Melodies of repose
JITENDRA PRATAP
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It was a treat to hear vocalist Veena Sahasrabuddhe perform in Delhi recently.
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Basically Veena belongs to the Gwalior khayal tradition. But she has also imbibed some of the nuances of the Agra and the Jaipur-Atrauli gharana, thereby creating a totally individualistic style of her own.
Vocalist Veena Sahasrabudde Photo: V. Sreenivasa Murthy
The Pune-based Hindustani classical vocalist Veena Sahasrabuddhe hails from a family of eminent musicians. Her father the late Pandit Shankar Shripad Bodas was a close disciple of the late Pandit Vishnu Digambar Paluskar. Earlier, she received training as a Kathak dancer and later commenced her musical training under her brother the late Pandit Kashiram Shripad Bodas, Pandit Balwantrai Bhatt, the late Vasant Thakar and Gajananbua Joshi.
Basically Veena belongs to the Gwalior khayal tradition. But she has also imbibed some of the nuances of the Agra and the Jaipur-Atrauli gharana as well, thereby creating a totally individualistic style of her own. She had always impressed as a highly matured classical singer. But listening to her again after a prolonged period one felt delighted to find her performing in a highly sedate and still more matured manner.
Her lengthy rendering in raga Maru Bihag was with an altogether different approach and artistic insight. The reposeful alap at the commencement with inroads into the mandra or bass register revealed hitherto unheard meanderings in Maru Bihag. The slow or vilambit composition "Patiyaan le jaeeo" delighted for her development with highly reposeful alap-badhat that indicated a deep insight into the raga's hidden folds.
And how beautifully developed was the mid-tempo number "Kaise kar aaoon tore paas" which she colourfully laced with liltingly executed rhythmic variations in sargams and taans. Veena provided a befitting finale to her renderings in Maru Bihag with the fast tempo number "Devi tum Bhagawati" with quite a few intricately knitted variations.
While Seema Shirodkar provided able accompaniment on the harmonium, it was Vishwanath Shirodhkar who gave appropriate rhythmic accompaniment on the tabla.
Sarod recital
Earlier the evening featured a sarod recital by the Delhi-based Biswajit Roy Choudhury, who is a former disciple of the sarod maestro Ustad Amjad Ali Khan. Although claiming as belonging to the Jaipur Atrauli gharana (by virtue of having learnt later on from the late Pandit Mallikarjun Mansoor), the overall flavour of Bishwajit's sarod recital has the notable features of the Rampur-Senia gharana of which the late Ustad Hafiz Ali Khan of Gwalior (father of Ustad Amjad Ali Khan) was one of the leading doyens.
Biswajit commenced his recital with an alap-jod-jhala taken up at length in the dusk-time raga Shree, which is one of his favourite melodies. Although he rendered this part of his recital with a total involvement, one felt it was not up to the mark set by his earlier renderings in the same raga. One felt him to be a bit aggressive in his handling of this serene melody on this particular occasion. This could be attributed to his being too close to the microphones, which were later adjusted by the attendant.
Biswajit excelled with the mid-tempo Jhap tala composition, which he rendered with quite a few boldly inserted variations intricately permuted, and with an apt insight towards the rhythm. His next rendering in raga Jaitshree indicated some nuances of his training under the late Pandit Mallikarjun Mansoor.
Concluding his recital in Adana Bahar was a fitting choice for the spring season. However, his renderings had an overdose of the raga Adana and very little of the raga Bahar.
This reminded one of the late thumri exponent Pandit Sunil Bose who when once requested to render raga Puriya Kalyan asked about the percentage of the raga Puriya and raga Kalyan the listener would prefer to hear!
Biswajit's renderings in Adana Bahar seemed to be with 75 per cent Adana and only 25 per cent Bahar. Ram Kumar Mishra's accompaniment on the tabla added charm to Biswajit's renderings besides his scores of lively rounds of quite a few well-knit solo variations and retorts.
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