The Hindu Business Line : Carnatic music for business creativity?

Mumbai May 31 Whatever is the connection between Carnatic music and executive creativity? Executives numbering 120 who have enrolled for a workshop `Voice Within — A Business Creativity Workshop' in Mumbai will find out on June 1, without having to sing a single note.

The workshop takes its inspiration from a coffee table book, Voices Within, by Carnatic musicians Ms Jayashri and Mr T.M. Krishna. This book outlines the life and times of seven heavyweights (From Ariyakudi Ramanuja Iyengar to M.S. Subbulakshmi) of Carnatic music.

They, along with Mr R. Sridhar, an advertising industry executive, will conduct the workshop. "Why were these artistes so successful? We will extract the principles from their life, work and music and apply it to business creativity," said Mr Sridhar.

"Also if you take a raga, you will notice that whoever sings it or plays it, it is immediately identifiable. This is exactly what marketers are striving to create for their brands, that there should be something distinctly identifiable about them," he said.

Of course, there was a slight apprehension among participants that they may have to sing, said the organisers. "There is nothing that will be threatening about the workshop and nothing that will make them feel self-conscious," said Mr Krishna.

`No jargons'

Mr Krishna and Ms Jayashri have established an organisation called Matrka. "We feel that our duty does not stop at performances. We are taking carnatic music from corporation schools to the business workplace," said Ms Jayashri.

Mr Sridhar says that the principles to be communicated to the participants contain no jargon, and there will be no Power Point presentations either. The two musicians sit with laptops as they discuss the workshop, but there will be no laptops at the workshop itself.

Sheer curiosity about the workshop has brought in many blue-chip executive participants (each paying Rs 5,050). They are CEOs, Executive Directors, Vice-Presidents or General Managers from Birla SunLife, BPCL, Colgate Palmolive, HDFC, Hutch, Mahindra & Mahindra, Pepsi Foods, Reliance Petroleum, Tata Motors and Shoppers' Stop, among other companies.

And, adds Mr Sridhar, 80 per cent of them are not South Indians.

Of course, the workshop could have been organised for Chennai, but hosting it in Mumbai brings a novelty to it.

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