Music for a cause
MELODIOUS COLLECTION: on Lord Ayyappan.
Another leaf unfolds in the life of R. Shreedhar, the founder trustee of Maithri Educational & Charitable Trust, T-Nagar, for his undaunted spirit and passionate work towards serving the challenged. Shreedhar (physically challenged himself), this time, as part of the trust's fund-raising programme, decided on building a school and providing transport and infrastructure for the economically backward children, and has released an audio CD `Sri Sabareesa' — devotional songs on Ayyappan — with 10 captivating songs that propitiate, describe, adore and praise Lord Ayyappan.
The proceeds would be utilised for the school of music and arts, `Maiththri Vidhyakendram' proposed to open on Vijayadasami this year, an annual three-day music programme featuring prominent musicians just before the new year unfurls, and for maintaining a free audio-cassette library of education syllabus from various universities for the visually impaired.
Starting with the invoking of Lord Ganesha in the CD for avoiding obstacles in the long journey, unfolding a myriad names of the Lord, showering praises on the Lord, to a visual descriptive of the serpentine path that leads to the Lord at Sabarimalai, the lyrics by S. S. Venkataraman in most of the numbers draw one to the lines couched in melody.
Encapsulating a soft and lilting religious fervour, the musical beckoning has ragas with overpowering classical touches given by director Prapancham Ravindran. Both the music lover and a staunch devotee would be tempted to listen to the whole CD as every raga has been chosen to suit the mood. And the singers that helped all these moods get across are G. V. Viswanathan, Sikkil Gurucharan, Anuradha Sriram, B. Balasubramanian and Gayathri Sivaraman.
Let alone the individual expressive voices, even the chorus in several songs provide welcome breaks in several tracks. And the base notes that emerge amidst the tabla (N. Sundar) and mridangam (Prapancham Ravindran) in "Iyyappa Swami Iyyappa" or the Pahadi chosen for Sabari Girisa are the special touches worth mentioning.
The collective endeavour includes K. Sivaraman (violin), Ramani Thyagarajan (flute), P. R. Venkata Subramanian (keyboard), Y. Bhagavathi (veena) and Parthasarathi (special effects). (Maithri Trust - Ph: 28156880).
RANJANI GOVIND
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