Tuesday, August 21, 2007

TQ or nothing

I remember my first tanjore quartette experience. It was in 91 or 92 - I was going to all the kutcheris everywhere. I would attend every single BN performance. And after a while, instead of being always dazzled and blinded, things slowly started to fall into place for me.

By then I was quite familiar with the performances of all the big stars. Then one day I was sitting in the mini-hall and I watched a student dance a piece. She was not a big star. But in spite of that, there was this feeling. It was jatiswaram and after watching it, it stayed in my mind for days and days and days.

That was my first clue that a piece and how it is performed are two different things. I mean, you can have a brilliant dancer perform a mediocre piece. And you can have a fairly good dancer perform a piece that is a great composition.

After going to a few more months of performances, I discovered for myself what so many other people had already known - the Tanjore Quartet pieces are the crown jewels. And from then, it was a constant obsession always present in the back of my mind. After I saw those pieces, nothing else would do.

These seven glittering kohinoor diamonds - master gave them to me: sakiye, yemaguva, mogamana, adimogam, yemanthayanara, danike, sami ninne.