The Veena is a stringed lute instrument, which is also the oldest within the South Asian tradition and often overshadowed by its North Indian cousin, the Sitar.  Each individual instrument has its own tonal quality, style and timbre.

In One, Mithila Sarma, looks at creating a new sound to carnatic music by opening up structures to include chords, harmonies and counter-melodies, not common within the genre. Most compositions in carnatic music are composed for Vocals, therefore not exploring the full range of the instrument; however, ‘ONE’ focuses on the Veena alone, bringing an ensemble of three Vainikas (veena players) together to experiment and push the limits of the instrument’s unique bass tones, multi-octave sounds and rich gamakas.

Mithila Sarma is a London born South Asian classical musician trained in East London with further training from India since the age of seven. She represents a growing number of musicians from the South Asian heritage training in South Asian classical music, looking at exploring new ideas within the genre.    

Mithila is joined by Shyla Shanmugalingam and Pradeepa Sivasanthiran on veena and on percussion by Abhiram Sahathevan

ONE is supported by Arts Council England

Tour Dates:

Apr 20 -  mac birmingham/Sampad -- 5.30

May 18th - Attenborough Arts Centre, Leicester, 7.30pm: Tickets available here

June 7th -  Kings Place, 7.30pm: Tickets available here

June 15th - Sage Gateshead in association with Gem Arts, Gateshead, 7pm talk, 7.45pm performance : Tickets available here

September 29th - Kalasangam, Bradford, 7.30pm

October 10th - Brunel Arts, Brunel University, 7.30pm