K.A.Viswanathan
The doyen of carnatic music late Dr. M.S.Subbulakshmi ‘s 102nd birth anniversary celebrations was held at the Sri Shanmukhananda Chandrasekharendra Saraswati auditorium , King’s Circle.
On this occasion 50 young and promising musicians from all over the country were given the fellowship in Music award which carries a cash prize of Rs. One lakh each for three years. The Sabha had already given the fellowships to 103 young artists till date from 18 cities in 13 disciplines of Indian music, said Dr. V.Shankar, president of the Sabha. The disciplines include Carnatic vocal, Violin, Flute, Nadaswaram , Mrudangam , Sarod, Veena and Hindustani vocal music.
The list of awardees who received this year include Anirbhan Roy who is 8 years old from Kolkata (Flute), 11-year-old Rahul Vellal ( vocal) from Bengaluru and for the first time, Hindustani Violin has been included and Yadnesh Milind Raikar who is just 18 years old and Danish Khan Altaf on Hindustani Vocal who is 15 yrs old were honoured.
This fellowship award was set up by the Sabha in the year 2013 in memory of Late Dr. M.S.Subbulakshmi. From this year the award will be known as Shri Shanmukhananda Vijaya Bank Dr M.S. Subbalakshmi Fellowship Awards since the bank has donated a sum of Rs. 1.5 crores for three years for this award. The programme commenced with Vedic chanting by the young students of the SIES Vedapatashala, Nerul.
In his address the vice -president of India Mr. M.Venkaiah Naidu who was the chief guest said “India is indeed blessed with two distinct systems of classical music, Carnatic and Hindustani which have always enjoyed the status of being highly cultivated art forms”. Thanks to the pioneers like the late Bharat Ratnas Dr. M.SSubbulakshmi, Pandit Ravi Shankar and Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, Indian music has become popular throughout the world, he said.
More and more scholars from both India and the west have studied and mastered these arts and many universities and institutions like Shanmukhananda have kept this alive and added further richness to the grand tradition , the vice president said.
The award ceremony was followed by a thematic dance presentation by the Tharanginee School of Bharatanatyam , Chennai on “ Maithreem Bhajatha” on Universal Harmony. Maithreem Bhajata is a benediction composed in Sanskrit by Jagadguru Shri Chandrasekharendra Saraswati, renowned as the Paramacharya of Kanchi Peetam .It was rendered at the United Nations on Oct. 23, 1966 on the occasion of the UN day, by Bharat Ratna M. S. Subbulakshmi and her daughter Radha Viswanathan.
