Susheela Raman & Mian Mir Qawals at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, London
Pax vobiscum, pilgrims.
If there’s one thing about Susheela Raman that I know is a guarantee is this: you will never, ever, get a boring performance out of her, thus you’d have to be completely out of it not to be able to photograph a good shot of her. It’s been about over an hour since I came out from her show halfway (Hey! I have to file the shots out; brother’s got to pay the bills!), and the one thing I kept thinking was “If only other musicians are as giving as she is to photographers!” And boy, can she sing! I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: she has somewhat of a hypnotic voice to enchant the listener that she pulls off when she goes deep into the musical zone. Here’s a proud Tamilian who’s not afraid (and why should she be?) to vocalise her proud roots.
Part of her band had Sam Mills on guitars and Aref on tabla:
in collaboration with the Mian Mir Qawals from Pakistan:
Performing to a packed and sold out Queen Elizabeth Hall, these guys brought their ‘A’ game to the show. For the whole 15-20 minutes that I covered the show, it was a ‘wow’ for me. Raghu, if you’re reading this, you’re going to have to pull something special to top this one!
I heard from the missus that Susheela and all the musicians received a standing ovation, and it somewhat turned into a mini-rave during the encore. Hence the big smile, I guess:
Food for Thought & Soul: ‘I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten‘. —Joel 2:25
© 2012, Akin Aworan. All rights reserved.