Jennifer Thomas By Express News Service BENGALURU: Ahead of World Yoga Day on June 21, Paris held its celebrations on June 15 where Carnatic musician, vocalist and Bharatanatyam dancer Bhavana Pradyumna performed with great zeal at La Villete. “I chanted all through the session commencing with Aditya hridaya, Patanjali shloka along with Samskrutha verses for good health and concluded with Shanti mantra in Carnatic ragas,” says Bhavana, who will be performing again in four more cities -–Pornichet, Guérand, Saint Nazaire and Rezé – in France on June 22 and 23. Bhavana has been a proponent of classical Carnatic music through her organisation, The Carnatic Conservatory Of Paris (CCP), which she co-founded along with her husband, Pradyumna Kandadai. She started training at the age of six, under the tutelage of her mother, Vid Padmamalini Raghunandan, whom she describes as her first guru. Born and brought up in Bengaluru, she credits the city for fostering her passion for music. “My childhood in the city provided me with a beautiful, culturally rich environment. My family encouraged me to immerse myself in cultural activities,” she recounts. Her zeal to explore the world and not settle in one place has taken her around the word, and most importantly, to Paris. Through her organisation, she has undertaken various projects to promote and teach Carnatic music to a more diverse populace and has travelled across Europe in her attempt to promote music. On International Yoga Day 2018, she was invited to sing at the beginning of an event in Paris at La Villete, a park where 2,000 yogis participated to commemorate the day. It was at this event where she was asked to play the the Tambura during the yoga session. “It was my experiment to blend in my voice with alapanas and chantings as they performed yoga. People were mesmerised with a pure voice accompanied by a Tambura alone,” she says. Bhavana calls this combination of yoga and music as ‘Naada Yoga’. According to her, “Music works as well for yoga as it does for dance.” She sings Sanskrit texts set to beautiful ragas and chants mantras as the yogis perform, which adds to the mystic feel of performing yoga. She’s eager to announce her new project in collaboration with 30 other artistes, a yoga anthem composed by Mysore Manjunath and written by Shatavadhani Ganesh.“This anthem will be launched on June 21 across the globe. I will be presenting the anthem at different events across France and Europe in the days to come,” says the vocalist.

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