Remembering Lalgudi Jayaraman through a violin duet

It was billed as a violin duet, and so it was, as H.K. Venkatram and B.U. Ganesh Prasad took the stage. However, their unison in playing style, identical tonal hue, control over myriad modulations and impressive sruti alignment combined to create cohesive music. This was a Lalgudi G. Jayaraman memorial endowment concert at Kasturi Srinivasan Hall, and one was reminded of the legend’s recitals with his son and daughter.

That the concert would be bookended by a Lalgudi varnam and a thillana was almost a given, considering the composer’s specialisation in these genres. The judicious choices in between enhanced the performance, as did the support from accompanists Neyveli S. Skandasubramaniyam (mridangam) and Adambakkam K. Sankar (ghatam). That the first four of the six compositions were in Telugu, albeit by different composers, may be purely of academic interest in an instrumental recital.