CHENNAI: The weekl-ong Yagnaraman July Fest 2010 at Sri Krishna Gana Sabha came to an emotional end on July 4. Former Supreme Court Judge, Justice S Mohan conferred Yagnaraman Life Time Achievement Award on veteran Carnatic maestro Dr M Balamuralikrishna at the valedictory function. He was awarded Rs one lakh and a gold medal.
Yagnaraman Award of Excellence was conferred on Carnatic singer Sikkil Gurucharan and Bharathanatyam dancer Sheejith Krishna of Rs 15000 and a gold medallion each. The awardees were felicitated by Art critic Sundaram, Prince Rama Varma of Travancore Samasthanam, Preetha Reddy of Apollo Hospitals, Nalli Kuppusamy Chetty among others. Bharathanatyam dansuse Leela Samson and dancers of Vipanchee entertained the audience with their performances prior and after the felicitations.
Fourth year of this unique music festival brought well known artists to treat the Chennai audience with excellent performance. From the classical performance of dancers from different states and Jugalbandhi concert of Carnatic and Hindustani music, to the Kathak performance and Bharathanatyam, the festival was truly a confluence of classical and contemporary arts.
The performance of the duo Shubbendra Rao on sitar and Sasikia Rao-de Hass on Indian cello was simply mind blowing. Just three songs filled the evening with soul stirring music. Their first number was typical of any other Hindustani performance. Sasika Rao’s cello followed the hard but euphonic compositions of Shubbendra Rao on his sitar. The second performance was based on a folk tune of Greek. This was followed by a soul-melting composition about parenthood. “We’re bringing out what and how it felt when we heard that we’re going to become parents,” Shubbendra informed the audience before started reciting the music.
