About Artists
Surmani Dattatreya Velankar is one of the foremost and illustrious disciples of Pt. Vinayak Tor-vi. A ‘Sangeet Prabhakar’ in Hindustani Vocal, Dattatreya is an accomplished artist, teacher and founder of the Shadja Kala Kendra, an institution dedicated to the age-old ‘guru-shishya param-para’ of Hindustani Classical Music. Born into a family of Keertanakaras, Shri Dattatreya Ve-lankar has inherited a unique lineage from his parents. Dattatreya is a ‘Vidwat’ in Vocal Music from the Govt. of Karnataka, an M.A. in music from Dr. Gangubai Hangal Music and Performing University, a graded All India Radio and Doordarshan artiste . He has been conferred ‘Suramani’ title by Sursingar Samsad ,Mumbai . He has authored a book titled ‘Sangeet Mala’ outlining the basics of Hindustani classical music, and has several audio CDs to his credit.
Shri. Balasubramanya Sharma hails from a traditional family of Kaiwara in Karnataka. He has been into divine art of Carnatic music from tender age of 7 years. Mr. Sharma’s father, Shri. Kai-pu Lakshminarasimha Sastry was his first guru. After that, he was under the tutelage of Vidwan Salem P.Sundaresan. He has been awarded scholarships by Central Government and Dr. Sub-baramaiah Cultural Trust. He has received awards from several organizations like ICCR (Fiji), Triveni Academy (France), Sri. Gurudev Lalit Academy (Mandya) to name a few. He has per-formed in several prestigious festivals in India, US, UK, France and Canada. Shri Balasubraman-ya Sharma has founded an organization called ‘Nadaroopini Foundation for Arts and Culture’ which regularly conducts music festivals. He has composed and directed music for several com-mercial devotional CDs and dance ballets. He has also sung for TV serials and classical albums. He is a also a popular accompanying vocalist for several renowned Bharatanatyam artists all over India.
Photographs from Performance
THARANG UTSAV 