Indian Classical Music - Vocal And Instrumental Options

[RajanCS]

Pt. Ravi Shankar Sitar

Raag Madhuvanti
Format: MP3
Bitrate; 96 Kbps
Duration: 00:23:53



This post has been edited by RajanCS: Mar 8 2009, 08:13 PM

[RajanCS]

I love violin. In my opinion, along with Sarangi, violin is the instrument which comes closest to vocal singing. However, not many violinists have become popular in Indian Classical Music world. The names that come to mind are N. Rajam, V. G. Jog, Gajanan Rao Joshi. Though some South Indian Carnatic violints have also given concerts in Indian Classical Music style (e.g. M. S. Gopalakrishnan), I feel that their concerts are not so rich in musical content, probably because their base is essentially in carnatic system of music.

It is very important for an instrumental classical musician to have undergone rigorous vocal singing training. Gajanan Rao Joshi was basically a vocal singer and due to certain circumstances (on the insistence of a royal patron) picked up violin. Probably this is what made Gajanan Rao's violin recital worth listening. Another example is Ustad Vilayat Khan, who as I understand, used to break into vocal singing even when giving a Sitar recital.

Let me add that all these are my personal opinion.

I like N. Rajam's violin recital. She was a disciple of Pt. Omkarnath Thakur. Uploading her recital - Rag Bageshri.

The zip files are split into two parts due to size limitation of a post in HF. Please download both the parts in same directory and then extract using winrar. It will extract them into a single file.

Artist: N. Rajam
Rag Bageshri
Duration: 00:29:26
Bitrate: 128 kbps
Format: MP3

[nirvana]

I love violin. In my opinion, along with Sarangi, violin is the instrument which comes closest to vocal singing. However, not many violinists have become popular in Indian Classical Music world. The names that come to mind are N. Rajam, V. G. Jog, Gajanan Rao Joshi. Though some South Indian Carnatic violints have also given concerts in Indian Classical Music style (e.g. M. S. Gopalakrishnan), I feel that their concerts are not so rich in musical content, probably because their base is essentially in carnatic system of music.

I agree with you RajanCS. I also prefer the North Indian style but I have a real soft spot for Lakshminarayan Subramaniam who is an extraordinarily gifted carnatic violinist. In case you haven't heard it, I recommend the album Beyond (1996) for the tracks Weeping Soul and Wandering Saint. These haunting pieces really capture the soul of Indian music.

Also, I made a post in the Hindustani Violinists, A rare breed thread listing some wonderful Hindustani violinists which you may find useful. Most notable are Prabhakar Jog (try Gaanara Violin - Bhaktigeete Volume 6) and Indrayudh Bose (try Ahir Bhairav, Jog 2007).

I have all of these albums and can post then as torrents if you wish (bitrate and size too high for HF).

This post has been edited by nirvana: Mar 22 2009, 09:48 AM