Eternal Light

Lalgudi Krishnan is the son of the famous violin legend Lalgudi Jayaraman, and for this recording he has teamed up with Anil Srinivasan, a Western-trained classical pianist who is well-known for his many collaborative projects with South Indian vocalists. The album features duets of violin and piano with seven short tracks featuring an array of South Indian ragas. Starting with an alap in the captivating ‘Raga Amritavarshini’ (also called the ‘Raga of Rain’) in which both instruments evoke the many moods of an Indian monsoon continues into the second track when the instrumentalists are then joined by percussionist BS Purushotham on the kanjira (the South Indian frame drum, similar to a small tambourine.) It is at this point that the music becomes particularly intriguing, and the added layers of chord and harmony from Srinivasan’s piano really begin to make an impact.

While the violin made its way into Karnatic (South Indian) music some 300 years ago, and has since been firmly entrenched as the main accompaniment for vocals, the piano and its rigid tuning has never had a place in any Indian classical music, North or South. So this is an intriguing experiment if nothing else – and one which, for the most part, works surprisingly well. With the so-called ‘fluid piano’ waiting in the wings (which is apparently tuneable to Indian ragas), perhaps the piano will eventually start to be heard more widely in classical Indian music.