Vocal & Key Board

Seema Kasthuri

Seema Kasthuri is an accomplished singer with a charming voice. She has undergone Carnatic Music training for over 10 years under Vidwan K.R Venkatesh. She has completed her Senior level board exams in Karnataka. Seema has accompanied Guru. Venkatesh in several concerts held in many places of state of Karnataka. Seema has taken active participation in most of the music productions from Sharada Vidyalaya under guru Venkatesh that was produced for All India Radio. She has also given concerts in Devotional Music and light music. Later, she is pursued her education studentship with Chintalapalli Krishnamurthy.

Seema is an active dancer by herself; she performs with the productions of Soorya Dance Company. Seema has provided vocal support to classical dance drama productions. She composed music for "OM Ganesha" - a classical dance drama on lord Ganeshji's story.  Seema's album "Sri Lola" - a collection of Daasa literature songs is released in India in November 2002. Seema took greater training with many, yet the important ones are Carnatic from Guru Nagamani Srinath and Hindustani Music from Ustad Imrat Khan.

Seema performs frequently in many Sabhas and temples. She has performance in “Chintalapalli Smaraka Sabha” in Bangalore, Kansas Music Association, Chicago AKKA Sammelana, Hindu Temple of St. Louis, Indian Association of Greater Springfield; ANANYA – Bangalore, Mallur Sri Venkateshwara temple and many other places.  Seema accompanied many of arangetram functions of Soorya Performing Arts in 2006, 2007. Her recent role as RADHA in - "CALL OF THE FLUTE" - the first ever dance musical of USA got the attention of classical music and classical dance lovers evenly.  Seema was selected to perform in “Saagaradache Sapta Swara” , a music show, which was telecasted on Indian television channel – Chandana. Recently, graduated her Masters Degree in Information Management from Washington University, St. Louis.  

Violin : Vidwan Ganesh Kumar Neelakanta : Ganesh Kumar Neelakantan Nanjunda Rao, hails from Mysore. He currently settled in Bangalore, India he plays violin in Carnatic style. Ganesh learnt from age of 10 under the tutelage of senior violin maestro Mr. H.K. Narasimha Murthy of Mysore, who was Staff artist in All India Radio in Mysore. He took 15 years of dedicated training in Carnatic classical music with him in Mysore. Later he received advance training from another violin Guru from Chennai - Mr. M.A. Sundaresan. Ganesh is teaching for the past 20 years and trained many students in India, Singapore and U.S.A.  He worked as a Violin tutor in prestigious Singapore Indian Fine Arts Society, Singapore for 7 years and trained hundreds of students.  Six of his students got I and II prize for continuous three years at national level conducted by National Arts Council, Singapore. He was invited to teach in Pittsburgh Temple in 2011.

Mr. Ganesh has travelled to South East Asia and USA several times to accompany many senior artists and to give many solo performances. Till today, he has accompanied many senior artists such as T.V. Sankaranarayanan, Prof. Nagamani Srinath, Dr. Suma Sudhindra, Neela Ramgopal and other main stream musicians. He is a regular performers on Indian Government Television Channel - Dooradarsan.

Mrudangam: Vidwan Ramesh Ramalingappa

Ramesh Ramalingappa, with more than 3500 performances, is a master Mrudangist. He is the student of legendary percussion master Vasudeva Rao. Ramesh is versatile percussionist who can play more than 5 instruments. He holds a rank in Vidwath Exams and has awarded prestigeous Ananya Yuva Puraskar. He has accompanied major classical musicians and dancers since 1980's.

Ramesh was a major figure in Indian Dance music festivals such as Hampi Dance Festival, Mysore International Music Festival, The Royal Kadamba festival of dance and music and others. He is an “A” graded artist from All India Radio - the National Radio station of India. He has accompanied famous musicians such as TV Gopalakrsihna, MS Gopalakrishna, NaivKalaskeli Santhana Gopalana, TV Shankaranarayana, RK Surya Narayana and others. With his team Nandi Talavadya academy, he has toured European countries such as Holland, Germany and other countries. In 2011, he performed in Mexico’s historic cultural events, in which he participated close to 25 shows in a span of 20 days. Ramesh is a highly sought after mrudangam player in classical music dance and recording industry of Bangalore, India.

Flute: Vidwan Jayaprakash Kakkopurath

Jayaprakash Kakkopurath, a veteran flautist hails from Kannur District in the beautiful state of Kerala. He started his career as a Professional traditional Bamboo flute player in 1970s. He is the senior disciple of Guru C R Panikkar Achar(1962 – 1975), in which he was trained in flute in a traditional Guru-Shishya tradition. Jayaprakash as an experienced flutist, has contributed immensely to the field of Indian classical dances. He was invited to perform in many prestigious festivals such as Guruvayur Chembai Sangeethothsavam; Lasya Festival, Calicut; World Performing Arts Festival, New Delhi; Bhopal Arts Academy, Madhya Pradesh; Kalakendra, Hyderabad.  He performed in key venues such as Narada Gana Sabha, Brahma Gana Sabha in Chennai and in Bangalore, which are called cultural capitals of India.

He performed in World Kannada Conference in Chicago, 2008; World Kannada Conference in New Jersey, 2010; St. Louis Indian Dance Festival in 2008. Jayaprakash was awarded ‘Krishna Geetika” award from Chilamboli Academy of arts in Tiruvangada, Kerala. Jayaprakash produced successful musical CDs -  Hare Ram, Shivoham, Muthappa Charitham. Since 2008, he is accompanying the dance projects conducted by Soorya Performing Arts based in St. Louis, MO. He provided music to their productions such as “Call of Flute”, “Zero”, “Bhakti Patha”, “Shringara Naradiyam” and many arangetrams. He accompanied Guru Prasanna Kasthuri in his dance performances in India and USA.  Jayaprakash is a graded All India Radio Artist.