New Delhi   

Lots of strings attached here....

P. Anima

NEW DELHI: Melodious tunes from the sonorous strings of the veena will enthral music lovers in the Capital during the four-day Veena Festival that begins at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts here this Friday.

The first of its kind in Delhi, the concert will have Veena maestros performing and Delhiites will get to know more about the famous Saraswati Veena tradition at the festival. The festival, organised by the Veena Foundation and the IGNCA, will also be an attempt at documenting the Saraswati Veena tradition.

About 30 artistes like the legendary R. Venkataraman, Kalpagam Swaminathan and Padmavathy Ananthagopalan will be performing at the festival. Artistes are also coming in from Chennai, Bangalore, Kerala and Hyderabad to participate in the festival.

Veena Foundation Chairman L. M. Singhvi will felicitate veena maestro R. Venkataraman with the prestigious "Veenavadantattvaja" award during the festival.

A highlight of the festival would be six-hour-long recitals with each artiste being part of a relay with half-hour recitals. These marathon relay recitals are inspired by the tradition at Tyagaraja Utsavam in South India.

"The festival is an attempt to revive interest in this divine instrument," says Raghurama Ayyar, veena exponent and secretary-general of the Veena Foundation.

"The instrument can express serene feelings with ease and it represents a fusion of the scientific and spiritual traditions," adds Mr. Ayyar. Elaborating on the role of the IGNCA, programme officer Sabiha Anjum Zaidi says: "IGNCA is making a database of the various art and cultural traditions in the country. After the festival, cultural archives, old recordings, photographs and books on the veena tradition will be collected at the IGNCA."

"While we are giving a forum for showcasing the Saraswati Veena tradition, we are also building a base of resource material for the future generations," says Ms. Sabiha.

Keeping alive the age-old "guru-shishya'' tradition, many maestros will be performing with their disciples at the festival. An exhibition of photographs of veena exponents spanning a century to the present day will also be part of the festival. Recordings of the recitals of maestros will also be available. Chennai's Sampradaya Kalashetra director Geeta Rajagopalan will give a power-point presentation of the "History of veena in the temples of South India".

The Veena Foundation plans to hold similar festivals in the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia to popularise the instrument.

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