Chinmaya Jyoti yatra was in Koramangala

In connection with the Chinmaya Birth Centenary Celabration, Chinmaya Vidyalaya, Koramangala had arranged a series of programmes on Thursday, 23rd July 2015, as part of the Chinmaya Jyoti Yatra, in their school premises.
One of the items in the program was devotional music rendered by “Neelambari” group, Bangalore.  The group consisted of senior vocalists, Vidushi Geetha Murthy, Vidushi Usha Kesari, Vidushi Bhargavi Manjunath and Vidushi Rema Ramiah.  Vidushi Lakshmi Priya on the Violin and senior artist Vidwan Gopalakrishna on Tabla supported the vocal artists during the two hour programme between 4 pm and 6 pm.
The Neelambari group is formally trained under renowned artist and senior guru Sangeetha Kala Acharya Vidushi Neela Ramgopal.  The artistes presented a number of songs in different melodious ragas.  To suit the occasion the ragas and songs chosen were very pleasant and devout.
They added variety by choosing songs in different languages like Kannada, Tamil, Telugu, Sanskrit, Hindi and Malayalam.  While they presented most of the songs in chorus, a few of them were sung individually.
Each one had full control over the sruthi, speed, tone and other aspects of singing.  The same was reflected during their chorus rendering also.  As qualified musicians there was no faltering any where.
On the whole their soulful rendering was soothing and brought forth a blissful atmosphere. A bigger audience cheering the artistes would have enlivened the atmosphere.
-Harini Raghavan