11/29/05

Tuesday! Talk.

BCCI members elected their new president; usually every BCCI election is trick or treat event, or “பொம்மலாட்ம்” [Dollmia Puppet show] . This time the election was overseen by Election commission of India. So we can expect some sanity.

Mr. Jagmohan Dalmia bites dust and will have to stepped down after running his show for around 20000 years. Union minister Mr. Sharad Pawar gets the power to control the most lucrative game in India. The only game body in India that did not have any political control or influence was cricket; this was one main reason for Cricket being successful in India. Good thing is Mr. Dalmia and his cronies were shown the door for now but getting in a political leader to govern is a concern; let us hope for the best.

Dravid was all praise for his team and thanked everyone. Dravid passed the exam with flying colors. Under his reign India seems to perform much better.

Pathan bowling spell for precise and probing, while Agarkar was mediocre and lacked consistency in fact he was pathetic. Balaji where did he go? I am sure he deserves another chance. Sachin started off with some fantastic strokes, but was out to an unbelievable catch by Prince.

Umpiring issues: When players are penalized for their “wrong doings” Why not treat the umpire in the same fashion? Two LBW decisions yesterday went against India; Butcher was plumb to Murli Kartik, while Sehwag LBW decision was dreadful, both the decision came at a crucial juncture. Sehwag and Sachin were blasting every bowler around when Sehwag was given out. This slowed down the innings, Dravid was very tentative for first 30 minutes at least. However he played a captain’s knock to see India home.

My point is such umpiring incidents make me speculate about umpire Harper; it makes me feel that he had an agenda in mind to upset India. Like players Umpires needs to be penalized or Captains should get an opportunity to appeal against such ruthless decisions that could change the outcome of a hard fought series. Did ICC announce New Year bonus for its employees? I was very much worried to see Jeff Crowe as the match referee; he is notorious for fine collection.

Sri Lankan Test series starts on Dec 2nd 2005 in Chennai; Hope we get some game time as rain gods have been too liberal and at times brutal towards Chennai. “Goliath” Gangully will back but he has come to good - really good, there is no “DOLLMIA” to support him. All the best DADA.

11/28/05

Monday!

Nov 28th, 1996, boarded an Indian airlines flight to Delhi from where United 747 took us to Chicago via London. We landed 1/2 sleep, cleared the daunting immigration, landed in Minneapolis along with 20 inches of snow. Clueless we were about our future, we started our life, a life similar to a roller coaster ride, today 9 years gone, and we are here! With great friends, family; Thank you god!


India lost the Kolkotta one day game, I really like to know “the experimental reason” for asking Irfan to open, that too when Dravid had time and again mentioned that he is still a bowler in the team. I would never meddle with the top order for a crucial game; I found the idea of promoting Irfan simply ridiculous. Greg Chappel got into some more controversies; it seems he managed to show the middle finger to a bunch of Gangully fans picketing outside the stadium. Though they deserve it, I think the coach should take the higher road in these kinds of issues. Players like Kiriti azad had cribbed as though this was against the “so called culture” I think it is bull, the same fanatics burnt effigies and “slippered” pictures of Chappel before TV cameras. Is this our culture?


Yesterday on Sapthaswarangal [SunTV], the drummer who played for JPR College of engineering, was simply excellent, great sense of timing and perfection, I am sure he has a great future and will come round the Kodambakkam community. The winner of the show was Loyola collage Thanks to their vocalists “Harish” he was amazing and sang with perfection. The keyboardists were also too good and played some tough Raja-Phrases of the 80s with ease. It was really nice to see such young talents have a stage to present them. Thanks to SunTv , in the midst of dull boring soaps, these kinds of musical shows create some sanity in the entertainment values. Talking of soaps I peeked into the serial Kolangal, Yuk!, that’s it. It is really pathetic to see so called “Tamil” creativity reach a new lower level of degradation.


We had a great thanks giving, friends of ours visited, we spent the whole long weekend end talking music, movies and cricket.


We were 191/4 when I uploaded this page; I hope we level the series.

11/22/05

Great Depression of Chennai

50,000+ cricket fans went depressed today in Chennai, thanks to the clipper “depression” that sailed over Chennai. Third time in a row people of Chennai were denied from watching good game of cricket. When India was all set to beat Australia, the final day’s play was washed out, and then the washout New Zealand game, now one more to the list.

When it comes to good cricket, Chennai is already under the Set top box fiasco spell, now it is the turn of the weather gods; Mr. Varuna is really stingy when it comes to Chennai, but he suddenly decides to shed his charitable contributions over Chennai. Alas one more game gobbled by a depression from Bay of Bengal. It was kind of sad to watch people who showed up for the game busy cursing the rain god, the irony here is for past few years the city has been trying very hard to impress Mr. Varuna, he was their temporary enemy today.

Most went back home just in time to catch the evening quota of Tele serials that establishes Tamil culture and its heritage. This also includes reality shows called “News” where we get to see tamil men and tamil women with broom sticks cursing in pure Tamil about some one in full throat.

It is not very surprising to know that BCCI have no clue about geography in general. They don’t know even their own boss till date, so how will they know the north East Monsoon around the Coromandal Coast? A school kid will tell you that it rains cats and dogs or if not at least some rats in Chennai during October and November time frame. What is the point in scheduling a game during this period? Chennai does having a fantastic competitive stadium, so what? Our proud TNCA is always on the bad books of BCCI for political reasons; so we don’t get good games, if at all we get, it rains out. Out of 50,000, I hope at least 40,000 loyal cricket fans get their money refunded; the rest 10,000 allocated were OC tickets anyway.

Sitting on the other side of the world, I woke up this morning at about 3.55am, just to catch glimpse of my home town, when the camera pans I would look for someone I know. My little Banner which I made - "Rain Rain go away - come again another day" our little Sachin want to play! Went waste; Kolkota, here we come!

Good day.


Ps: Please donate your old geography books to BCCI.

11/21/05

Monday!

Over the weekend, watched a movie on DVD called 'Ullam Ketkumae’. I liked the movie for its theme and clean screen play. We have seen similar movies about collage love, fun etc, however the young cast in this movie made it more realistic. No “heroism” or “Chroma key” fights or “Punch Dialogues”, or “Teacher teasing in name of comedy” or “over loaded soft core porno” a set of simple love stories /infatuations that is knitted around college life. Characters in the movie can found in everyone’s school life. Harris Jeyaraj does a fine job in few songs however in every song he uses some weird language for the hook phrase, “Lieko Laima” was one such thing I am yet to understand. There were some impressive English lyrics too, however singing seemed too loud. I wish more movies are made in this manner and this movie would be really interesting if the running time is reduced by 60 minutes. Since the director has to cater for 3 hours, he had to include some dragging Tamil movie elements.

Yesterday evening saw “BABA the movie” on Sun TV, since this has been discussed I have nothing more to comment on this, however the end of the movie there was a note - “to be continued..” I really don’t know what the intention was, may be “BABA” becomes a post graduate, which is “ ” Thank god as Rajini fan I have Chandramuki to celebrate.

It is been raining in Chennai; one day might be washed out or a shortened game are in cards. India won the Banglore one day in style. Sehwag played a good innings to ensure his place in the team. Weekend I was also busy with few recordings and composing sessions. Yes! Another project in the pipe line already and things are starting to pick up. Expect some announcements end of next month.

Lieko laima – Have a Good day.

11/18/05

H1BEES NEWS

(1) Interview with Srikanth Devarajan, Shankar Nagarajan, and Srivatsa Srinivasan, the team behind the CD "H1-Bees by Srikanth" By Ada/AV team, UCLA International institute. Published on: 11/15/2005 -
Click Here.., Thanks to Ana La O' for the interview;


(2) The popular Indian Pod cast show – “A Pod Cast on Indian Music” has featured H1BEES which includes some of the old compositions of Srikanth. Srikanth/Shankar and Srivatsa spoke to Amit Varshneya, the host for the show.
Thanks Amit for featuring us.

Other news
============
(3) CD Baby Restocked our Cds ,If you have not ordered the CD yet, you can order it via www.cdBaby.com/srikanth

Have a good weekend.
Thanks.,

11/16/05

********** An Update

After a month long empty “hundis”, ICC finally managed to get some doe in their coffers.

Harbajan fined 25% of his match fee. Jeff Crowe fined Harbajan for gestures against Ashwell Prince. It seems Harbajan pleaded guilty and fine was reduced by to 25%, this offense carries an 50% forfeiture.Duh! there goes the 6 star dinner for ICC members.

seriously, my question is: How come Crowe missed Mel's ill behavior and gestures to the Indian batsmen? But managed promptly to ticket Harbajan? May be the South Africans “caught the Crow” well ahead of the game. This is Ridiculous! Dear Banglorians if he is still around for the next game don’t give him Water.

GPS Failed to work this time.

The flouring new Indian team lost its way and lost the game to South Africa. I really felt why there was a need to play an international game on a semi constructed stadium. Like players getting tuned by playing first class games the cricket pitch should also be tuned with few first class games. The pitch was an unpredictable slop with uneven bounce; the conditions suited the bowlers more in the first session. Dravid for his part lost a vital toss and as expected India was in trouble right away. Sehwag was tempted and he was out playing the same stroke for the millionth time. I think he never learns. In this process he also gave hopes for Dada.

Sachin might be the player with most number of dubious decisions against him. He was given out caught behind by umpire Hariharan. The ball clearly missed the edge and I really do not know how umpire could miss such decisions. Top order was tinkered once again. Kaif was promoted; it was matter of time before he walked back with a pale face. Dravid was bowled, I think Dravid could have come in at number three; Dravid has the technique to keep the bowlers checked on an unpredictable wicket. But! Keeping it short, thanks to Yuvarj, Harbajan and Ifran India had put forth a respectable score. Yuvarj’s century was worth millions.

Super sub: I really don’t what was the reason to pick Gautham Gambir as the super sub. Ok may be an extra batsmen, but already having 2 openers in the lineup, why not an all rounder like Suresh Raina? On Gambir’s selection - he plays or Sehwag plays.

South African batting was not “fantastic” or “mind sweeping”; the same old Modus operandi - dull mechanical mode. Smith was out plumb in the first over to Irfan. Everyone except the umpire got the decision right. Soon he started to play some strokes and hit Irfan quite well in next few overs. If someone complains about Sehwag’s footwork, hey! What about Smith then? Indian bowling was over all pathetic at stages. Harbajan did reduce the run rate though. However the most pathetic issue in this ordeal was the commentary team, Robin Jackman and Ranjith Fernando especially. Seriously at 12.00 midnight, agony multiplied. There was clearly a bias in commentating by the South African crew, while Mr. Ranjith was settling accounts. The new guy MEL was full of tantrums however South African commentating team appreciated every inch of it. If it had been “dada Ganguva”,oh wait!.. We term that as misbehavior.

Bottom line, India lost the match however gave a good fight, while South Africa did not win it convincingly, from 35-5 they managed to donate 214 runs in spite of unpredictable uneven track - they just won with an over+ to spare. 0-1 , I hope we recover in future games, BCCI should pick stadiums that really suite India. Home team advantage has to be exploited.

Ps: Boasting English team lost the first test to Pakistan!

11/14/05

Monday!

One more big time H1bees Buzz, H1Bees on “All Things Considered”.

Vatsa and I were on NPR on Sunday on “All Things Considered”; we spoke about the album and my musical ventures. I also did an impromptu composing for them, a simple melody on the Raga Amurthavarshini with little bass and drum parts.

It was a pleasure to talk to the NPR, Thanks to Tracy Wahl - NPR, for this interview. And thanks to my boss Craig Shaffer for permitting me to talk to them during working hours in my office. Yah!, I am still a dedicated computer consultant and not yet a full time musician.:)

You can listen to it here.
All things Considered
or
Inteview Site


Now back to Never ending Cricket Craze…
Great victory for the India team; we can enjoy this victory for one more day. I was browsing through some statistics in Rediff .com, surprise! I did find something interesting.

Record #1. Indian wicket-keeper Dhoni hit 17 sixes in the series. He established a new world record of most sixes in an ODI series/tournament.

Do you know who was holding this record before along with Jayasuriya?
Gangully - 16 sixes in 7 matches; He falls in 2 slots for this world record meaning 3rd and 6th position for his record is held by Gangully.

Record #2: Dravid and Dhoni had an outstanding Average of above 100, this is the third and fourth instances where Indian batsmen ending a series or tournament with an average of 100-plus while scoring at least 300 runs.
Do you who second person to have such a record
Gangully ICC Champion Trophy, 2000-01, Total of 348 – with an average of 116.00

It is a pity to watch a person with such batting talent being neglected out rightly from Indian cricket. I don’t want to take side and argue for Gangully. However I feel Gangully deserves another chance and on his side he needs to accept the fact “No One is indispensable”. I am sure he can do better in spite of the golden ducks in a recent first class game. I feel the pitch must have been a “clay” pond.:)

Good day.

11/11/05

TGIF...

The final game of the series, I got carried away in my earlier Blog and mentioned India was 6-1, however I still believe that my “typo” predication can happen.

India has to open with Sachin and Sehwag; basically this batting pair can create jitters even among good bowlers. I still feel the rotation policy should not be overused on the top order. Gangully and Sachin was one such pair in later part of 90s who created such Jitters.

Dravid should be back in command, and I want Sehwag to score some runs to boost his one day average, which is really mediocre. Or may be some one should tell him this is a test match, he might whack some runs then. Sehwag had recently mentioned that he is not worried about batting form, he is concerned about winning, frankly if this rule is applied to everyone Gangully should be given another chance. As mentioned in my previous Blogs his winning streak was pathetic only for last few years.

Today, Gangully’s return to the side is still a doubt. It is a pity to see a player who has a five figure aggregate to be left out for granted. However if anyone is to blame for this, it should Gangully himself. We need to agree that GanguDADA was a different Indian captain; the rest of the cricketing world simply assumes an Indian captain to be timid person. It was in this manner. Gangully certainly changed this equation in the cricketing world. He did follow Steve Waugh’s Sledging or sugar coated “Mental Aggression” Techniques. He did reply to the media with aggression etc. This is all good and different from other previous Indian captains.

But a captain, the CEO of the team has to set an example; this includes off and on the field. His fielding abilities were useless, and he was informed about this from various quarters, still he never bothered to improve. His running between wickets, he never grounds his bat, this is basics, and once again experts told him correct his weakness for which he never cared. Off the field, many have complained about him for not sticking to the schedule, not coming in proper uniform for Toss. These issues might sound minor to him however when it comes to the CEO post, it matters a lot for the post. Such minor issues have accumulated against him over a period of time.

Bottom line, one need to respect the “designation”, “portfolio”, if not the designation will not respect him/her.

In my 2 cent opinion, statically Ganguly has phenomenal scores and records, India should have this player in the squad. However he has collected a lot of speed tickets points and never cared to resolve them. This attitude will supersede the statistical value and make him look like a real bad boy. Only some superlative performance in domestic cricket can get him back into the team, until I feel he is done.


Finally, some H1BEES Buzzzzzzzz..
How would your name sound on French Radio?
Yes, my album effort was discussed in "Radio France". Radio France carried a 6 minute capsule talking about me, my album and my wonderful team of artist/marketing personals behind this effort. Shankar our Marketing/Pro KGuru told me about his yesterday; Thanks to him, if not for Shankar we would have never known about this.

Le portrait du jour par Marc Kravetz
Srikan't et les H-1Bees
You can check their website here online.
Thanks to Radio France for this introduction and provding a link to h1bees.com.


Have a great Weekend.

11/9/05

One more victory, a reality check

Along with in-form injury return Kaif, Yuvaraj Singh finally got runs under his belt. Both saw India home to win the 6th one day, Indians are 6-1 now. Indian team fielding was at his best in this game. 9 out 10 of times fielders were able to hit the stumps directly. The run outs of Dilshan and Arnold were crucial to the game. Dhoni also came up with a lightning speed stumping to get rid of Jayawardhane.

An assertive Sehwag was leading the side with real enthusiasm and confidence; he kept attacking, after seeing the initial onslaught by Messer’s Jaya Suriya & Co, I was nervous about his decision to bowl first. It was a hardcore batting track. Most captains would chose to put up a high score, and then defend it. However Sehwag opted to bowl, after initial hiccups, his bowlers came good with tight line and not to forget some ridiculous batting display by Sri Lankans. Another interesting thing on Sehwag’s captaincy was his field placing, it seemed to be very unique; the region from point to cover was “defended” by 4 best fielders in the side, they just stood on the circle. They stopped everything and anything creating a virtual pressure for the batsmen, who then automatically perished by pressing the panic button.In fact all the fielders were placed just on/around the inner circle.

Sreeshanth was pathetic at the start, and kept bowling short and gave lot of room to Jayasuriya, however soon changed his line and foxed Jayasuriya. More than anyone the left hander R.P.Singh bowled quite well and earned the man of the match, getting four wickets on a “CowPoop” coated batting track is big deal. He deserves the award.

India’s batting order was modified once again. I see no reason why Sehwag took the number one slot. Sachin and Sehwag has to open the innings, this should not change even for experimental reasons. I don’t feel Gautam Gambir can take on new ball on a bowling track. Indians are 6-1; we were underdogs before the series started, the team went through commotion and changes in the team chemistry, however today the team seemed to have over come all the issues, and on the right path.

What is for Gangully in this? What is his future? His credit history for runs is still good on papers, but today the team does not seem to miss his batting or his captaincy tantrums. I really do not know if he would be considered even as player now.

Bottom line, under the new management Indians have won six games comfortably. Under this new management certain usual issues stands corrected. For example Fines, the ICC match referee fund did not get cash inflow till date. The dreaded “Over rate” fine has always been an issue for திருவாளர் Gangully. He often gets penalized by the match referee for time delay, over rate or failing to follow some ridiculous ICC code of conduct principle.

The over rate under new captain Dravid or captain-Sub Sehwag seems to be perfect Or may be we can speculate on this, had the referee been one Mr. Ranjan Madhugulle , at least ICC’s tea expenses would be covered. What ever, the team India looks more disciplined or looks just what the doctor ordered. We need to accept the fact that new Coach Dravid and every team members really want to establish some professional conduct and working ethics in the team. Along with the coach Dravid is ready to work towards such changes and experiments.

I wish the same level of sanitization is done for the BCCI Selection Committee. The latest fiasco by the Joker Bunch was Vikram Singh’s selection. He was selected but now sits out with an injury. What this means is, there was no clear communication between the player, the local board, or the Indian team and or the BCCI HR department, How can board select someone who has been declared unfit?, Joker bunch had no clue who is on the roaster. We cannot expect Kiran More and his cronies to answer any logical, rational questions in this matter.

Some one out there, please check with Ian Chappel, if he is free we can get him to head the BCCI selection committee.

11/8/05

Quick Update

H1BEES CD is now available world wide via CD Baby.COM, Click here.Very soon Tracks will also be digitally available on Apple ITunes ™, ITunes™ –Europe, MSN Music and many other popular digital outlets. Using the digital distribution mode, tracks can be purchased individually.

11/7/05

Monday

Music: Dr. Thomas invited me to attend the Washington post Scholarship awards on Saturday. Every year Washington post presents Scholarship awards to high school students in DC metro area for their talent. Alisha and Swathi were among the finalists. Alisha performed live “Daddy’s girl” a song written by Udhaya and composed by me. It was composed for the short film Stinking Cigar, directed by Arun. It was really fantastic to watch Alisha sing in front of 400 people; to me it was an amazing experience to hear my composition on the Warner Theater’s PA system, later people cheering for the track. Thanks to Alisha for choosing this track.

“Swathi Raman”, [She sang Thikutheriyadha katil in my H1BEES album]. She sang a Carnatic Number along with a Mirudangam accompaniment. For the entire evening all most 95% of the songs were in English, Swathi went ahead and choose a Tamil classical number, In her 3 minutes time slot she sang “thUkiya thiruvadi” , she managed to squeeze in little “kalapana swarams” with a mini “nerval” too. It was a great pleasure for me to hear the only Indian language/Tamil song for the entire evening. One more Indian high school kid played the “Dhol”, man he was amazing!

Having used both the voices before in my recordings, it was a proud movement for me to watch these teen singers expand their talent horizon. During the evening there were many fantastic Tap dance, Ballet dance and opera presentations, many talented kids performed mind blowing stuff. Congratulations to all the winners.


Weekend...
Circle the best answer,
Q) What would happen to a person if he is thrown from 3000 feet mountain cliff? He is about 200 pounds.
(a)[RIP] He Rests in Pieces
(b)He survives but with a skull, rib, shoulder, hands, legs, hip fractures and be in a coma for next year or two.
(c)In about 20 minutes he walks out from a 1970 Benz with his newly married wife.


If your name is NOT K.S. Ravikumar you would be thinking about choosing (a) or (b), and never ever consider (c), C is clearly illogical by any IQ standards. Yesterday I was watching Thalaivar’s movie “Muthu” and the above question is from the “chapter 22 – Climax”. In 1990-95 semesters, KS.Ravikumar chooses option C and passed the exam with flying colors. God only knows how? Taking about GOD, Sachin was rested for the 5th one day; India managed to lose an easy game in spite of 2 good knocks by Gambir and Dravid. Winning is a habit, I feel India has left an opening for the Lankan’s. Hope the team comes back with full force to maintain the winning streak.

Now Continue Your Monotonous Monday…

11/3/05

Game Day, India wins the Videocon cup!

Breaking my superstitions I went ahead and subscribed the games on willow.tv; my money did not go waste. YES, India won the game and the series with flying colors. Dhoni finished the game in style by launching 2 massive sixes to complete the formalities. India won the Videocon cup 4-0. Sri Lanka is yet to win in India in this tour.

It was a pleasure to watch many new faces in action; future of Indian Cricket.

Raina, he impressed me right away by his balanced and matured batting ability. The lefthander’s short selection was very prudent and did not want to give anything away. He was firm on his approach and made sure India won the game. Partnership between him and Dhoni was well organized. "Maro Maro" Dhoni played second fiddle while Raina took the lead. Raina is also an amazing fielder, a very promising future Indian team permanent. He was the “Supersub” and he replaced Srisanth.

Venugopal Rao, The youngster’s square cuts bought back reminiscence of GRV. The good old Gundappa’s style seems to have reborn, thanks to little man VenuGopal Rao, another good prospect for the future Indian team with solid batting technique.

Srisanth, he has a smooth run up with a crisp side arm bowling action. He was very impressive in the first few overs, he bowled a perfect line and length but very soon he lost his accuracy and started to bowl too many short balls and paid the toll. He can be tuned and share the new ball with Pathan.

Thanks to some fantastic swing bowling by my “man” Agarkar, he won the well deserved man of the match award,. Ravi Sastri once again talked about his all round ability during the function, this time Agarkar clearly mentioned that he prefers to bowl rather than bat. Promoted Yuvraj Singh started of with a bang played gleeful shots however perished to a superb catch. I feel Raina already holds a team travel ticket however he is still on “RAC”. Yuvraj has to perform to his full potential else Raina’s ticket would be confirmed.

Sachin played an ambitious stroke and “was bowled by VAAS”, Sehwag was very lucky, Lankans kept dropping him at regular intervals. He managed to stick around with the captain who played his usual cameo knock. I should also mention about Harbajan, he bowled a sensible line to keep the Lankan’s under control, 4-0, I am hoping for a 7-0.

Yawn!, I am very sleepy.:)