A chat with Balabhaskar

The moment I was told that I am suppose to interview Balabhaskarji I was excited because I am his biiiig fan.. from the time I have heard him in the Soorya Fest. So last night I was busy googling about him and got in touch with some of his close friends to get some itsy bitsy masala stuff for the show. I was told that he would reach by ten and I reached Mascot Hotel ,the venue around ten. The wait is horrible but when you know it's for someone special it's worth it. In between Venu Nagavalli sir had come there for an interview and since he is my distant relative I went up and introduced myself.. Apparently my face is familiar :) God knows how !! By around 11:30 am we were getting anxious about why he didn't arrive on time and voila! he was waiting for us from the past one hour on the other side. Why was there no communication done between the producer and Baluji is still a puzzle in mind... Anyhow the shoot started and I had rehearsed my introductory lines about him. On the side he was testing his violins and was tuning them. I was extremely conscious at first but he is soooo smiley and so natural that he makes you want to be a kid. I mean we were literally giggling and smirking and I was making why-are-you-so-humble-looks for which he returned I-am-born-humble smiles :D The best part of this session was his explanation about one of his works namely pa-less. It was one work which was appreciated by his Guru and it was a small thing that he composed in Vasantha ragam. As Vasantha is a raga that does not use panchama he names his piece pa-less :D :D... Now I don't really have to explain about his humor! One of a kind I tell you! I made him communicate through his violin a lot and he also made me sing. I hate to sing when I am not the guest or the 'main' person. But my producer was hell bent on me singing and blah blah so I eventually sang a Hariharan ghazal. It will be telecasted on Rosebowl pretty soon and will update you on that!