Koushiki Chakraborty (Picture by Sanjoy Chattopadhyaya)

The most impressive item of the last two-night-long sessions of the 53rd Dover Lane Music Conference was Koushiki Chakraborty?s khayal recital in Maru Bihag on January 24. Opening the third session, she produced mature, sustained and full-throated phrase development in the vilambit ektal khayal. She delivered equally excellent slow-to fast-medium sargams, fast boltaans, fast rhythmic sargams and aakar taans in the last section. Such figures, along with deria taans of all shapes and length and long, progressive aakar taans made the two drut khayals exhilarating. Her presentation of the original Carnatic and Amaan Ali?s north Indian adaptation of Dikshitar?s Ganapathi Vatapim in Hansadhvani and the Balamurali Krishna tillanain Kalyani were equally impressive.

Shruti Sadolikar Katkar sang khayals in Sawani Nat and Kaunsi Kanada in the authentic Jaipur Atrauli style. These, however, lacked the extra dimension that had made her Sabrang Sangeet Sammelan recital memorable. She erred in entertaining an ill-timed request to sing Bhimpalasi well after 2 am.

The final recital of the night was by violinist M.S. Gopalakrishnan who played Abhogi and Saraswati. His vocal-style and instrumental-style presentations were well-structured but otherwise unexceptional.

Singing early in the morning and at the end of the conference, Ajoy Chakraborty surprised by singing a full-fledged alaap in Bibhas and a self-composed ada chowtal bandish in the Dhrupad style. Yogesh Shamsi, accompanying him on a low-pitched tabla, produced figures that sounded like those of the pakhawaj. The drut teental composition was more khayal-like in that it featured sargams, sargam taans and aakar taankari. All this added up to create a grand finale for the conference. The final night had started with Bageshri khayals by Tripti Mukherjee. Then came a sitar recital in Janasammohani and Yaman Kalyan (generally without the shuddh madhyam) by Salil Shankar.

Santoor maestro Shiv Kumar Sharma was at his best in the jod and gatkari he played in raga Jogkauns. The alaap was dull in comparison. Anindo Chaterjee?s tabla accompaniment added substance to the music. Earlier, Ashwini Bhide Deshpande chose an ultra-slow teental khayal in the raga Jog for inconsequential vocal posturing. Some taankari towards the end was, however, competently delivered.