CANCELLED: The Art of the Tillana

The Tillana is a specific musical form of South Indian classical music that incorporates an attractive melodic structure into a strong rhythmic framework, and is also commonly featured in classical Indian (Bharatanatyam or Kuchipudi) dance performances. After providing a brief introduction to basic elements of South Indian classical music such as raga and tala, I will give a brief history of the evolution of the tillana and present different types of tillana compositions, while highlighting their stylistic differences.

Kavita Ramanan received her initial training from renowned singer Aruna Sairam and has been under the guidance of the globally acclaimed Chitravina N Ravikiran since the late 1980's. She has also benefited from the tutelage of several other gurus, including Geetha Raja, Padma Srinivasan, veena exponent Padma Varadhan, Manjula Muralidharan and her father, Dr S Ramanan. Despite the demands of her profession as a Professor of Applied Mathematics at Brown University, Kavita has given several concerts at major events including the LearnQuest Concert Series in Boston, Dikshitar Festival in New Jersey, and the Cleveland Tyagaraja Festival, the latter as part of the North American Melodic Ensemble.