Amrutha Venkatesh Carnatic Vocal Concert

Amrutha Venkatesh (Vocalist)

Amrutha, who started training with M.T. Selvanarayanan of AIR-Bangalore at the age of four, continues to learn from him. Charumathi Ramachandran has also been coaching her for over nine years. Amrutha has also learnt to play the veena from Suma Sudhindra. She is currently under the guidance of Prince Rama Varma, a Royal blood who is a popular vocalist and Vainika himself.

She won a ragam-tanam-pallavi competition at Narada Gana Sabha at the age of 11. At 13, she came to the notice of T.V. Gopalakrishnan, when she won a music competition in Bangalore. This resulted in her first December season concert in Chennai in 2001. By 2003, she had attracted the attention of the late S.V. Krishnan of Nada Inbam, who became her mentor. Under his patronage, she had numerous opportunities to perform in Nada Inbam and soon became a popular favorite, besides winning the acclaim of the leading critics of the day.

Amrutha has won prizes in many competitions including those conducted by AIR, which has also been broadcasting her vocal and veena concerts. She won the Voleti Venkateswarlu prize in 2004, and the Emani Sankara Sastry prize in veena in 2005 besides best vocalist awards from Hamsadhwani, Spirit of Youth, and CMANA prize given by the Music Academy.

Amrutha’s voice is strong but malleable and mobile. She treats ghana and naya raga-s equally well. Flat swara-s or gamaka, long karvai or briga she has them all. Her sruti and laya sense are admirable. Her repertoire is considerable — besides the Trinity, she is equally at ease with other vaggeyakara-s. Her versatility with Tamil composers of old as well as modern composers such as Subramania Bharati has to be experienced to be believed.

Rajeev Mukundan (M Rajeev – Violinist)

Rajeev was initiated into this art form at the tender age of four. He’s currently under the tutelage of the legendary Kalaimamani A.Kanyakumari  for almost a decade.

Received scholarship from the Government of India from 2001 to 2009. One of the youngest ‘A’ graded artiste of All India Radio (AIR).

Rajeev is a receipient of several prestigious awards like  ‘Spirit of Youth Award’ given by ‘The Music Academy, Madras’ in the year 2008, “The Best Violinist Award” from ‘The Music Academy, Madras,’ in December 2011, etc.

Rajeev has given many violin duet concerts with his Guru A.Kanyakumari, and also has toured and accompanied leading artistes like Sangeetha Kalanidhi T.V.Sankaranarayanan , Dr. N.Ramani, Malladi Brothers, Vijay Siva, T.M.Krishna, Oscar nominee Bombay Jayasri, Dr Nithyashri Mahadevan & Ranjani Gayathri

Arjun Ganesh Sankara Narayanan Jayalakshmi (Arjun Ganesh) - Percussionist.

Born in Kumbakonam, a city well known for its rich musical tradition, Arjun Ganesh started learning mridangam at the age of five from notable mridangam Vidwan Poongulam Sri. R. Sabesa Iyer, who developed the Thiruvarur Bani (Method). Subsequently, he migrated to Chennai and became a full-time mrudangam artiste. He continued to learn the nuances of the instrument from Vidwan Poongulam Sri. S. Subramanian, son and senior disciple of Arjun’s first guru, Vidwan Sri. R. Sabesa Iyer. Today, Arjun is one of the most sought after artists of his generation. He has been fortunate to accompany some of the senior most artists in the field such as Sri. T.K. Govinda Rao, Dr. M. Balamuralikrishna, Sri. T.V. Gopalakrishnan, Sri. T.V. Sankaranarayanan, Sri. O.S. Thyagarajan, Sri. Sanjay Subrahmanyan, Smt. Aruna Sairam, Malladi Brothers (Sri Ravikumar and Sri Sreeramaprasad), Neyveli Sri Santhanagopalan, Smt. S. Sowmya and Smt. Visaka Hariji, among others. He has also performed in prestigious venues in India and around the world, and has completed concert tours in Malaysia and the USA.

In addition to his career as a performing artiste, Arjun Ganesh imparts his mridangam knowledge on over forty students whom he has been training for the past seven years in Chennai. He holds an A-grade from All India Radio, Chennai, and has received the praise of rasikas and critics alike