Svanubhava 2010

True to the name Svanubhava, it is indeed an experience.
I missed out on programs of Svanubhava over the last years. Thanks to Sri TMK’s mail on the program and schedule. Big thanks to their use of Technology, they created virtual reality.

A podium where one could see tradition and technology, both together and to their core-Svanubhava. Tradition was preserved in every event... I feel small to talk about the depth of convention and custom, be it in Vidushi N Rajam's performance and her explanation of Carnatic and Hindustani concepts, Shashank’s venugaanam or Malavika’s graceful natyam. Never to forget the “Sriram” duo. There is an inherent tradition - musicians shouldn’t be sent empty handed and this was by and large followed, by rewarding even the school kids who sang some 2 or 3 compositions, as a token of appreciation.

To the technology part now...amazing streaming and buffering. Despite TMK's email, I had missed the first few days of this music fest, "music feast" would be a better expression. This morning (Aug 6th) I tried linking to the program online and faced some problem with streaming...All I had to do was send a mail to TMK and it worked amazingly fast, I do not know if it was a coincidence or he really got it to work after my mail. Then was an issue with buffering and a mail yet again fixed it. TMK and his technology crew are just remarkable. I fall short on words. Do I appreciate music or technology? Each is better than the other. What an event and immense organizing; I just could watch rest of the program since then from office, home from anywhere and everywhere. I could remain connected till the end. My personal take away from the day’s program was more from the last event –“Vid. Sriram Parashuram and Vid. Anooradha Sriram on their Guru Dr. T Viswanathan”. One could see obedience and reverence in the two stalwarts’ eyes when they were talking about their Guru – Towering examples of Guru bhakthi! Just loved Sriram’s elucidation of jaru and kampitha gamaka paddathis. Anooradha’s exhibition of the use of single swaram as sounding different(based on its orientation with the adjacent swara)was one of its only kind.
Few points that reached me deeply were:
-Empowering a composition by adding beauty to the words that make up the musical piece.
-Importance to aesthetics while singing, every line to be sung with grace.
-Knowing the syntax of the language while singing non-tongue compositions
-Importance of learning an instrument for a vocalist - imposing the facets of violin, flute -and other instruments in the vocal instrument
-Singing based on the essence of the kriti and not just on raga...2 songs of same raga would carry different personality depending on their context.
That was quite an invigorating session.

(Added on 7th aug)
It was a feast to see Vid. Soumya and Vid. Nityashree together on stage. The debate session on “Gender bias in music and dance art forms” was thought-provoking with an entertaining moderation by Sri R K Sriramkumar followed by the on-going(3:52 pm now on aug 7th) Varakari Sampradaya by Tukaram Ganapathi Maharaj. The single stage embraced ample of varieties.
Many audiences including me would have thought that there wouldn't be enough time for such many special sessions over a span of 6 days, 9 am – 4 pm each day. The program proved me wrong. I followed only 2 days of the 6-day festival and Svanubhava has been so informative and revealing that I have piled up bits and pieces for later digestion. If one thought Carnatic music and programs of Svanubhava kind are confined only to Chennai, NO, TMK, Bombay Jayashree and their crew streamed music to every house, every part of the world.
I shall not get into deeper musical details of the program for I write about music in almost every other post. I would like to retain this blog post to appreciate the whole team of Svanubhava for such an event. Am sure the once termed “struggling-to-exist” classical art forms will flourish with efforts of this kind. This is an interesting event to prove technology can positively contribute to not just keeping alive of tradition but promote it. As TMK rightly says Svanubhava is not a corporate event with advertisements and banners. Its an event purely driven by passionate people. Using technology rethinking on tradition is the way I would term this!!!

Kudos! Its difficult to wait for a year for similar soul-stirring experience!Special thanks to Sri TMK.