Neyveli Santhanagopalan sparkles with manodharma

(Another version of this review appeared in The Hindu on January 13, 2012)

Sitting in front, in full view of the men on the dias, there was easy eye-contact between me and Neyveli Santhanagopalan, a friend of mine couple of decades (and indeed one of the extremely few artiste-friends, because I assidiously keep away from artistes so as to keep my independence in judgement shielded from influences, friendly or otherwise.) It also helped that I happened to be sitting next to Papanasanam Ashok Ramani. Since Santhanagopalan caught my eye and acknowledged my presence with a nod, it was easy to communicate. When it was time for the central piece of the concert I therefore had no inhibitions in screaming to the singer that I liked him to take up a vivadi raga--any vivadi raga. "Tell me what you want" insisted, Neyveli, but I held my ground. The raga must be his choice, not mine. As long as it was a vivadi, it was ok by me. I am a vivadi junkie. I cant help it.
This is the background to the splendid Vagadeeswari, the 34th Melakarta raga that Neyveli treated his audience to at Kalarasana on December 30, 2011, the majestic dive of its signature shatsruthi rishabham providing a soul-filling calm.
It was a superb sketch of the raga, but it must be said that violinist Delhi Sundararajan's essay was a whisker better than Santhanagopalan's. In this, Sundararajan sort of made-up for his 'average' follow-up of the previous Lathangi, the brilliance of which vocal alapana the violinist could not quite match.
Tyagaraja's ‘Paramathmudu' followed the Vaagadeeswari alapana as expected, which was tailed by some imaginative swara sequences. I know that Neyveli Santhanagopalan is fond of this raga. Elsewhere in this blog, there is description and review of another rendition of Neyveli Santhanagopalan's Wah!gadeeswari. Vocalists generally seem to prefer this to other shutshruthi rishabam ragas--we dont get to hear Jyothiswaroopini or Nasika Bhushani or Rasikapriya, or for that matter, even Nattai, much. I would have preferred Nasika Bhushani, but having left the choice to Santhanagopalan I could do nothing but sit back in acceptance.
But indeed it was a brilliant Vaagadeeswari indeed.
For Latangi, it was Papanasanam Sivan's masterpiece, ‘Pirava Varam Taarum.' Santhanagopalan is in fine form. The Latangi and Vagadeeswari alapanas in the Kalarasna concert, as well as the enchanting Purvikalyani and Sankarabharanam in his concert for Parthasarathy Swamy Sabha, rich in manodharma as they were, clearly showed him to be a class apart.
Neyv eli Santhanagopalan is a superb artiste. If you regard the world of carnatic music's performing artistes of today as a straight line, the left end representing preference for bhava and aesthetics even to the point of sacrifice of manodharma, and the other extreme representing the opposite, viz., a 'bhava-be-damned, it is the imagination that matters' stance, you could probably think of Aruna Sairam and Sanjay Subramanian as the ambassadors of the two extremes. The moment you bring Neyveli Santhanagopalan into the model, the line bends into a circle, the vocalist standing on the point of contact of the two ends, standing for best of both bhava and manodharma. A remarkable artistry, with few parallels in the contemporary world. (The problem with Neyveli, however, is his reluctance to reach out to the rare, and it has been my regret that for two decades I have been trying in vain to get him sing Simhendra Madhyamam for me.)
The manodharma aspect came to the fore particularly in the niraval and swaras of Purvikalyani piece, ‘Deve Deva Jagadiswara' of Swati Tirunal. ‘Vaanara Parivrudha' was the point chosen for swara singing and Santhanagopalan heaped dozens of single-avartana swaras. The eka-avartana swara singing is perhaps becoming a defining feature of Santhanagopalan's singing, for it was sumptuously present in the Latangi piece too.
The Sankarabharanam (Tyagaraja's ‘Enduku Peddala') came out fine in all its features —alapana, song, niraval and swaras (at the traditional point, ‘Veda Sastra'). It was a thoroughly enjoyable Sankarabharanam, even if it was lacking in an element of novelty. Pretty much the same could be said of the Sriranjini peice ‘Bhuvijidasu' of Tyagaraja, which Santhanagopalan sang at Kalarasana. In fact the only blemish of the two concerts was the hurried RTP
in Sama. There was too little time left and the choice of Sama was unwise, because it is a raga that needs leisurely treatment. Santhanagopalan's Sama raga as well as the tanam were too brisk for comfort.
(In contrast, the Kannadagowla piece, ‘Orajupudu' of Tyagara, rendered at Parthasarathy Sabha, was surprisingly slow.)
A line from a Dikshitar composition was chosen for pallavi in the Sama RTP, ‘Parameswaram Rameswaram Meswaram Easwaram.' That it was partly in honour of the mridangam accompanist, Mannargudi Easwaran, was clear by the way Neyveli waved towards Easwaran, and I unabashedly admit that I felt chuffed when he waved towards me too, at the mention of 'Rameswaram'.
Regrettably, the pallavi was hurried through, in the interests of time. Santhanagopalan is an expert pallavi singer and one has heard him do complex, multi-raga pallavi's with ease. A decade hall, in this very hall, he did the 4-raga pallavi, 'Sankarabharanai Azhaithodi vadi Kalyani Darbarukku' in a manner that could only be described as superhuman. The RTP of December 30, 2011 was, therefore, sub-prime.