BBC Tamil Prom

The BBC Proms is an annual music festival running from mid-July to mid-September and comprising over seventy Prom concerts. Taking place at the Royal Albert Hall in London, the BBC Proms featured it’s very first Carnatic concert on Wednesday 27th July 2011. The latest graduate of BBC Radio 3’s World Routes Academy young veena virtuoso Hari Sivanesan shares an evening with his mentor Aruna Sairam, widely regarded as the leading South Indian female vocalist of her generation.

Listen to the concert on the BBC (Available for a limited period)http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/b012rb58

Aruna is widely regarded as the leading South Indian female vocalist of her generation and has long sought to create a larger following for Carnatic music, seducing Indian audiences with her unusual deep vocal timbre and defying boundaries in her collaborations with internationally renowned artists from Europe and Africa. 

London-born to Sri Lankan Tamil parents, Hari Sivanesan is a student of Smt Sivasakthi Sivanesan, one of the UK’s foremost Carnatic figures. An exponent of the veena – a lute-like instrument dating back 3,000 years and prefiguring the sitar – Hari is the latest recipient of BBC Radio 3’s World Routes Academy scheme, founded to support outstanding young artists working in world music. Hari believes ‘it’s time for Carnatic music – India’s music of the South – to shine in the West, and I’m looking forward to diving into the roots of our music further!’.