My Guru: Shri. Prafulla Athalye

Prafulla is a talented tabla player who started his initial tabla education at a very early age of 7 from Pt. Vasant Vishnupurikar. Later he became a Gandabandh disciple of World renowned Tabla Maestro Padmashri Late Ustad Allarakha Khansaheb of Punjab Gharana. Ustad Allarakha Khansaheb gave him a sincere talim continuously for more than 14 years. He is one of his favourite disciples and a promising tabla player of younger generation. At present he is undergoing his training under his son Tabla Maestroe Ustad Zakir Hussain. Knowing his Guru's high expectations from him, Prafulla has been very serious and particular about his riyaz and learning. Prafulla was quite active during his college days as he used to perform in various cultural activities as well as inter collegiate competitions. He received many prizes in various competitions at district, state and national level such as - 1st prize at The Youth Festival in 1994, organized by The University of Bombay, 1st prize in West Zone Inter University competition at Jabalpur and 2nd prize in All India Inter University Competition held at Gulbarga in January 1995. 1st prize in all over Maharashtra in State level Competition held at Amravati in January, 1995 organized by the Government of Maharashtra. 2nd prize in the first All India National Youth Festival at Bhopal, organised by the Government of India in January 1995.

PERFORMANCES

He gave his first Tabla solo performance at the age of 11. He is a graded artist of All India Radio and has been performing on All India Radio as well as on many television channels. He has given

many public performances (solo as well as accompaniment) at various Music Festivals in different parts of India, France, England, Scotland, Ireland, Kuwait, Malaysia, Singapore, Qatar, Bahrain, UAE, Oman, Germany, Italy, Austria, and Switzerland. Prafulla is fortunate to get guidance also from other maestros such as Pandit Suresh Talwalkar, Pandit Anindo Chatterji, Pt. Arvind Mulgaonkar, etc. Recently, he toured Gulf and Europe to perform classical concerts organized by Shri. Soorya Krishnamoorthy. So far, he has accompanied many maestros mainly : -

Ustad Allarakha,

Ustad Zakir Hussain,

Pt. Jasraj (vocal),

Pt. Manohar Chimote (Harmonium solo),

Pt. Ajay Pohankar (vocal),

Pt.Rajendra Prasanna (Flute),

Pt.Birju Maharaj,

Shri. Nandkishor Muley (santoor),

Pt.Ramesh Narayan (vocal),

Ustad Siraj Khan (sitar),

Smt. Shalmali Joshi,

Shri. Raghunandan Panshikar, etc and many other talented musicians.