As part of its third anniversary celebrations, RAAGA Music Academy, a young and one of the most popular sangeetha sabhas, presents a grand musical ensemble by Sangeetha Vidyanidhi Dr. Vidyabhushana and troupe. The programme, aptly titled Swara Raaga Sudha, is being held at the Mysore Vasudevacharya Bhavana, Nadabrahma Sangeetha Sabha, JLB Road, Mysuru, on Saturday, the 19th instant, at 5.30 pm.

With over 50 programmes under its belt since its inception in 2013, RAAGA with the basic objective of bringing the three vedic sciences — Music, Ayurveda and Yoga — into focus has been making impressive strides. Conceptualised by Dr. Poornima K. Murthy, an Ayurveda Consultant, RAAGA is supported by Guru Vidu. Koviladi Kala, mentor and patron K.V. Murthy and a team of dedicated music aficionados.

‘Abhinava Purandaradasa’  Dr. Vidyabhushana, well-known for his devotional songs, mainly Haridasa compositions, was initiated into music at a very young age by his father Govindacharya. He was also under the tutelage of B.V. Narayana Aithal. Later he trained under Sangeetha Kalanidhi R.K. Srikantan and Vid. T.V. Gopalakrishnan. He was honoured with the title Sangeetha Vidyanidhi in 1994. He was conferred with a Doctorate by Hampi University and is doing yeoman service to the field of music through Bhakti Bharathi Prathistana, of which he is a Founder-Trustee.

Vid. H.L. Shivashankaraswamy (HLS), born into a family of musicians, had his training in mridangam from renowned artiste Vid. B.R. Sridhar of Mysuru. He has accompanied almost all leading Karnatak musicians like Dr. Balamuralikrishna, R.K. Srikantan, Dr. N. Ramani, Lalgudi Jayaraman, M.S.  Gopalakrishnan, T.V. Shankaranarayanan, Dr. Vidyabhushana, Mysore Nagaraj etc., on mridangam. Presently, he is a “A” grade staff artiste at AIR Mysore. He is the brain-behind Laya Vidya Pratishtana, which has been training young musicians interested in percussion instruments.

Vid. HLS has in his troupe a dazzling array of 8 musicians who will be accompanying Dr. Vidyabhushana. They are Vid. C.N. Thyagarajan on the violin, Vid. Sameer Rao on the flute, Vid. H.P. Srinivasan on the sitar, Vid. Sangeet Thomas on keyboard, Vid. Raghunandan Rao on the ghatam, Vid. S. Nagaraju on the tabla and Vid. H.L. Ananthakrishnaswamy on the rhythm pad.

Vidu. Roopashree Madhusudan will be compering. For details contact Mob: 8277733410.

—Veena Arun Kumar