Raaga Anuraaga

A Symphony of the Soul – “Raagam Anuraagam”

An alternative music programme titled Raaga Anuraaga was held at the Tagore Auditorium under the banner of CIC - Chennai International Centre on the 31 January, 2026. This programme was conceived and presented by the mother-daughter duo Sreemathi Ramnath and Shreya Ramanath, and was a culmination of a 15-year-long project to collect and preserve lyrical verses from the North, East, West, and South of India.

The presentation was stitched together from very evocative poetry that swept across the Indian subcontinent, spanning states and languages, by eminent poets and litterateurs, who brought about a 20^th - century renaissance. The poetry ranged from Telugu to Marathi, Bengali, and Tamil. There was poetry from Rajanikanta Rao, Hridayanath Mageshkar, Nazrul Islam, right up to Perumal Murugan. Music ranged from some of India’s greatest minds, including Rajanikanta Rao, M. Balamuralikrishna, Oleti Venkateswarlu, Malladi Suribabu, Anasuya Devi, C. Aswath, Sudhir Phadke, Hridayanath Mangeshkar, to Sabesh Subramaniam. Songs were sung in ragas like Rageshri, Yaman, Vaasanthi, Kapi, Tilak Kamod, Bhoga Vasantha, Janasammodini, to name a few.

The concert focused on the wave of new age lyrical poetry that swept through India in the 1900s—a movement that celebrated universal human emotions. From the fervour of patriotism and the serenity of nature to the intimacy of romantic love and the spiritual yearning for the "macro soul," the evening captured the essence of expressionist verse. What stood out about the lyrics was the profundity of meaning and the delicacy of expression. One of the poems, a conversation between flowers for pooja was interesting. While the jasmines, hibiscus and roses are proud to be adorned by the Lord, touching Him during the pooja, the little flower by the wayside, though crest-fallen, makes a mighty proclamation that the Lord’s feet touch it during processions, thereby making it highly useful and relevant! The lyrics reminded us of an era when thought and poetry daintily romanticised situations, with careful attention to details and subtle emotions that are lost to the present generation’s staccato and short-form writing.

Shreya, who holds a Doctorate in Social Anthropology from the Central European University, Budapest, is a gifted singer whose voice is sweet, with a fine muslin-like texture that can traverse octaves and pitches easily. Her pronunciation and diction of various languages were appropriate with a natural ease, making one feel that she should be an expert linguist! Complementing the music, Sreemathi, a polyglot, corporate trainer and coach, provided deep contextual insights, exploring the aesthetic significance of each piece and regaling the audience with vibrant anecdotes that breathed life into the history of the poets. As the daughter of Balantrapu Nalinikanta Rao, niece of Balantrapu Rajanikanta Rao, and granddaughter of Balantrapu Venkata Rao (one half of the legendary "Venkata Parvatheeswara Kavulu" duo), she has been steeped in Telugu Bhava Kavitvam (romantic poetry) and Bhava Sangeetham (emotional music) since childhood. Her professional tenure with Doordarshan, the Films Division, and All India Radio (AIR) further allowed her to collaborate with and document the works of luminaries such as Devulapalli Krishna Sastri.

The popularity of the duo was visible in the houseful and overflowing Tagore Auditorium.

by

Sivapriya Krishnan