Sri Parthasarathy Swami Sabha, the city’s oldest sabha, inaugurated its 113th December music festival, recently in the presence of renowned vocalist M Balamuralikrishna and Ramanuja Embar Jeeyar Swami of Sriperumbudur.
The 19-day festival will feature about 100 musical programmes, and will conclude on January 5, 2014. The festival will also include lecture demonstration sessions, which will begin from 8.30 am, everyday. On the occasion, Ramanuja Embar Jeeyar Swami conferred the title of ‘Sangeetha Kalasarathy’ on N Ravikiran, chitravina player. The award instituted by P Vijayakumar Reddy and Preetha Reddy, included a citation, a shawl and a cash award of `1 lakh. Nalli Kuppuswamy Chetty, president of the Sabha, listed out the contributions of Ravikiran as a musician and as a promoter of music, for which he will be awarded on behalf of the sabha.
Ravikiran, in his acceptance speech, stressed on the responsibility which he has to carry forward on having received the award. “Awards make me responsible to carry forward music, a divine art and a traditional chariot that should be passed on to the next generation,” he said.
Mohan Parasaran, the Solicitor General of India, delivered the welcome address and Cleveland V V Sundaram felicitated the award winners. Along with the main title, four other endowment awards were also presented on the occasion.
The Palghat Mani Iyer Centenary award Instituted by Nithyashree Mahadevan was presented to percussionist Trichy Sankaran.
The M L Vasanthakumari award was presented to promising musician Ramakrishnamurthy, while the Dwaram Venkataswami Naidu Award instituted by Mohan Parasaran was presented to Nagai Muralidharan and the G Ramanathan Award Instituted by Sathanur V Parthasarathy was presented to R Suriyaprakash.