Tag: music

Experiencing Mysore

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Mysore is a connecting place, social entrepreneurs, community animateurs are forever initiating new ideas to bring us together.

Sriranjini Simha kindly invited me to experience mysore. Well I have been doing that for twenty years, initially on holidays and now as resident with our own business. But joking aside this was an invite to a new initiative that is actually called ‘Experience Mysuru’ and I’m so pleased I checked it out.

I’ve always thought that the Mysore city feels more like a village, by that I mean : it has an intimacy, interactivity, on a human scale. Well ‘Experience Mysuru’ reflects exactly that. Mysore has a well deserved reputation as a cultural capital that was fantastically represented last night..

The ‘showcase’ was curated to reveal through the senses of taste, hearing, smell, touch and sight and included: yoga and meditation, ancient board games, percussion, storytelling, dance, music and singing. To be more precise — Chande: the pulse of Karavali, Bharatanatyam, Carnatic music and Kamsale— come find out for yourselves what it is. 

I can’t say performers, yes they shared, their skills, they entertained but it went beyond that. Each person introduced their activity to ‘get beneath the skin’ they fitted all this in to just 120 minutes and it was not crammed. It was exactly right, the timing, the diversity, the interactive-ness, the rich content, their expertise, I’ve got to know Mysore a bit over the years but this brought me to so many new layers and levels.

Well done team, we’re rightly proud of our heritage and this was a great way to share with young and old, local and not so local, and I’ll be back..

Who is this guy, who pops up everywhere? An active entrepreneur who’s become a good friend.
Great to catch up with established and meet new friends.

Thank you Kim Kanchana Ganga, Tanushri SN, Shrimathi and her team, Pranav Athrey’s-Pranav Athreya, Suraksha Dixit, Tejashri Murphy, Pushpa and her team… plus the managers and organisers behind the scenes that put it all together and made it go so smoothly…..

More info 

http://www.experiencemysuru.in 

0091 8105318650

Info@experiencemysuru.in

@experiencemysuru.in

The venue was the amazing The Heritage House in Saraswathipuram  

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I’ll write separately about Mysore – Mysuru, about the city’s name and history but this is not the place. 

WOMAD.

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The world music festival in south England

There’s a group of us that meets and camps together each year. Sharing cooking and news of our lives, supporting each other.

WOMAD 2023

Some of the same group eighteen years before… on the front row from left … youngest son Oliver, me, friend Louise, Liz mum of my boys, Ben, my eldest.
July 2023
My son Oliver was visiting from Canada with his partner Rachel. Wonderful and rare opportunity to catch up.
It often gets muddy
This year I’ve been fortunate to meet a few friends, who are previous guests at Mysore Bed and Breakfast.

We’ve lost two from our group that’s MAnjula and Peter but they’re still in all our hearts.

‘Til later…

Manjula after cooking one of her gorgeous meals and overcome by the appreciation from our group. Wonderful memories from 2016 and 2017
There’s always time for new friends and stories.
Cool things to buy for the forever shopper. You’ll see this and similar around, as they’re significant.

One of the Magicians of Mysore

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Jan Brouwer does it again, with the relaunch of his popular and well regarded: Cottage Chamber Concert.

On the 14th February, in his home in Mysore we were entertained by Faleen and his sister Falisha.

Falisha age 13

Imagine you’re in a lovely house, tastefully decorated and well designed but it is a home. You meet the other guests in the downstairs hall (Lounge) for snacks and politely talk about the concerns of the day, in this case, no surprise as it was about vaccinations and the pandemic. Promptly, on time you’re invited upstairs to the Music Room where a Yamaha C2 concert grand piano is centre stage. You’re seated on attractive 19th century Dutch furniture, surrounded by paintings and images of some of the featured composers.

We were entertained by two young people to the music of Burgmuller, Chopin, Shostakovich, Bach, Beethoven, Schubert, Prokofiev, Grieg, and Moritz Moszkowski. Phew, yes, all that.

Faleen age 13

It’s as if many years of training, practice and performing as concert pianists had been crammed and concentrated into two small , young bodies who gently teared across the grand’s keyboard to provide a wonderfully unexpected experience. A musical talent demonstrating a sensitive maturity way beyond their years. You just had to close your eyes to imagine you were in a concert hall in one of the European capital cities but with the comfort and intimacy of visiting a favourite auntie and uncle.

Congratulations to Faleen and Falisha for a wonderful concert and thanks to the Brouwers, as we look forward to more entertainment from the jewels you find.

Tonight’s adventure

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First time for years. Revisited a Mysore institution: The intimate Cottage Chamber Concert. Organised by the inimitable Jan Brouwer since 1996. With Jan Sham on Viola and Mitali on piano. (Baby grand seeing as you ask)

A lovely evening. Meeting old and new friends.

Stephen and Catherine with one of the youngest aficionados.

For me, what was extra special, after a few very sad months, was to have my mood lifted by the beautiful music. I’ll continue by listening to music throughout the weekend.