Music has an undeniable power to move the human body as well as the spirit; it can soothe and comfort, stir and calm one at the same time. Geetanjali’s evening of rhythms presented by India Society of Worcester (ISW) on April 10, 2004 was redolent with all the qualities mentioned above. As the talented musicians played on into the evening, old and new favorite tunes were distilled to pure melodic essence.

The ambience reeked of pure nostalgia. Posters of early Raj Kapoor films (collected painstakingly by Mrs. Mundra) were displayed in the foyer, prompting excited gasps of recognition and reminiscence from film aficionados and the general public alike.

After a welcome by Renuka Garg , Cultural Secretary, ISW, Pramila Mundra and Vandana Goyal presented the invocation.

This reviewer walked in as Ajit Mundra (Keyboard) and Ajit Nagral (Tabla) had the listeners captive with their instrumental rendition of classic tunes. This was followed by Abhijit singing the Kishore Kumar classic Who Shaam Kuch Ajeeb Thi and Vasanth singing Mannadey’s Laaga Hunri me daag. These melodies raised the expectation of the gathering and one is glad to report that the artists did not disappoint even for one moment.

Getting the evening going with tunes from Raj Kapoor’s immortal hits, Geetanjanli’s musicians had the audience surfing a tidal wave of nostalgia. The twin screens flanking the stage showed scenes from RK movies and narrative commentary by the emcee Ms. Nagra helped remind all present why the RK musical stamp meant the most melodious, hummable tunes of their times.

Anu & Abhijit, Smita Pooja and Vasath kept the pace going singinng songs like Yashomati Maiyya and Barsaat Mein with equal gusto and ease, in the process winning much praise and applause from the audience. They rounded up the first half with a delightful medley from RK films, with the audience joining in at various parts.

During the intermission Pardeep Sharma, President of ISW gave an update about the developments of the proposed India Center.

The latter half of the program swung to that unmistakable modern Indian rhythm: the house was rocking to AR Rahman’s beat! The most complicated melodies were rendered with ease with the audience tapping their feet and swaying to the rhythm. The transition from genre to genre was seamless, and they made look effortless what one suspects took hours to plan.

Speaking to many different members in the audience, the universal opinion seemed to be that the group had pulled off one of the most profesionally arranged and executed cultural events ever. While raising over $60,000 for the ISW sponsored India Center, Geetanjali had provided the public some top notch entertainment.

The Orchestra had Ajit Nagral on the Tabla, Chaitanya Nadkarni on the Kabasa, Gauri Shankar on the Conga and Ajit Mundra at the Keyboard. The stage decoration was by Nalini Goyal and the Audio Visuals were co-ordinated by Sandeep Shah and Arvind Goyal.

The graceful dancers accompanying some songs sung by the Geetanjanli group were students of Ms. Jasmine Shah of the Angikam Dance Academy.

Indian musical concertgoers often suffer because of excessive amplification. Thankfully, this concert managed to strike the right balance, helped immensely by the superior acoustic system of the Westborough High School.

The musicians all professed sincere gratitude to the public for supporting the worthwhile cause and Lokvani caught up with individual members for their comments.

We asked them two questions.
1.What did this concert mean to you?
2. What feeling did you take home after the concert?

All of them expressed their appreciation To Dr. Ramesh and Mrs. Pramila Mundra for spearheading and seeing this project to fruition. They also thanked Dr. Sarla Patel and Lata Vasanth who coordinated the costumes of the artists and also Sarita, Vivek and Rahul who made sure that the costume changes of artists between songs was seamless and stress-free.

Smita, Pooja, Abhijit and Vasanth are students of Mrs. Kumkum Sanyal, who is an accomplished artist and teacher of Hindustani Classical music.

The Mundras said “This Geetanjali concert was a long time dream come true for us – bringing back Ajit and Ajit to perform together after ten years, enjoying the all day practice sessions at our house, feeling young in the company of the youthful new team of musicians and singers and getting an opportunity to work with sincere, dedicated members of the local community.

What we took home was a feeling of joy beyond words, for months of sincere efforts and hard work by a dedicated, cohesive group of music lovers, culminating in a class act performed by individuals who had fun performing on stage and working behind the scenes, and enjoyed and appreciated by a dignified audience, all for the benefit of the local Indian community.”

Said Abhijit “The concert meant an opportunity to prove myself to the audience here in Massachusetts being my debut here, to my wife as she was witnessing my show for the first time and most importantly myself as I was doing a stage show after a long time. I took a feeling of pride, elation, satisfaction and humility after the show.”

Ajit Mundra said “To answer your question, this concert has very special significance to me.
Personally, this concert means a lot ot things. It represents my own intense love for Inidan music and the broader Indian culture. Despite being raised in the US, I have a great love for Indian music and its spiritual and cultural significance in my own life. I credit my parents for fostering and developing that within me. Secondly, throughout the practice sessions and this concert, music has enabled me to form deep connections with new friends and to deepen and strengthen existing relationships with my current friends and especially my family. Finally, this concert has given me the very fortunate opportunity to share my talents with my co-artists and to demonstrate these talents to a wider audience. My appreciation for this is very great.

I am especially grateful to my parents for organizing this event and motivating me and inspiring me to channel my love and talent for music. There are also a countless number of helpers both obvvious and behind the scenes without whom this show would have been impossible. I felt very energized and immensely satisfied that our intense hard work over the months was much appreciated by the audience and that the actual show with so many contributors and supporters came together very nicely, despite the complex coordination involved. We had a truly wonderful audience, very appreciative and very attentive.

Vasanth Murthy had this to say “One of the best concerts I have performed in - a coming together of a detail-oriented organizer, very talented artists, stage decorators, costume designers, audio-visual specialists, and a fantastic audience!”

And Pooja Goswami said that “"I felt that the team Goals and my debut performance were successfully accomplished."

Said Gaurishankar Chandrashekhar “The show meant a true professional presentation of collaborated skills from talented individuals. The joy of success is what I took back from the show.”

We at lokvani wish this musical bunch the very best and hope to be witness to more such talented performances from them!

The musical evening was preceeded by a dinner for the sponsors of the event which included Suchitra and Sudhir Agrawal, Susmita and Barin Bando, Sujata and Prakash Bhalerao, Ranjana and Dilip Bhavsar, Pratibha and Jag Bhawan, Upma and Manish Chauhan, Divya and Ajay Dabhi, Priti and Rajiv Dayal, Sangeeta and Nilesh Doshi, Anita and Merwyn Figueiredo, Bhanu Gandhi, Narinder and Malkiat Gill, Sunita and Nitin Godiwala, Nalini and Arvind Goyal, Praveen and Subhash Gulati, Meera and Suresh Gupta, Padmini and Amar Gupta, Suhasini and Radhakrishnan Iyer, Pushpa and Harihar Joshi, Radhika and Kanti Kanzaria, Noopur and Anand Kapadia, Alep and Anup Khatra, Mona and Mohan Korgaokar, Vicky and Subu Kota, Kokila and Suban Krishnamurthy, Lokvani.com, Indira and Baltej Maini, Jean and Nandu Marketkar, Shiamin and Raj Melville, Jyotsna and Anil Mhatre, Sheema and Satya Brata Mitra, Rani and Muddana Haribabu, Pramila and Ramesh Mundra, Rani and Brigadier Sita Ram Nautiyal, Kalyani and Budhinath Padhey, Krishna and Keshav Pandey, Carolyn and Sahdev Passey, Nihita and Siddharth Patel, Sarla and Chaudhary Balwan Singh Patel, Neena and Rashmi Patwardhan, Radha and Avad Ramachandra, Anita and Kuldeep Rana, Paramjit and Jaswinder Sandhu, Purnima Sangal, Hemlata and Lalit Savla, Sonia and Jitendra Saxena, Ragini and Jitendra Seth, Neela and Sanjay Shah, Kiran and Pradeep Sharma, Shobha and Sharad Shashtry, Venkat and Pratima Srinivasan, Shaila and Ashok Vichare, Nisha and Chandrakant Vora and Neelam and Anupam Wali.

The dinner was sponsored by M.S. Gill of Chef of India / Bollywood Grill.

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