Vivek Chellappa

    Vivek Chellappa began learning mridangam at the age of six from Sri R. Kannan, who hails from the style of Sri Palani Subramania Pillai. He has also taken lessons from Sri. Anoor Dattatreya Sharama of Bangalore, Sri Srinath Bala of Jayamangala and Kalaimamani Guruvayur Sri Dorai.

He has won prizes in the percussion competition at the Cleveland Aradhana, including first place in the Senior mridangam category in 2005. Since his arrengetram in 2004 with Smt M.S. Sheela , Vivek has been regularly performing in mridangam and kanjira, including concerts for five years at the Cleveland Aradhana.

Vivek have been fortunate to perform with leading musicians including Dr. Balamuralikrishna Smt. M.S. Sheela, Mysore Brothers, D. Seshachari, Dr. Panthula Rama,  Dr. T. S. Sathyavathi, and US-based artists, including Sri Madurai Sundar, Sri. B. Balasubramiam, Sri Salem Sriram, Sri. D.B. Ashwin and Smt. Kiranavali Vidhyashankar.

Vivek is a graduate of Brown University, completed medical school at Georgetown University, and is now an anesthesiology resident at UCLA.