A great bhairavi canvas - part III

As we continue to explore MDR's bhairavi portfolio, we come upon MDR's rendition of upacAramu, a lovely little kriti by tyAgarAjA. In contrast to the amba kAmAkshi posted earlier, upacAramu, here, is really short - barely touching the four minute mark. MDR has this rare ability to treat the same rAgam (or even the same song) at different levels of granularity in different renditions. Today's post is a case in point. My personal all-time-favourite rendition of a bhairavi has always been (and will always remain) MDR's grand amba kAmAkshi, but upacAramu is an important element in MDR's diverse bhairavi canvas. His succinct treatment of bhairavi here, however, may be more "accessible" and much easier to "get" to the many who are uninitiated to MDR's brilliance-in-detail.

A great bhairavi canvas - part II

MDR's vilambakAla rendition of the shyAmA sAstri magnum opus, amba kAmAkshi, is a masterpiece. From AlApana to kalpana svaram and most importantly, through eight wonderful caraNams in-between, MDR takes us through a spectacular journey of bhairavi. shyAmA sAstri composed the caraNams beautifully -- the first caraNam begins with sa, the second with ri, the third with ga, and so on until the last caraNam, which begins again with sa (but of the next octave). Such a composition allows MDR to explore the full range of bhairavi's nuances. As always, MDR pays attention to the words, e.g., dikkanusu, nammitini, sampadala niccEvippuDu, etc. are never split in ungainly ways. But this is only part of the story. The most striking feature is the depth of delivery -- MDR dwells and rests on each note, caressing note after note, allowing the listener to absorb their each individual resonant quality. In the seventh caraNam (that begins ni ri sa ri ni ri ni da pa) notice how beautifully MDR sings the svara sequence sa ri ga ma pa, sa ri ga ma pa da, ma pa ga ri ga ma~ -- the last ma~ (with brugA) being the most beautiful note of them all! When he next sings the corresponding sAhityam, he strikes this beautiful ma~ once again -- aparimita vaibhavamugala nIsmaraNa madilo~!! The entire rendition is full of this kind of brilliant detailing. MDR ends, typically, with some simple but striking kalpana svara phrases - check out, e.g., ni ni ni ni~ da pa da ni da pa da ma ma, ma ma ni da ni pa da ma!

A full forty minute track is not in the least bit blogosphere-friendly and I had to cut it down cruelly to half its length in the version below, retaining only three of the eight caraNams (first, seventh and eighth). I urge you to listen to it and if you do not enjoy it, I urge you to try again, perhaps more than once if needed, until (I hope) you eventually get it -- a bhairavi in all its glory, a masterful composition at the hands of the master practitioner of musical detail.