Soak in ragas of glorious past

BENGALURU: Bengalureans can now walk into the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA) and treat themselves to vocal and instrumental music of legendary singers, free of cost.
Carnatic and Hindustani musicians like Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavathar, Shemmangudi Srinivasa Iyer, M S Subbulakshmi, N Ramani, T R Mahalingam, D K Pattamal, Pandit Ravi Shankar and Ali Akbar Khan will be available at the newly set-up digital music archive.
Vikram Sampath, executive director, IGNCA, southern region, said: "I started working on the project soon after I took charge of the centre a year ago. R T Chari, MD of TAG Corporation, shared 1,000 hours of live recordings of Carnatic music since the 1930s.They are from his collection that he has put together in the past 30 years, digitized and catalogued."
The collections include concerts of artistes like Chembai, Subbulakshmi, K V Narayanaswamy, Alathur Brothers and M D Ramanathan.
Vikram, too, donated his collections from the Archive of Indian Music (AIM). "They include recordings on gramophone discs from 1902 in Hindustani and Carnatic music, folk music, movies and plays. Works of Gauhar Jaan, Peara Sahab, Kesarbai Kerkar, Ariyakudi Ramanuja Iyengar, Salem Godavari, Bidaram Krishnappa, Veene Sheshanna, Bal Gandharva, K L Saigal, P Kalinga Rao and speeches of Mahatma Gandhi, Rabindranath Tagore and Subhash Chandra Bose are part of this collection," he said.
Chari also helped IGNCA develop user-friendly software that allows users to select songs by using parametres like raga, genre and names of composers/singers. They are categorized in alphabetical order. He has also donated paintings and murals of Indian music icons to adorn the walls of the archival unit. The unit, reprography and library are open from Monday to Friday between 9.30 am and 5.30pm. Contact: executivedirector.igncasrc@ gmail.com