident Mridanga vidhwan of South Florida.

Dr. Iyengar, one of our South Florida patrons, must have been in seventh heaven at this point. Usually, he would wait for the thukkada section and request a Kannada song from the singers. But Sri Ramachandran probably knew this and preempted the request and sang a series of “Iyengar Specials” (Kannada songs!) like “Ksheerabdi Kannigai”.

The main piece was O Rangasayee in Kambodhi. The alapana was simply superb. The songs, niravals, kalpana swarams were fantastic. The singer was taking some risks in the high pitch and trying some very difficult gamakams. Some of them paid off and some did not. On the low pitch side he was flawless. Well, he needs a little more time to become his father! Who doesn’t?

The RTP was in the beautiful ragam of Brindavana Saranga. During the raga maligai section of the RTP he gave quite a work out to the audience. He sang in Vaasanthi (not Vasantha) and Sumanasa Ranjani. CLEAN BOWLED! Sri Ramachandran saw the “deer in the headlight” look on our faces and took pity on us to announce ragam name.

He sang a wide variety of ragams either in a song or as part of ragamalika including Rithi Gowle, Yamuna Kalyani, Kanada, Sindhu Bhairavi, Madhyamavathi, Shanmugapriya, Shivaranjani etc. The Sai Baba song, another one from the CD that was released, in ragam Dwijavanthi touched many hearts. He sang his father’s favorite Nalina Kanthi Mathi with the names of several ragams in each line and those lines will be sung in that specific ragam! In other words, the ragams chosen did not put us to sleep but made us sit up in the chair wanting even more! Sri Ramachandran also demonstrated his extensive range on the musical scale from low Madhayamam to the high Panchamam.

Folks, let me tell you something – today, even in India you cannot attend a kutcheri like this which is more than three-and-a-half hours long. The December season kutcheris end in two to two-and-a-half hours. The sabhas have to pack so many concerts in so few calendar days and so they schedule two kutcheris in the same evening. To hear very traditional concert like this one with complete with varnam, invocatory songs, two elaborate songs full with alapana and kalpana swarams, an extensive main piece with thani avardhanam, a complete RTP with Raga malika section, viruttham, thukkada songs and thillana – it is a rare treat. It is like paying for one and getting two concerts! These are the good old days!

The veteran player, Sri Nagai Muralidharan was on the violin. He was excellent but for this concert he sounded somewhat sterile. He did not seem to put his full being into the playing during this concert. He had talent but lacked some spark or luster on this day. Surely, there were many bright spots and he offered a great support for the main artist – but we want more! Sri Thanjavur Ramadoss on the mridangam was brilliant, but in patches. First half of his thani was average but the second half was brilliant. The final hand off to the singer after the thani was poorly orchestrated. It looked and sounded clumsy. The singer and the violinist dropped the ball. The naadam that came out of the mridangam was divine and his training from Palghat Mani Iyer was very evident throughout the concert.

Let me close with how the evening opened – the CD release ceremony.

Sri Ramachandran had set to music songs written by our very own Dr. Venkataraman Balu of South Florida. The songs were written in Tamil on the Navagrahas and Sathya Sai Baba and published on a beautiful CD along with a detailed booklet. As mentioned above, he sang a couple of songs from that CD and mesmerized the audience. Sri Ramachandran was “a chip off the old block” when he mentioned that the navagrahas placed a lot of obstacles during the production of the CD! Do musicians learn to have a sense of humor as part of the music training?!

Mrs (Dr.) Daya Balu, may have started a new trend. It may be the first time I heard a woman publicly acknowledge the talent of her husband! I hope more women follow this trend. There will be fewer wars! Hmmm, I can dream, can’t I? But seriously folks, it is fascinating to hear from her how Dr. Balu’s poetry was transformed into this beautiful garland of songs on a CD. Hearing a set of songs on the Navagrahas is a rarity. The raga selection, arrangement of the instruments, vocal talent of Sri Ramachandran, recording quality and the lyrics were all excellent. I highly recommend the purchase of this CD with the proceeds going to a worthy institution, our very own Shiva Vishnu Temple of South Florida. Please approach the board members of the Shiva Vishnu Temple or Dr. Balu himself for the CD. Hats off to the Balus! Great job!

Congratulations to our Cultural committee. Another great job! Sound system set up was excellent! Crowd is getting bigger! I tasted the vada, bonda and the milk sweet – super job by our Food committee! What is a carnatic concert without some cholesterol medication?! Keep up the great work!

See you all at the next concert on Sep 30 at 4:00PM!

B. Seetharaman
Sep 10, 2007