Learning to zoom in...

A group of 10 non-resident Keralites settled in Malaysia is all set to stage a percussion ensemble (chenda melam) performance at Thamaramkulangara Sree Dharma Sastha temple in Tripunithura on January 31. Interestingly, though percussion ensemble music is hugely challenging and demands real musical knowledge from the players, the group of techies employed in the south east Asian country learned to perform the ensemble music online, with their teacher sitting miles away in Kerala and offering them live music lessons and virtual music classes.“It all started with our Onam celebrations just before the Covid outbreak in 2019.
We used to dabble in drumming on and off and listening to our performance during the Onam celebrations, one of ourfriends suggested that we should learn drumming on the percussion instruments the professional way,” said George John, one of the members of the team set to make its debut in the chenda melam. “Our friend suggested the name of Hariprasad of Radha Lekshmi Vilasom (RLV) College of Music & Fine Arts. We are grateful to Hari Asan for taking the time and effort to give us the chendalessons,” he said.
“Hari Asan showed extraordinary patience while conducting the online classes all these three years,” said George John, another member of the group and director (IT) of Skoruz Technologies.
“Initially, I was worried about the effectiveness of the virtual classes. Faceto-face interaction is a must for conveying the verbal notations for each rhythm. But I understood that they were passionate about chenda melam and were willing to go the extra mile to learn about it,” said the teacher, Hariprasad.
Hariprasad then started the online class for the group of enthusiastic students who were ready to go to any extent to learn the Melam with all its intricacies.
Having conducted the online classes regularly for about two years, the teacher met his students face-to-face for the first time when he visited Malaysia in 2022. He stayed with them for four days and gave lessons in orchestra percussion.
“While conducting online classes, the real challenge was maintaining the time interval and the accurate pattern. Even a difference in a fraction of a second will derail the rhythmic patterns of each rhythmic note. But the rhythmic sense ofthe students enabled us to overcome this difficulty to a great extent,” Hari Prasad said.
Once they mastered the basic lessons of Melam, they started learning the highly intricate musical assemblage bit by bit, constantly progressing, he added.
He said the students also sought the technical support of software to sharpen their skills, Hari said, adding that they have proved their mettle by giving a consistent performance in the rehearsals.
The students are excited and waiting to showcase their talent at the Arangettam.
“This has been my deep passion since childhood and it will be a dream come true moment for me,” said Santhosh S Nair, another member of the group and director(Energy Segment) of Oracle International.
It was really a thrilling experience to join the group and learn the percussion ensemble, that too by attending the online classes, said Jyothi Joseph, one among the two women members of the team.
After having completed several rehearsals, all the ten chenda melam enthusiasts are now waiting eagerly to get on the stage to do the live show.