'A King Among Composers and A Composer Among the Kings' - that was the theme of the day long music and dance festival sponsored by the Sri Siva Vishnu Temple in Lanham, Maryland on Oct. 28, 2007 when the area families and local music teachers interested in Carnatic music paid tribute to the South Indian King, Maharaja Swathi Thirunal Rama Varma who lived almost 200 years ago.
This was one of the four such festivals celebrated by this 18-year-old Hindu Temple where many cultural programs are promoted besides practicing authentic and traditional Hindu forms of worship and rituals.
Maharaja (the Sanskrit word for The Great King) composed over 480 songs in the Carnatic music, a style of music most popular in Southern India, and also authored seven books of poetry which are considered as gems of literature for their musical and devotional content.
Swathi Thirunal was a vaggeyakara (a music composer who wrote his own lyrics) like the great trinity composers namely Thyagaraja, Muthuswamy Dikshitar and Syama Sastri. After composing in several Indian languages, he died at a very young age of 33 leaving behind a legacy of a brilliant singer-composer and a king who was the first to introduce English in the schools in his state, and also to start western form of medicine in his kingdom.
Attended by over 400 music enthusiasts of the Greater Washington area and neighboring states, the program covered a series of individual and group singing by veteran teachers and students, dances choreographed to the music of the composer, a Mohiniattam tillana by Sangeetha Menon, and an abridged presentation of the Indian epic Ramayana (Bhavayami) by Shobha Subramanian, and her students.
The grand finale was a three-hour concert by Dr. Omanakutty, a professor and performer from India. The steering force behind this magnificent event celebrated for the first time in Washington DC, was an enterprising arts promoter M.G. Menon.
<<<Girija Vallabhan was part of the event coordination team >>>
