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INTERESTING READ Below is an article I wrote for website www.sangeetham.com many years ago. Thought it was an interesting read. Hope you enjoy it Yenna sar inda varsham yenna slotle paadarel? As a musician it has been a very interesting experience to move through these entire slot. When an artiste first sings in the music season the slot really does not matter. It’s the opportunity that he or she wants. For the rasika it’s a new artiste whom they can assess. Well this is a time when the rasika definitely hold the upper hand. By this I mean that they can make or break the artist future. They would venture to advice the artiste on what are the do’s and don’nts in concerts etc. This continues for maybe a season or two. During this time the sabha organisers provide the chance when available and the artist sings , period . As the musician grows in popularity everything changes. The artist will most likely want o sing in the so-called sub senior slot. This is when possible differences between the TN musician and the sabha begin. Problems need not arise if the secretary thinks the artiste will draw the necessary crowds. This afternoon slot in many sabhas is considered an important career move for the budding musician. It is believed the gnynasthas of mylapore attend concerts at this timing. An approval in this slot is believed to be the stepping stone to the promotion to the coveted evening grade. Whether a promotion will happen depends on many other parameters. When the artists starts drawing crowds in this slot the sabha also start respecting the musician and considers him ‘evening potential’ so to speak. If the crowds don’t happen then some artistes through a period of time miss the bus. All the afternoon slots in all sabha are not the same. In some it is better not to sing in the afternoon. Then the morning comes into play. You find artiste saying sir navandu kaarthaale paadidren. This usually means that at those sabhas the afternoon concerts don’t really matter. Obviously in sabhas where the morning concert is ticketed the above is not applicable. Singing the morning concert can also be considered a promotion, especially by the Rasika. This works to the advantage of the musician. If you find that an artiste is continuously singing only in the morning at a major sabha it means that the organiser is not confident of collections in the evening. Jokes apart the subsenior concerts are important in a musician’s career and do help in moving to the evening. Lets get back to the move to the evening concert. When does this evening happen? Sounds almost like a million dollor question does’nt it? There are two ways you can get it 1 automatic promotion 2 fight for it and may be not sing in that sabha for a year or two Both the above cases have been happening for years. Which will happen to a person cannot be predicted. An evening grade artiste is definitely at a commading position. This is because the artiste now knows that he or she commands a good audience and the sabhas want to have the them. A very important thing is that as you move up the ladder you can choose your accompanist. When you first sing you had better sing with the pakkavadyam provided and here too the sub senior slot seems to play an important role, because this is when you start asking for a choice of accompanists. I am not going to deal with accompanists and their promotion because it is too complicated. Maybe somebody needs to write a separate article. After the artiste stabilizes at the senior slot it gets boring. Meaning that this article is coming to a close. On the whole this graduation process is very interesting to observe. I will finish with just one thing. what are the answers that an artist can give when asked why he or she has not been promoted? A a simple kadekale B yennakku yeppa paadinalum parvaale sar yennoda kootam vandurom C afternoon thaan sar gyaanamana audience varum adunale thaan promotion vaandaante |
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