 |
Date:03/02/2006
BangaloreChennai and Tamil NaduDelhiHyderabadThiruvananthapuram
RISING ABOVE CHALLENGES
RANJANI GOVIND
Musician Gayatri Sankaran's career has been a saga of grit and determination. |
|
PROUD MOMENT:
|
|
|
|
|
Gayatri Sankaran receiving the Role Model Award from President A. P. J. Abdul Kalam in New Delhi. Subbulakshmi Jagadeesan, Minister of State (SJ&E) and Secretary (SJ&E), is at the centre . Photo: Shanker Chakravarty.
"When President Abdul Kalam asked me to sing two lines from Tyagaraja's `Entaro Mahanubhavulu" just after he handed over the Role Model Award (instituted by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment) in New Delhi on World Disabled Day, last December, I thought it was the culmination of 30 years of public singing. So I didn't know how to react when I was informed last week that I was conferred Padma Sri," says the jubilant Carnatic musician, Gayatri Sankaran. Continuing with her experience on that occasion in New Delhi, Gayathri says, ``The next day when I met the President at Rashtrapathi Bhavan on his invitation, I was overwhelmed when he asked me to sing the whole Sriraga Pancharatna. He also joined me now and then."
Tower of strength
"It is in such incidents and gestures that I actually `see' good human values, benevolence and kind-heartedness around me. I don't feel visually challenged, it's bright and sunny," she adds recalling how the President enquired about her accounts of grit and toil in reaching this stage. She attributes her success to her husband Sankaran who has been a tower of strength.
Draped in a resplendent silk sari and sitting amidst tamburas, violins, sruti boxes and a hoard of cassettes at her Tiruvanmiyur residence where she conducts music classes for about 100 students during weekends, this Staff Artist of AIR (vocalist and violinist) looks excited. ``I just came back after a National Programme recording at Doordarshan," she explains.
Born in Karur, Gayatri started learning music at the age of three from her mother. Her father, a sugar consultant, was shifted to Kakinada. Having lost her mother at the age of three, and with a few years of basic lessons from Allamaraju Someshwara Rao, Gayatri came to Chennai with her brother's family only to be taken by Rukmini Devi, founder of Kalakshetra, as a student.
"Rukmini madam waived off the entire fees for my tenure of diploma and post-graduate diploma where I took up vocal and violin study," she says. Later she went on to get a degree in arts and a post-graduate diploma in Braille in which she can handle Sanskrit, Tamil and English. Her favourites are M.S. and M. Balamuralikrishna.
Dream come true
Singing Purandaradasa's "Jagadodharana" to demonstrate how she manages the three octaves with ease, Gayatri says her dream of learning music under Lalgudi Jayaraman came true when the maestro accepted her as a disciple in 1998. ``This was a very crucial turning point in my life," she saysIt is not sight that is required to gauge the audience response, insists Gayathri. ``It is the divine magnifying force that music establishes from the mind and heart that should reflect the reactions," she says.
Gayatri has performed in more than 800 concerts that include her trips to London and Canada last year. What she cherishes most is her singing for a full-length dance programme at the Music Academy from Alarippu to Tillana for the Clarke School of Deaf and Dumb Children. She was moved to find the children synchronising rhythm and melody with astute observation of her lip movements.
Gayatri is pursuing her doctorate on ``Stylistic analysis of Kallidaikurichi Vedantha Bhagavatar."
© Copyright 2000 - 2009 The Hindu
|
|
Date:30/01/2009
Back Friday ReviewBangaloreChennai and Tamil NaduDelhiHyderabadThiruvananthapuram
ACCOLADE FOR EXCEPTIONAL TALENT
JYOTI NAIR BELLIAPPA
|
|
Tamil Nadu Governor S. S. Barnala honours Gayathri Sankaran and Suchit Narang for Carnatic and Hindustani music.
|
|
|
|
|
Award: Tamil Nadu Governor with Gayathri Sankaran.
Tamil Nadu Governor S. S. Barnala, as a gesture to encourage, recognise and promote cultural and artistic development, gave cash awards of Rs. 15,000 each to two visually-challenged artistes – Gayathri Sankaran and Suchit Narang – for Carnatic and Hindustani music at Raj Bhavan.
The beautifully lighted sprawling, lush green lawns was reverberating with traditional music.
Recitals by recipients
In the half hour concert that followed, Gayathri Sankaran, a recipient of the coveted Padma Shri and the Sangita Kalanidhi, moved through Tilang, Revathi, Miyan ki Malhar, Shivranjani, Bhairavi, Bebas, Khamaj and Darbari and concluded with a Tyagaraja kirtana, traversing through three octaves in a voice laced with sargams taken with perfect gamakas and swara delineations.
Next came Suchit Narang, a recipient of the prestigious National Talent Award 2001, who took the Nom Tom alaap and set the tone in majestic Darbari with his exhilarating fast sargams and high speed tans and thereafter, showcased his acumen in Hamsadhwani, Zhinzhoti, Kalavati and Bhairavi with the same flourish.
© Copyright 2000 - 2009 The Hindu
|
|
|
|
Date:05/01/2011
Tamil Nadu - Chennai
MOVE TO MAKE THE VISUALLY-IMPAIRED INDEPENDENT READERS
|
|
|
|
|
|
Staff Reporter — Photo: R. Shivaji Rao
Twenty-five Braille titles were donated to Sarva Siksha Abhiyan, National Association for the Blind and Anna Centenary Library in Chennai on Tuesday.
(From left) IIT-Madras faculty member Shanti Bhattacharya, Indian Musician Gayatri Sankaran, Sarva Siksha Abhiyan joint director N. Latha, Secretary of the Department for the Welfare of the Differently abled Persons S.S. Jawahar and president of the Booksellers' and Publishers' Association of South India Gandhi Kannadasan are in picture.
|
|
|
CHENNAI:
A walk in the dark jungle with characters from Panchatantra has always been narrated to visually impaired K. Durgadevi by her teachers. “Sometimes we just convey the crux of the story,” says her teacher M. Christie Leela.
To make the visually challenged independent readers, moral stories and folktales such as Panchatantra, Jataka Tales, Akbar and Birbal series books and self-improvement books such as Vetriyin Rahasiyam were brought out in the Braille format on Tuesday. The Tamil and English version of the books were donated to the Anna Centenary Library and Sarva Siksha Abhiyan on the Louis Braille Day.
“They can now experience the pleasure of reading story books without waiting for our assistance,” said Ms. Leela.
Educational books are the ones predominantly available in the Braille format, said P. Chandraseskar, Honorary Treasurer, National Association for the Blind.
Launching the books, S.S. Jawahar, Secretary, Department for the Welfare of the Differently abled Persons said, in an information world, access to a variety of books is important.
“We are working on various initiatives such as propagating the employment of differently abled in private sectors and in providing them a barrier-free environment. We are also laying emphasis on providing special attention to the different categories of challenges,” he said.
The visually challenged have largely had access to educational books. “To propagate more awareness among publishers and encourage them to take up publication of more such books, we will give the trust a stall in the Chennai book fair next year,” said president, The Booksellers' and Publishers' Association of South India, Gandhi Kannadasan.
At a time when voice-recorders dominate educational institutions and libraries for the visually impaired, only the habit of reading can teach children the basics of language such as spellings and grammar, said Mahua Seth of Third-eye.
This would greatly help students when they write competitive examinations in the future, she said.
The books would also give visually challenged parents the joy of reading out to their children, said Shanti Bhattacharya, faculty member at IIT-Madras.
N. Latha, joint director, Sarva Siksha Abhiyan, and Gayatri Sankaran, a visually-challenged musician, were present.
© Copyright 2000 - 2009 The Hindu
|
|
