Adithya Venkatesh, 18, from Bengaluru, is considered a music prodigy. He plays Carnatic music on the keyboard and remembers the notes of 100 Ragas. His parents share his journey and how music helps overcome autistic challenges and reinforces his confidence in other areas too.
Parents Vidhya and Rajesh tell us about Adithya
Adithya was diagnosed with developmental delay when he was 2yrs 10 months. However, what was stark even when he was just 3 months old was his acute sense for music - we clearly remember that he used to listen to Carnatic Music for hours together. He started going to a regular school around 7 yrs of age . But unfortunately he would keep moving in and out of schools due to lack of facilities being offered by regular schools and high levels of anxiety he always had due to which he would resist going.
Journey with Carnatic Music
Adithya has been trained in Classical Carnatic since 2006 under the tutelage of Vid. Tirumale Srinivas who taught him the nuances of playing ghamakas and anuswaras and later ragas and manodharma. He was later with the renowned harmonist, Vid. Ramdas from whom he learnt the skills of fingering on the keyboard. Adithya has given more than 30 performances until now playing the Carnatic music to the delight of the audience – in Bangalore, Chennai & Coimbatore.
His journey under the recent tutelage of Vid. Kumaresh opened up the paradigm of tapping the fullest potential of the keyboard by exploring different dimensions of the various Indian Ragas. Vid. Kumaresh ji and Vid. Praveen D. Rao ji have jointly nourished his skills attempting to play Carnatic Classical Music on the Keyboard based on Ragas & Thallas – in a way that has not been attempted before.
He has an extraordinary ability to a) remember the notes of more than 100 Ragas, has the ability to remember the aroganam and avarogaman of any raga (the ascending and descending scale of a raaga) b) to remember the count in music and c) innate ability to imbibe new instruments - drums, piano, guitar.
"He experiences his life when he plays music"
Adithya is a child prodigy whose world revolves around music and it is music alone that is the medium of communication to the world & his sole passion. Adithya often says that “he experiences his life when he plays music”
Music has helped Adithya heal himself and has also helped him to get a lot of self-belief, respectability & acceptability among his peer group. Music has also helped Adithya to excel in other extra-curricular activities – mainly in sports like Golf, Badminton, Tennis, Swimming & Skating where he has won many trophies. Music reinforces the confidence in his ability to create and maybe it is music that pushes him to look beyond what currently exists and express himself in a new way.
Listen to his audio interview where he talks of his love for music, his desire to be a musician, his friends (The pings are in the original recording) and links to 2 of his recitals in Raga Abheri and Raga Hamsanadhanam (his favourite raga)
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