Whither Carnatic Music?
This was the subject of a recent discussion held at a Mylapore auditorium. A subject, a question, a theme that has been asked, posed and debated over some years now.
'Only seniors attend concerts . . . Sabha halls are never full . . . Youngsters want to perform but aren't seen at concerts……are some of the points that rasikas raise.
And yet there does not seem to be something drastically going wrong in this music world.
Anyway, artistes Palghat Ramprasad, Vijayalakshmi Subramaniam and Anil Srinivasan and the Head of the Madras University's Music Department debated the topic. And made some strong points.
Ramprasad's focus was on the importance of an artiste's devotion to learning and practice than towards looking to grab performance invitations.
Anil said the music world was just fine, with lots of keen and knowledgable, young rasikas attending concerts around the world and that one must not get too excited at small attendances at concerts, because this was the norm worldwide for classical music.
Vijayalakshmi's thoughts were more for rasikas - rasikas patronising only the concerts of the famous and popular and ignoring young, bright talent elsewhere was a big discouragement for artistes. And for rasikas to not request for all-time favorites at concerts but be open to the music of less-known composers or rarely-sung songs.
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