Geetha Navale

Geetha Navale (born 1966) is a veena artist in Carnatic music from India. Navale has been described as a gifted veena player, with a style as diverse as that of Ravi Shankar or Jimmy Page. She has performed at the Knitting Factory, an avant-garde jazz venue in Manhattan. Based in Bangalore, she gives regular performances in the classical sabha circuit and performs regularly with the Esperanto World Music Project for over two decades.

Early Life

Geetha Navale (nee Sreenath) was born to Manjula and Sreenath in Hyderabad hails from a hebbariyengar family. Born into a family of industrialists and entrepreneurs, she turned out to be an artiste of high imagination. She has had the privilege of learning the ancient art of playing the veena from the age of nine under the renowned Gurus Sri J.Anjaneyulu the Vice Principal of Hyderabad music college and the legendary Sri R.K.Suryanarayan in Bangalore.[2] It was her marriage to songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Gopal Navale in 1986 that broadened her vision. With her music world, she spent part of her time to her academic studies too. She did her schooling from Andhra YuvathiMandali and obtained her graduation from Osmania University.( R.B.V.R.R college)

She continued her music journey under legendary Guru R.K.Suryanarayan from 1988-2003. Out of this professional artiste she was nurtured to become a stage artiste. She completed the Vidwat examination and secured a 2nd rank in the Karnataka state. Her inward inspiration made her to give performances with much aplomb and proved as a merited artiste of high thinking.

Career

In 1998 she along with her husband Gopal Navale has established a global music project called Esperanto in their world music school, Guruskool, which explores cross cultural music, the emerging exciting new music of our time. Esperanto brings together talented musicians from diverse cultures to learn from each other and play together. This has over the years evolved into exciting music which touches the heart of the listener wherever she performs — from a small temple in our neighbourhood of Malleswaram or some over-the-edge jazz club in Manhattan. Knitting Factory, with whom she shared the stage in a 2001 live performance recorded here, is something of an experimental jazz group in Manhattan.

She was invited by a band called Baroque Nomadeto France in Janury 2006 for a recording project retracing the footprints of the European music traveler, Pietrodella Valle, who about 500 years first carried this magical ancient instrument back home from India. She recorded with the XVIII-21 Musique des Lumières baroque ensemble led by a French musician named Jean Christophe Frisch.

She has been working across musical disciplines with jazz, blues and Western classical musicians. She believes that the instrument Veena, despite its antiquity has infinite scope and its rich sound can easily blend with any kind of music.She constantly innovates and experiments with several crosscultural musicians to create some glorious fusion pieces.

An active musician, she still teaches and gives great performances around the world. She has even been instrumental in curating artistes for popular fests like Freedom Jam and Fireflies in Bengaluru.

In her tours and collaborations, she played along with many well known musicians including Jazz musicians Erik Truffaz, Isabelle Anatena of France. Amercian bass clarinet artiste David Rothenberg who plays avantgarde jazz. Baroque cellist Lourdes Pfiffer of Spain, Caravan from France, Malik Berki– project Kodakoda(France), Eliana Burki– to name a few.

Part of Guruskool Music, the pilgrim of every budding musician in Bangalore, she along with her husband Gopal Navale promote the spirit of music in Bangalore with awe-inspiring grit and determination.[9] Through the annual Freedom Jams and the monthly Sunday Jams they provided an un-judgmental, unbiased platform to help upcoming musicians show off their fare and kick-start their musical careers. Geetha now wants to give back to her home town and is planning a world music fest, which she visualises at the Golkonda Fort.

PERFORMANCES:

Debut concert:

with Guru J Anjanelulu at the TyagarajaAaradhana,Thiruvyaru the cradle of carnatic music, at the age of nine.

The Classical Sabha Concert circuit

To name a few - South Zone culture center- Brihadeeshwara temple, Tanjavur Basavanagudisangeetasabha- Bangalore Rama sevaMandali.Fort High School, Bangalore. Ramanavami Celebrations-Sheshadripuramcollege. Gurvayur Krishna Temple - Hyderabad VijaynagarSangeethsabha – Bangalore Raghavendra Swami Aradhana festival- Chintamani Shiva Vishnu Temple- Washington DC And many concerts with Guru Sri RKS.

Other:

Knitting Factory-New york Alliance Francaise-World Music Day Great Music revival-Kala Academy-Goa Espirit de Pondicherry -pondicherry tourism department Concert for the Taiwanese delegates- School of ancientwisdom, Bangalore Fundraisers for Karunashraya trust, Crystal house, Sarthaka trust-RVeng college Bangalore. Fusic- Fusion music festival, Chennai

COLLABORATIONS:

Jean christophe Frisch-( P a r i s ) - Ba r o u q u e ensemble. Lourdes Pfiffer (Spain) -Cellist - baroque Dr.David Rothenberg- (New York) - Bass Clarinet - avantgarde jazz Robert Wright-raw productions-(Seattle, USA) -blues piano Isabelle Anatena-(France)-Jazz singer Christian Faurve-(France)-electronica Pashupathinath Arya -( Delhi) - Hindustani flute Peter Dickson (Australia) - Flamenco guitar Martin Hingis (germany) Radio Therapy ( USA)- Jazz Deobrat Mishra (Benaras) Surbahar and Veena Malik Berki( France) Kodakoda project

Discography

• TillanaGuchcha, Volume 1, a Veena duet (1999)
• 'Mix'd Feel, An Esperanto project (Kreek, 2000)
• Rubber World, with Robert Wright, John Wayne and GopalNavale (Raw Productions, 2001)
• Esperanto at the Knitting Factory (Kreek, 2002)
• Ocean Floor (Kreek, 2002)
• Ancientstrings (Kreek- 2004)
• TillanaGuchcha Volume 2 ( Kreek 2003)
• Ondu- (Masala Maker, Germany 2002)
• Toujours du Soleil (with Isabelle Antena, France) 2003
• Pellegrino (XVIII-21 Musique des Lumières, France)
• Duet for poets

References

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