Gayathri Venkataraghavan

Gayathri Venkataraghavan (Tamil: காயத்ரி வெங்கட்ராகவன்) is an Indian Carnatic vocalist. ^[1][2] She lives in Chennai.^[1]

Gayathri Venkataraghavan
காயத்ரி வெங்கட்ராகவன்
Occupation	Carnatic vocalist

Education

Venkataraghavan trained in Carnatic music at an early age under Rajalakshmi, Padma Veeraraghavan, Rukmini Ramani, V. Subramaniam and Lakshmi Natarajan.^[1] At a young age, as Gayatri Ramani, she won a number of prizes in inter-school and Inter-collegiate competitions as well as at competitions held by Music Academy and other sabhas including Indian Fine Arts Society, Mayilapore Fine Arts and Saraswati Vaggeyakara Trust. ^[3] Her advanced training started in 1990 under Acharya Choodamani Sri. A. Sundareshan, a disciple of Sri C. V. Krishnamurty Iyer, Sri Ramnad Krishnan, and Alathur Shri Shivasubramanya Iyer. She moved to Madurai / Tirunelveli after marriage. Although it witnessed a hiatus in her career, she successfully bounced back into the performing scene after eight years and continued her training under A. Sundareshan. ^[4] Gayathri later trained with P. S. Narayanaswamy (PSN), a disciple of Semmangudi Srinivasa Iyer, until PSN's death in October 2020. ^[1]

Performances

The Hindu wrote that her singing shows "modesty and sincerity", and praised her for choosing rare kritis in a 2016 concert.^[5] In a 2015 concert, The Hindu wrote that she "comprehends the strong link between the devoutness of classical music and its manifestation in the form of kritis."^[6] They have also called her voice "melodious."^[7]

Discography

Her commercial albums have been released by Charsur Digital Workstation and other companies.

Awards and titles

• D. K. Pattammal Award for Lady Vocalist (2001)
• T. T. Rangaswamy Award (2002)
• Kalki Krishnamoorty Award (2003)
• Nada Oli title by Nada Inbam, Madras (2003)
• H. Natarajan Prize (2003, 2004)
• Carnatic Music Association of North America award
• Pappu Kamakshi Award (2006)
• MLV Endowment Award by Narada Gana Sabha (2006)
• Isai Peroli title by Kartik Fine Arts (2008)
• Shanmukha Sangeeta Shironmani from Shanmukhananda Sabha (2008)^[8]