Buoyant and melodic:

Francesca Meyer - touching the people with her tune

by Mahes Perera

It's not often that you meet up with a musician especially a flautist who enjoys coming over to Sri Lanka even if it means to just bask in the sun on the beaches of our country. Francesca Meyer has been to our island countless times to play gigs or to enjoy the beauty of the island. This time she was featured at the recently concluded Swiss Food Festival at the Mount Lavinia Hotel. But her appearance did not end with the Swiss Food Promotion. Francesca continues to be centre stage at the Lobby of the Mount Lavinia Hotel, entertaining the many guests. She will be doing so until the end of this month.

"You asked me why Sri Lanka figures in my travels. I have a special connection to Sri Lanka and a special connection to the Mount Lavinia Hotel. I can't explain it - call it a kind of a mystic or 'spiritual' attraction. The vibes draws me back to this island wherever I go. I like the people, I like the smiles on their faces and good things happened to me in music every time I was here. In 2010 when I was here I was featured on TNL TV singing Sinhala songs.

That was an achievement for me, I enjoyed every single moment during the recording. I have played with Sri Lankan musicians including Sunil Perera, Sohan Weerasinghe and Yasmin de Silva. In 2010 I was singing at the lobby of the Mount Lavinia Hotel, my gig was for five weeks and during this time Traum Hotel recorded the TV production which featured the Hotel and me", says Francesca.The flute has a special attraction for Francesca. A teacher too of French, English and German in her homeland, she hails from a family of musicians. Her father is a pianist, her two brothers - one is a saxophonist and the other a pianist. Francesca plays sax as well but she chose to concentrate on the flute because according to her "I like the sound of the flute; I can touch the people with my sound. Through breath control I can choose the sound that I want and capture the interest of my audience."The blurbs indicate that you are jazz oriented as well, what are your influences?

"Billy Holiday is one of my favourites, there's Quincy Jones, the Crusaders and I'm the First Rated Winner of the State of Missouri Music Competition. Blues, Fusion and Brazilian music figure a lot in my repertoire. In 2002 I followed three semesters at the Swiss Jazz School in Berne and have released the Wellness Jazz CD in 2004. Also 'The Combination' with the U.S. pianist John Capo. This CD was recorded in Los Angeles in 2014 and in Switzerland in 2015. I've brought some of my CDs with me."

If you haven't heard her before then make a date with Francesca Meyer at the Lobby of the Mount Lavinia Hotel. Tall and flexible in person her playing like a critic said 'matches her stature'. She is precise and buoyant and her melodic flights contain the flutter and trills that is associated with a flautist's expression.

S.P. Balasubramanyam in Sri Lanka

The well-known Indian film playback singer, actor and music director S.P. Balasubramanyam will be in Sri Lanka with the band of Gangai Amaran and popular singers of the Indian film industry to perform at Nannbenda - live in concert. The event will be held on October 9, 2016 in Jaffna.

Sripathi Panditaradhyula Balasubramanyam was born on 4th of June 1946 and has won the Guinness World Record for recording the highest number of songs. He won the National Film Award for Best Male Playback Singer six times and the Nandi Awards in Telugu cinema 25 times from the Government of Andhra Pradesh.

He has recorded over 39,000 songs in various Indian languages which include several albums of contemporary Indian music, private albums for devotional songs and movies, which is a world record, as acknowledged by the Guinness Book of World Records. He has won National Film Awards across four languages as well as a Filmfare Awards, five South Filmfare Awards and numerous state awards from Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. He is a recipient of civilian awards such as Padmashri (2001) and Padm Bhushan (2011) from the Government of India.

SPB has been a regular feature in the films which had music by Ilaiyaraaja and AR Rahman and it would be no exaggeration to say that his popularity which had peaked by then and his singing prowess played very vital roles in their climb to the top. SPB's association with Raaja dated back to the days when the maestro had been conducting concerts all over Tamil Nadu and once Raaja got his break with the film 'Annakili', SPB became a vital part of most of the films for which Raaja scored the music. And this included films in Telugu such as the Vishwanath directed Saagara Sangamam and Rudraveena as well. SPB won National Awards for both these films.

He worked with companies such as M.S. Viswanathan, Illayarajah, Deva, G.V. Pragash Vidyasagar, M.M. Keeravani, S.A. Rajkumar, but his association with A.R. Rahman turned out be a major success.