Voices, verses...
JITENDRA PRATAP
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The young musicians at the Sopan Festival impressed with their prowess.
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WELL-PRESENTED Vishal Deo Mishra and (below) Priyanka Mathur at the Sopan Festival
It was a sheer delight to observe the young scholars of the Sahitya Kala Parishad performing at the Sopan festival with excellence at a well-presented concert at the Triveni Chamber auditorium the other day. The event witnessed a large gathering of lovers of performing arts.
Priyanka Mathur is endowed with a sonorous voice and a good musical temperament. One however wished she had opened her vocal recital with a slow tempo composition, a bada khayal rendered at good length instead of short renderings of three chhota khayals in the ragas Nand ("Darshan ko tarasat hai ankheeyan"), Shahana ("Goond lao-ree malaniya") and in Desh ("Kali ghata chha rahee"), set respectively to madhya Teen tala, madhya Jhap tala and Dadra tala. Priyanka delighted for her neat enunciation of the lyrical texts and her well delivered variations with good melodic appeal, even though her renderings were in bits and pieces.
In sharp contrast to Priyanka's renderings, Vishal Deu Mishra's vocal recital impressed better for his good planning of the contents and better presentation, with his rich vocal forte encompassing a wide range and good lung power. He opened his recital in the raga Puriya Kalyan with a slow or bada khayal ("Aaj bana") set to slow or vilambit Ek tala of 12 beats. His alap, badhat and behalawa were rendered with good aesthetic approach and in a methodical manner. His renderings of sargams and taans were varied, neat and colourful. The next rendition of a madhya Teen tala piece in the same raga ("Bhatakat kaahe baaware") was also sung with much aplomb.Vishal rendered the next piece in the season's raga Basant ("Chhabi barana Basant ki") with a charmingly sung piece of music with the raga's hidden folds handled with pleasingly inserted variations. The bhajan in the raga Bhairavi ("Kaho re Prabhu aawan ki") was a befitting finale to young Vishal's commendable performance of the evening.
Professional finish
However, the star performer at this Sopan festival was a young Neel Ranjan Mukherjee, whose guitar performance had the semblance of an accomplished professional. The sonorous strains from his well-tuned guitar fell soothingly on one's ears. His neat and tuneful meanderings over the strings and the frets released scores of melodic strains with pleasing tonal flavours that were at times soft and at other times, quite bold. He also impressed for his judicious handling of the nuances of the raga Jog of recent origin. The initial alap-jod followed with gat-todas in Teen tala and Dadra tala were handled with good awareness towards the rhythm and the raga's format.
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