By Purvi Radia | NT BUZZ
‘Stree Thaal Tharang’ was a unique five woman Carnatic ensemble that performed at the recently held annual Monte Music Festival. It comprised of a one of its kind ghatam tharang percussion performance by Sukanya  Ramgopal played to the accompaniment of various classical instruments

Born in Mayiladuthurai, a small town in Tamil Nadu, to an orthodox Brahmin family, Sukanya  Ramgopal, is the only woman in the world to have mastered the art of playing Ghatam, which requires a lot of physical exertion.
Ghatam, a clay pot percussion instrument used in Carnatic music, is usually the domain of male musicians. However, Sukanya swam against currents, and has today brought the Ghatam, which was a secondary instrument to mridangam, to centre stage.
Sukanya learnt mridangam from her guru Harihara Sharma and later, as she had developed a liking for Ghatam, learnt the Ghatam from his son Vikku Vinayakaram. After going through an array of designations like vocalist, violinist and mridangam player, Sukanya found her true calling in Ghatam.
Since Ghatam fell mainly in the male domain, Sukanya faced a lot of discrimination and rejection. “Once, when I was offered to play in a concert, the chauvinistic male accompanist refused to play with me. I was stopped right at the entrance,” says Sukanya, as way of explanation that the path to success and fame was, for her, not strewn with rose petals.
This steadfast woman with her perseverance, hard work and dedication brought the Ghatam to the forefront of Carnatic music from its erstwhile fifth position. Over the years, Sukanya had observed four Ghatam students, under the tutelage of her guru, playing ghatams of different harmonics and this inspired her to come up with the concept of a ghatam mala wherein six ghatams of varying rhythms are played successively by one percussionist. This Ghatam mala is nothing but Ghatam tharang, a new challenging, which was the brainchild of Sukanya.
Sukanya formed an ensemble of five ladies, including herself, called the ‘Stree Thaal Tharang’ in 1999, which sees the percussion wiz playing the Ghatam tharang with the other ladies accompany her with different instruments - veena, Yoga Vandana, violin, Sowmya Ramachandran, mridangam, Ranjani Venkatesh and morsing by Bhagyalakshmi M Krishna.
The ‘Stree Thaal Tharang’ enraptured audiences at the recently held Monte Music festival with their musical prowess, fluidity and rhythm.
The group was formed with the intention to bringing talented ladies under one roof. She currently has four accompanying ladies and is open to adding more to the group.
Sukanya  has performed in US, UK, Germany and Dubai among other countries and was among 14 female artistes selected in the year 2006 by the ‘Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Manav Sangrahalaya’ in Chandigarh and Madhukali in Bhopal, for mastering and excelling in playing musical instruments predominantly in the male domain. She has to her credit several albums, which include ‘Rainbow’, ‘Shiv Shambho’, and ‘Pulsation’.
With the intention of preserving her guru’s tradition, Sukanya is contemplating on writing a book on ‘How to Play Ghatam’ and also plans to release a DVD on the same.