C. R. Vyas

Chintaman Raghunath Vyas
Birth name Chintaman Raghunath Vyas
Born 9 November 1924
Origin Osmanabad, Maharashtra, India
Died 10 January 2002 (aged 77)
Genres Hindustani classical music
Occupation(s) singer

Chintaman Raghunath Vyas (Marathi: चिंतामण रघुनाथ व्यास; 9 November 1924 – 10 January 2002), popularly known as C. R. Vyas, was an Indian classical singer. He was renowned for singing khyal style.[1][2]

Early life

C. R. Vyas was born in Osmanabad, Maharashtra, into a family of Sanskrit scholars and Hari kirtankars. He was influenced by the singing, of his father and grandfather, episodes from Ramayan and Mahabharata.

He had his initial training from Govindrao Bhatambrekar of the Kirana gharana for a decade. Then he learnt from Rajamrambuva Paradkar of Gwalior Gharana. While he was training in the Gwalior style of singing, he was impressed by Jagannathbuwa Purohit who belonged to Agra Gharana and started learning from him. He also got the guidance from Yeshwantbuva Mirashi. He was benefited by other scholar musicians namely Acharya S N Ratanjankar, Chidanand Nagarkar, S. C. R. Bhat and K. G. Ginde.

Career

C. R. Vyas was having an open throated voice and has created his own style with the nice blend of different flavours from all these gharanas. However, the influence of the Gwalior gayaki, is quite prominent. His musical performance clearly shows his efforts, honesty and devotion towards music. Music was penance for him and a pathway to the almighty. Music was his first love, first commitment and his first passion.

He had been employed at ITC in a white collar job. Music was not a primary vocation. In his own words, "In our time we did not think of earning either fame or money through music". He was a leading artist in AIR and on TV. He has participated in major musical events in India as well as abroad.

Among his disciples are Prabhakar Karekar, Kunda Veling, Sriram Parasuram, Sanjeev Chimmalgi, Ganapati Bhat and his son Suhas Vyas. Jitendra Abhisheki was his student for almost ten years.

Contribution to music

He was also engaged in research on traditional ragas and compositions. The new ragas composed by him shows the height of his musical talant. Shiv-abhogi, Dhanakoni-Kalyan, Sagera, Shuddha Ranjini, Sanjogiya and several other ragas composed by Vyas are popularly heard in concerts. His personality had another wonderful flavour of compsing bandish. He composed more than 200 bandishes in different ragas under the pen-name Gunijan. As a tribute to his Guru Gunidas he started the Gunidass Sangeet Sammelan [3] in 1977. He has written a book Raag Sarita which sums up his great work in the field of music.

Awards and recognitions

Discography

This album features Live recordings of Pandit Jasraj, Bhimsen Joshi & Vyas

This double volume album will feature the great Hindustani classical vocalist Vyas. The maestro has rendered in this album ragas like Bihag, Bimpalasi and Ahiri Lalit to name a few.

Live Recording In Mumbai

References

  1. "Reluctant Master". India Today. Retrieved 2013-08-18.
  2. "A matter of the swaras". The Hindu. Retrieved 2013-08-18.
  3. Swaminathan, Chitra (5 February 2010). "Santoor strains". The Hindu (Chennai, India).
  4. "Tansen Samman for Pandit Vyas". Indian Express. Retrieved 2013-08-18.
  5. "Padma Awards". Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (India). Retrieved 2009-05-16.
  6. "Sangeet Natak Akademi Awards - Hindustani Music - Vocal". Sangeet Natak Akademi. Retrieved 2013-08-18.