SAN­DRA L BLOOD

Founder and di­rec­tor of Tabla Sangam, Pun­dit Karan Ram­sun­dar and his wife Ria are ded­i­cat­ed to pre­serv­ing Shashtriya Sangeet - teach­ing and cre­at­ing op­por­tu­ni­ties for stu­dents to per­form and share their tal­ent.

Not­ing that May was of par­tic­u­lar sig­nif­i­cance for na­tion­als of East In­di­an de­scent, Ram­sun­dar said: “It is im­por­tant to com­mem­o­rate In­di­an Ar­rival Month, which is an oc­ca­sion to pre­serve cul­tur­al tra­di­tions and re­mem­ber the an­ces­tors.”

On May 25 at SAPA in San Fer­nan­do, the cou­ple host­ed the con­cert, The Jour­ney, a “heart­felt mu­si­cal trib­ute to their an­ces­tors in cel­e­bra­tion of 180 years since In­di­an Ar­rival.”

“The evening was a proud cel­e­bra­tion of her­itage, uni­ty, and the en­dur­ing lega­cy of In­di­an cul­ture in T&T,” Ria Ram­sun­dar ex­plained.

She said the evening high­light­ed the tal­ent and ded­i­ca­tion of their stu­dents, while al­so fea­tur­ing guest per­for­mances by ris­ing young mu­si­cians that in­clud­ed Shiv­anand Bas­deo in the genre of lo­cal clas­si­cal, Dim­itri Lal with a unique fu­sion of steel­pan, tabla, and har­mo­ni­um, and a trip down mem­o­ry lane with a per­for­mance by the Princess Priya’s Dance Group.

The Ram­sun­dars, joined by their sons Anup and Vi­raj at the event, be­lieve “Mu­sic can change the world be­cause it can change peo­ple,” (Irish singer-song­writer Bono).

Pun­dit Ram­sun­dar said he’s un­wa­ver­ing­ly ded­i­cat­ed to the tabla and aims to pro­duce stu­dents with a sound un­der­stand­ing of the in­stru­ment and dis­ci­pline in their riyaaz, en­abling a high cal­i­bre of fu­ture mu­si­cians.

At the con­cert, the stu­dents of Tabla San­gan per­formed Hin­dus­tani clas­si­cal pieces and a Sargam Geet pre­sen­ta­tion—Raag Bi­lawi Set to Teen Taal, DhatiD­ha­ge­na Dha Tiraki­ta—a Kai­da Trib­ute to the leg­endary Us­tad Za­kir Hus­sain.

“This melod­ic of­fer­ing ho­n­oured the re­silience, cul­ture, and lega­cy of our an­ces­tors who jour­neyed across oceans and laid the foun­da­tion of our vi­brant her­itage,” Ram­sun­dar said.