Curtain raiser

It is the newest of the city's concert spaces, but it is more than a just a stage. With a grand semi-circular frontage, Sir Mutha Venkatasubba Rao Concert Hall offers a great venue for performances. Within two years of being open to the public, it has become the venue of choice for not only concerts, but for art exhibitions and any kind of performance in general.

The superb acoustics of the hall are complemented by the excellent equipment. Comfy seats let you enjoy the performance without having to twist and turn for that correct positioning. And there is adequate space for parking - the advantage of being able to use the space of the Lady Andal School after hours.

And though I haven't had a chance to see one such yet, the hall has a provision for providing 'surtitles' - projected on the stage, above the performance space - to enable translations of plays into another language, should it be required!

Concerts / Performance Arts

Sir Mutha Venkatasubba Rao Concert Hall

This modern concert hall in the center of Chennai regularly hosts concerts and performances of both Indian and Western Arts and culture, which makes a good place for expats in Chennai who seek some entertainment outside the fancy hotel clubs.

The hall is fully air-conditonned, with comfortable seats and has a perfect accoustic. So don't be afraid, the Sir Mutha Rao Hall meets international standards and will guarantee you a fine night out.

The website of the Sir Mutha Venkatasubba Rao Concert hall, www.sirmuthamemorial.com , is still under construction, but hopefully will soon feature a list of upcoming performances.

In the past I have personally enjoyed a lot the Earthsync world music Festival at this venue and therefore I show you the video I made of it below. Other performances at Sir Mutha Venkatasubba Rao Concert hall the  include the famous citar player Ravi Shankar and Jose Feliciano.

Sir Mutha Venkatasubba Rao Concert hall

Shenstone Park 13/1, Harrington Road

Chetpet, Chennai

(in between Shopper's Stop and the French Loaf Bakery)

Earthsync music Festival @ Sir Mutha Rao Concert Hall

Line up for the blessings

Though it originally began as a day to worship weapons, Ayudha Puja has long ago moved on to be a day to worship the tools and implements of one's trade. Yesterday was the day of the Ayudha Puja and across the city, all kinds of 'tools', from CNC machines to computers, were cleaned and decked up for the puja. Almost every vehicle had a garland of flowers in front of it. Offices had had their signboards washed and sprayed with sandal-paste & kunkumam.

On Harrington Road last evening, these autorickshaws were lined up to participate in a puja being conducted by their welfare association. They looked all nice and neat, washed, polished and with smears of sandalwood paste. Though they all look the same anyway, the effect was even better with small banana stems on either side of the vehicle, all of equal size - and then the standardized garlands making them almost indistingushable.

It was a nice sight alright, but that didn't stop one from wishing these folks would swear to turn over a new leaf in their treatment of passengers!

Bringing down the curtains

'The Hindu', Chennai's venerable newspaper, has been bringing an annual week-long theatre festival to the city for four years now. Normally the plays are all in English, but this year's opening was a Korean adaptation of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' (with English surtitles), probably in acknowledgement of Chennai's large population of Korean expats. The other new feature this year was a play produced by the Fest, in collaboration with the Goethe Institut, which premiered on August 3.

Apart from the plays - which included productions from Mumbai, Bengaluru, Chandigarh and New York - the festival had a symposium on English Theatre in India, as well as a workshop on running a theatre company. Today is the last day of the festival; owing to a variety of reasons, I have not been able to watch even a single performance this year.

I therefore had to be content with going to the Sir Venkatsubba Rao Concert Hall to take pictures of these off-stage props!