The All India Natya Kala Conference at The Krishna Gana Sabha, remains unprecedented and unparalleled as a single forum showcasing the varied classical dance forms of India through annual lecture-demonstrations, research paper presentations and live performances. The nucleus of the concept was derived from a discussion with the Bharatanaatyam Virtuoso, Dr Padma Subrahmanyan who expressed the need for presenting the diverse Indian classical dance forms to posterity. The Natya Kala Conference celebrates its silver jubilee this year.

Double-mridangam accompaniment was first featured at the Krishna Gana Sabha and was a resounding success. In 1958, Sri Palghat Mani Iyer and his son, Palghat Rajamani, provided the first double-mridangam accompaniment to the Alathoor Brothers with Lalgudi Jayaraman on the violin. Krishna Gana Sabha,over the years, has featured many such concerts involving different mridangam artists of eminence.

The Violin-Venu-Veena trio of Lalgudi G Jayaraman-N Ramani and Venkataraman gave their first recital at the Krishna Gana Sabha in 1960. This much popular combination went on to perform numerous concerts.

Religious discourses were first featured in a Sabha platform at The Krishna Gana Sabha in 1956. Great Vedic scholars and Upanyasakars such as Sengalipuram Anantharama Dikshithar, Narayana Dikshinthar and Manjakudi Rajagopala Sastri, Kripananda Variyaar and others gave the first discourses on themes such as the Ramayanam, Skaandam to large audiences at the Sabha. Tha Sabha maintains its commitment to promoting religious and literary discourses till date.

First Sabha to deviate from the prevailing practice of other Madras Sabha’s that of concentrating all their programmes during the December-January time frame alone KGS pioneered the August-September Gokulashtami Festivals in 1955. The first Gokulashtami season was 6 concerts strong (namely that of MS Subbalakshmi Semmangudi Srinivasa Iyer, Chitti Babu, Sheik Chinna Moulana Sahib, Flute Mali KB Sundarambal with MS Gopalakrishnan as violin accompaniment). The Sabha is proud to note that the Gokulashtami festival has grown steadily over the years to offer a rich variety of over 60 concerts in 2005.

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The great, traditional Baghavatha Mela of Melstoor was brought to the city Sabha platform in 1965 by the Krishna Gana Sabha in a week long festival format.

The Krishna Gana Sabha’s Pongal Nadaswara Isai Vizha, an annual week-long Nadaswaram Festival that began in Jan 1987, gives pride of place to this great traditional instrument of South India. KGS is the first and only Sabha to offer such a concert platform to the Nadaswaram and Travil artists and popularise this instrument, otherwise restricted mainly to temples and marriage halls.

The Kalakshetra Dance troupe performed for the first ever time (outside their own premises) in Madras city at the krishna Gana Sabha. In 1960, the Sabha’s newly inaugurated “Gana Vihar”, featured Kalakshetra’s Geeta Govindam as its first event. The much acclaimed dance programmes of Kalakshetra have been featured regularly at the Sabha since.