Meeting some friends

I met fellow blogger Thulasi today in my town. He came along with his friend Hari and then blogger Achinthya aka Chechyamma joined us. Thulasi is a nice, soft-spoken person. [Are you reading this, Thulasi?? ]. So it was kind of a mini bloggers meet. Thulasi is from Neeleshwaram, north Kerala. He works in Cochin as an immigration consultant.

Thulasi gifted some books to me and Achinthya. Thank you buddy. Silly me don’t know how to treat friends when I meet them.

You guys should check out the pics he posted in the blog. It made me wanna go see his place. And I will be going to see Theyyam at his place in February, if time permits.

Its been one year now since the last time I met Sandeep. He came afternoon just a while after Thulasi left. Sandeep works in HP, Bangalore. We’ve been friends since the Syscom days (Syscom – the company I worked in 2-3 years before). He is mad about trekking and he treks almost every weekend. I hope he will start a blog soon with his trekking experiences and photos.

And we spent sometime together and there is a flower show going on in our town so we went there. I’ve put some pics from the flower show below. All these pics were taken with my mobile, so it is not of good quality.

 

Thalattu song of Mr. N.Venkitu

This is my rendition of N.Venkitu sir’s thalattu song. Excuse me for my bad voice, as I’m still recovering from the throat problems.

Song: Kanne Maniye
Music & Lyrics: Narayanan Venkitu
Sung by: Jo

 

The Electric Man

Check out this guy, “Current Mohan”!!!

 

Sinkaari Melam

This is in addition to my yesterday’s post. Slogan Murugan asked how does Sinkaari Melam differ from Pancha vaadyam. In Sinkaari melam there are only two instruments. Chenda (Kettle Drum) and Elathaalam (Cymbal), while in pancha vaadhyam they use five (pancham) insruments. I don’t know anything about the rhythmic patterns of this melam (orchestra), but it will make you dance to its rhythm and wave your hands up to the sky. And these guys also make some dance moves while playing. Here is a preview of the melam. I cut it into 3 pieces.

Thanks to blogger Thulasi, for sending me the MP3 of Sinkaari Melam.

Beginning:

Middle:

Ending:

 

Festival time

I have a sore throat these days. The parish festival of St: Sebastian was in the last weekend. It is the biggest celebration that we have here in our place. Had a lot of houling and shouting with the Sinkaari Melam orchestra (Sinkaari mELam is a diversion of Panchavadyam , developed by the new generation of Maaraars). The wild rhythmic music of Chenda is irresistible. I was boozed around and danced to the melam. It was quite a celebration.

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Here is N. Venkitu sir’s new song and am gonna sing it as soon as my voice get okay.

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Suresh Kumar has posted an email interview with me about Blogswara.

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Blogswara updates

Hola all,

Just thought I would give some updates on our music album — Blogswara.

The domain www.blogswara.in is registered and Mukund (Thennavan) provided www.blogswara.com for us to use. Thanks a lot Mukundji.

Narayanan Venkitu sir has offered to bear any studio costs that the singers or composers may have. Thanks a lot bro! Hats off to your support.

The songs are getting finalized and my sincere apologies that we cannot make it this weekend since some of the people got busy at work, and vacationing in India. But we all are trying so hard to get it done within the next weekend. I hope to keep you guys updated on the song list pretty soon.

Till then take care guys. And keep watching this space for some new songs and Blogswara updates. Thanks a lot for all your support.

 

30 minutes.. nahin toh free!!!

When I was in Bangalore, I saw some young chaps in red T-s riding their bike like rockets. They are faster than any other roadies or may even beat any world champions of biking. Sometimes I was like ‘ghosh! they are gonna crash now!’ while seeing their speed. Then my friend told me these pizza boys are the fastest bikers in Bangalore, coz they make a living out of it. And all these came after the “30 minutes, nahin toh free” kinda offers. It was sad to see how much they are risking their life to get a pizza for us to eat in 30 minutes. And I’ve never heard anyone died of not getting a pizza in 30 minutes.

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I was watching the program of Ammu (Malavika Mohanan), and there she started it with litting a candle thats in the shape of peace symbol. Right at that time, seeing the candle, it looked like a bomber plane that takes off. Isn’t it weird? Have any others felt the same?

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CCC Update:

CCC Blog Your Thoughts contest ends in 15 hours. Those who haven’t submitted their entries yet, rush to do the same.

Checkout Harish’s entry. Its different. Its a song titled “Hope”. Great work Harish!!!

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Raja Raja Chozhan with Nandu (Gumbals)

Here is my second song with Nandu (Gumbals band). Nandu did the karaoke of this song. I’m listening the song for the first time, but this is a great song from IR and KJY.

Song: Raja raja chozhan
Music: Ilayaraja
Originally sung by: KJY
Sung by: Jo

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The Hindu wrote about Malavika Mohanan’s program “Navashwaasa”. Click here to read about it.

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A day of memories…

The first time I saw someone, about whom I have heard a lot about, was yesterday in his coffin. Yes, the legendary Kathakali singer Kalamandalam Hyderali was killed in a road accident yesterday. Being a muslim to learn Kadhakali Sangeetham he had to struggle a lot within his own community and within the Hindu community. But he succeeded them all and became a very famous Kadhakali/Carnatic singer. He is a guru figure to Chechyamma, because he accompanied to her dance performances ever since her arangettam. We were planning to do an interview with him for M-Pod, but now that he is gone, the loss is mine.

We went to see him yesterday. The face wasn’t covered and nobody would dare to have a second look at his face. It showed how brutal that accident was. And it reminded me of my brother’s death. His face looked like the same when I saw my brother in the casuality ward of the hospital before he was taken to the operation theatre. He too was killed in an accident. And what a co-incidence, yesterday was my brother’s 9th death anniversary.

I find it strange, because all these days I haven’t tried to remember that day of my brother’s accident. Because it gives me a feeling that he is alive. But yesterday, I remembered the whole things, when we were rushing to the hospital, the casuality ward, the operation theatre, hospital attender telling about my bro’s death, and the ambulance reaching home on the next day… I miss him lots now. Lots and lots…

 

M-Pod update

M-Pod is updated with an interview with Pradip Somasundaram (playback singer). Check it out here: http://www.podbazaar.com/show/mpod/