Travelling light: a journey in music

By V Ramnarayan

Chapter 2

Growing up with music

The monthly programme at RR Sabha was Krishnan's window to concert music, but his musical education did not stop there, even though he had discontinued Paattu Vadyar's evening classes, vacating the arena for his sister and cousin to continue to wrestle with them.  He was by now an avid listener of All India Radio and Radio Ceylon, and he had already attended his first December season concert at the Music Academy, at the temporary pandal erected at the PS High School.

To go to RR Sabha, Krishnan had to walk about half a kilometre to take a bus to Mylapore Tank, and an equal distance from the tank to the sabha. Alwarpet where his family lived was a quiet enclave then, and at Mylapore, livelier thanks to the Kapali temple and the worshippers that thronged it, there was nothing frenetic about the traffic, no chaos on the Mada streets. It was perfectly safe for a ten-year-old to stay till the end of the concert, catch a bus and go home well past nine pm.

At the sabha, Krishnan also had his first taste of Tamil theatre--a mixture of comedies, serious drama and crime thrillers. If I Get It, Aaravamudan Asada, Kalyaniyin Kanavan, Avvaiyar, Gomathiyin  Kaathalan, Mr Vedantam, Tuppariyum Sambu and a Tamil adaptation of Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde were some of the plays he watched there. Unfortunately, he did not get to witness any of the famous musicals of the time. The iconic MK Tyagaraja Bhagavatar had retired from the scene, and the spectacular productions of RS Manohar did not come to RR Sabha during the time Krishnan was a regular there.

He heard some great musicians during that phase of about two years, when his father, stuck at work in the Mylapore office of an insurance company, gave him his season ticket which his membership of the sabha granted him. Though he was barely ten, Krishnan could recognise the subtle changes taking place in the voice of MS Subbulakshmi, gaining in strength and depth. He found the breezy glides of ML Vasanthakumari exhilarating, her guru GN Balasubramaniam's baritone very attractive, the veterans of the day--Ariyakudi, Maharajapuram and Semmangudi--going over his head somewhat, but it was Madurai Mani Iyer that captured his imagination most, with his cascading music of perfect sruti, and immaculate if idiosyncratic precision in the rendering of swaras.

It was much later that he learnt to pay attention to the accompanists to differentiate between the varied techniques and skills of Lalgudi Jayaraman, TN Krishnan and MS Gopalakrishnan or Palghat Mani Iyer, Palani Subramaniam and the up-and-coming Umayalpuram Sivaraman. He watched entranced as Vilvadri Iyer threw up his ghatam in mid-concert, and he tried hard to enjoy the customary tani-avartanam,  but found it hard going. Strangely, he liked listening to raga alapana more than the manodharma within kritis, which he found often overdone, at least to his young, untrained ears. Though he generally enjoyed most of the music on offer, he tended to cross his threshold of boredom some 90 minutes into the concert, but did not know that he could get up and leave midway through a cutcheri. So it was that he actually managed time after time to sit through concerts longer than three hours.

Krishnan went to a school in Mylapore, the redoubtable PS High School, which had produced some top class leaders of a whole variety of fields of activity, from lawyers and businessmen, doctors and engineers, sportsmen and artists, to bureaucrats and politicians, even ministers. During his tenure there however, the school was in decline, and its standards had fallen. Some of the students there were fast earning notoriety as ill-behaved louts. Happily, Krishnan's class was an exceptionally nice and well-behaved lot, fortunately taught by some brilliant and caring teachers. Outside the classroom, the school's vast playground afforded plenty of scope to enjoy competitive games of football and cricket. Krishnan got into the school's junior cricket team, which was so strong that some of his seniors went on to play for the state, one of them even for the country. Krishnan did not fare too badly either.

School also provided Krishnan the opportunity to broaden the horizon of his music appreciation. One of his classmates was the son of Mr Sudarsanam, a fine music director in films, and through him Krishnan had access to some excellent songs based on classical music. He learnt to appreciate the songs composed by such talented music directors as G Ramanathan, and KV Mahadevan, before Tamil film music witnessed the phenomenon of Viswanathan-Ramamurthi, the duo who dominated the scene for many years. He was intrigued by the strange fact that the brilliant raga-based music of a Hindi film called Swarna Sundari was produced by a music director of the unlikely name of Adinarayana Rao. The mystery was solved when he learnt that the songs in the film were originally scored for a Telugu film. The same tunes were retained when the film was dubbed in Hindi, with the voices of Mohammad Rafi and Lata Mangeshkar replacing those of Ghanatasala Venkateswara Rao and Jikki, as G Krishnaveni was popularly known.  A song that started with the words Kuhoo kuhoo bole koyaliya in a ragamala that included the ragas Sohni, Darbari Kanada and Bahar, was a runaway hit of the day, and is still popular among followers of film music of yore.

Thanks to the influence of one of his relatives, and led by his own natural inclination, Krishnan began to enjoy Hindi film music much more than he did what Tamil cinema had to offer. Introduced by cousin Venkat to the more jazzy numbers prominent in the hugely popular weekly Binaca Geetmala Hit Parade, broadcast by Radio Ceylon in the magnetic voice of Amin Sayani, Krishnan was completely hooked by the drama of the programme and the wonderful voices of Rafi, Kishore Kumar, Mukesh, Hemant Kumar and Manna Dey, not to mention Lata Mangeshkar, Asha Bhosle and Geeta Dutt.  In time, he graduated to some of the more nuanced music offered by Akashvani's Vividh Bharati, many gems based on ragas composed by some of the best music directors Indian cinema has seen. Naushad, SD Burman, Shankar-Jaikishan, C Ramchandra, Madan Mohan, Roshan, Khayyam, OP Nayyar, Chitragupt...the list was long and distinguished.

In the 1960s, Vividh Bharati produced some superb film music programmes including Jai Mala on Sunday afternoons, and a lovely little miniature called Sangit Sarita, which lasted all of 15 minutes everyday, but played raga-based songs followed by some basic explanation of the ragas.  It was a delightful way of learning to identify ragas. Akashvani also broadcast an Urdu programme, which was a veritable feast of ghazals, qawwalis and other songs from films. Lazy weekends were never better for a young (or old) music lover. 

Travelling light: a journey in music

By V Ramnarayan

Chapter 1
(Revised and expanded)

Beginnings

The first time Krishnan heard Carnatic music, he was barely five. He did not know it was Carnatic music, but it was clear to him that his mother Radha's singing was special. She had a sweet, ringing voice, perfectly aligned to sruti, and she loved the kritis she sang, sitting before the little puja alcove in the kitchen-cum-dining space in their first floor apartment. Her favourite composer was Tyagaraja (1767-1847), the saint-poet the rasikas of the present day classical music of south India worshipped as an avatara purusha. Largely influenced by her eldest brother Ramu, a successful  executive of Burmah Shell, but a firm believer in tradition and culture, she learnt music from a teacher who came home three times a week, and strenuously practised what she learnt from him. She was as eager to please him as she did her parents, and she became a regular devotee of Tyagaraja, because her brother was one.

Radha was also a devout young girl, though not an ostentatious practitioner of rituals.  She spent a quiet half hour every morning in puja, praying to her ishta devata Rama, whose Ravi Varma portrait in full regal splendour accompanied by his consort Sita, brother Lakshmana and lieutenant Hanuman, filled one wall of the puja space. A brilliant student, strong in English and mathematics, Radha was the joy of her family, with her perfect behaviour and unfailing courtesy to everyone, trusting ways and love of her siblings and parents. 87 years today, she still gets all misty-eyed when she recalls the care and concern eldest brother Ramu had for her. By the time she entered her teens, Ramu recognised her unusual musical ability and located good teachers for her at every stage. Two of her mentors were the veena vidwan Kalyanakrishna Bhagavatar and Professor Srinivasaraghavan.

Marriage when she was 18 to insurance company officer Ramanan put an end to her college education and her music classes. She married into a large middle class joint family, whose head was Srinivasan, a brilliant but unworldy-wise scholar in his mid-fifties. A widower, he lived in Mylapore, Madras, at a somewhat decrepit old two-storeyed bungalow, Sarada, named after the wife of Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, whom Srinivasan, a devotee of the saintly couple, had once met.

His three sons Raja (and wife Kamala), Ramanan (and Radha) and Raju and three sisters Lakshmi, Kalyani and Lalita lived together under one roof at Sarada, when Radha came into the family.

Srinivasan was a believer in women's empowerment and encouraged his daughters and daughters-in-law to develop an interest in literature, art and music. He had a good ear for music, and enjoyed listening to Radha's singing on the rare occasions she could take a break from housework. Srinivasan died two years after Radha came into the family. Soon after that, Ramanan and Radha left for Trivandrum, Kerala, where the insurance company transferred Ramanan.

Five years later, when Ramanan, Radha and their three children returned to Madras, the head of the family was Ramanan's grandmother, Paatti, a wise old widow. With both her daughter and son-in-law long dead, and only two grandsons earning any income, she had to run a tight ship. She told Radha she must give up her aspirations and merge into the family as a typical woman member bound to the kitchen and household duties, as grandma could not be seen to favour one daughter, granddaughter or daughter-in-law over another. The extended family under one roof then included Ramanan's two brothers and two yet-to-be-married sisters Happily, Kamala, the other daughter-in-law of the family, and Radha got on well. Kamala, the older of the two, was easy-going, and not afraid of hard work, so the workload of cooking and cleaning for an army of hungry adults and children, was shared equally by the two women in a true spirit of give and take. When the two had a few quiet moments to share, in the afternoons when the menfolk and schoolgoing children were away, the pair grabbed a shut-eye in a corner of the cool dark of the vast puja room, before the next round of housework caught up with them. Frequently, Kamala (whom Radha called Manni) asked Radha to sing for her a song or two out of her considerable repertoire. One of Manni's favourites was Syama Sastri's (1762-1827) Brovavamma in the raga Manji, which Radha sang in a deeply moving voice that captured the delicate nuances of the kriti with its pleading, plaintive verses before the goddess Kamakshi.

It was only when Ramanan's sisters had married and left Sarada, and  Krishnan and his sisters were old enough to go to school unescorted that Radha was able to find time to sing in the puja room of an evening. She was also able to persuade Ramanan to hire a music teacher for her daughter Vijaya and niece Gita. Ramanan's family then occupied the first floor of Sarada while his elder brother Raja, his wife Kamala and their four children lived downstairs. After his parents passed away, Ramanan never took a step without Raja's permission, and he duly approached Raja with Radha's proposal. Raja was a strict, orthodox traditionalist, but not an unreasonable man. With some music training because of his proximity to Balakrishna Sastrigal, an iconic harikatha exponent, he agreed, but not before teaching the girls to sing a couple of slokas, and satisfying himself that they had it in them to learn the rudiments of a complex art.

The paattu vadyar who came home twice or thrice a week to teach the girls the basic lessons of Carnatic music was a disciple of well known vocalist Ariyakudi Ramanuja Iyengar. He saw some talent in the girls, and taught them conscientiously, with patience and skill.

Listening to these music classes and Amma's tentative attempts to start singing the songs she had learnt in her own teenage years, Krishnan discovered a latent love of music in himself. As he managed to do a fair imitation of Amma's Kamalambambhajare in the raga Kalyani, and her rendition of Munnu Ravana in Todi, both Appa and Amma decided to enrol him in the paattu class, along with Vijaya and Gita. That year, he was also a member of a group of siblings and cousins that Raja Periappa gathered together to teach them Tiruppavai verses in preparation for a competition at nearby Subramaniaswami temple. With inputs from both Periappa and Amma, Krishnan did manage to learn a few verses in a ragamalika, which he sang with great gusto during practice, raising hopes that he might win at least a consolation prize. But, come the day of the competition, and he was a bundle of nerves, and made an ignominious exit without completing even the opening verse.

Krishnan had been born in Trivandrum, a ''midnight's child'', whose arrival into the world had been welcomed by much noise and celebration, as only hours earlier had the new Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru announced the fulfilment of India's tryst with destiny from the ramparts of the Red Fort. The Ramanans were at the time close neighbours of Radha's parents. A retired schoolmaster, Radha's father Swaminathan was a great music lover, and his offspring including his eldest son Ramu arrived every year to spend the summer vacation with their parents.

While Krishnan had been too young during the Ramanan family's Trivandrum tenure to remember much about these huge family gatherings, he now began to look forward to the annual summer trips from Madras to Trivandrum, where he would be joined by cousins and uncles and aunts. Grandfather Swaminathan's house was stacked with books, which had begun to attract Krishnan. Indoor games galore from Pallankuzhi to Scrabble were delightful escapes from the heat outside, while the late evening was reserved for singing by the adults of the family, Ramu Uncle leading the way. Though not the most talented of the many amateur singers in the extended family, Ramu was the most devoted, most prolific and most disciplined of them. If Tyagaraja was God incarnate to him, Ariyakudi Ramanuja Iyengar was his hero. One of his younger brothers, Mani, had a strong, sonorous and malleable voice with excellent reach. He loved to sing slokas in elaborate ragamalikas, and did so movingly, keeping his audience spell bound, even though he perhaps did not know a single kriti in its entirety. Radha was the most gifted of the women of the family, most of whom had learnt music from private tutors.

The high point of the week during these vacations was the Friday evening soiree in which everyone with a semblance of musical ability sang by turns, with Ramu Uncle guiding and controlling them. Though Tyagaraja was the favourite composer, the climax of  the evening was invariably provided by the grand coronation song Mamava Pattabhi Rama by Muttuswami Dikshitar (1775-1835) in the raga Manirangu, which almost everyone present joined to render together. Magically, the family sang in one voice, the grandeur of the chorus somehow managing to hide any false notes by individual singers.

Tyagaraja (1767-1847)

A link from Chapter 1

By V Ramnarayan

Tyagaraja was one of the greatest composers in Carnatic music. Known as the ‘pitamaha’ of the realm, he became part of a miraculous trinity of the greatest composers in the tradition-the other two were Muthuswami Dikshitar (1775-1835) and Syama Sastry (1762-1827)-born in the same little town of Tiruvarur, within a few years of one another.

Tyagaraja was born to Kakarla Ramabrahmam and Sitamma, a Telugu brahmin couple, at the home of his maternal grandfather Giriraja Kavi, a poet-composer in the court of the king of Tanjavur. He was named after the presiding deity of the temple at Tiruvarur.

Tyagaraja began his musical training under Sonti Venkataramanayya, a noted music scholar and court musician, at an early age. Music was a spiritual pursuit for him, his expression of his devotion to his favourite god, Rama. From a talented and devout singer, he eventually became a composer. Singing the praises of Rama was reward in itself for him, so much so that he refused lucrative offers to become a court musician. His rejection of worldly success and wealth in favour of the service of Rama is beautifully encapsulated in the famous song Nidhi chala sukhama in the raga Kalyani. “His lyrics reveal great depth of knowledge of the sciptures, epics, legends, purana, musical expertise, his humility as well as self-respect, introspection, and sense of humour,” says The Illustrated Companion to South Indian Classical Music (by Ludwig Pesch, Oxford University Press, 1999).

Tyagaraja was a prolific composer who had a major impact on the development of the south Indian classical music tradition, the structure of the typical Carnatic music composition, in particular. He developed the kriti as we know it today from the kirtanas belonging to the utsava sampradaya or tradition of festivals celebrating gods.

To Tyagaraja is attributed the origin of the present pattern of the kriti consisting of the pallavi, anupallavi and charanam, the song developing upwards from the opening or pallavi towards the middle part or anupallavi and concluding in the charanam. All three portions of the song, which occur in seamless progression, are marked by sangatis or melodic and rhythmic variations on the lines of verse that make up the song. The sangati is regarded as Tyagaraja’s major contribution to Carnatic music.

While Tyagaraja composed kirtanas in the bhajana tradition as well, but predominantly kritis in over 200 ragas-including several he created-he was also responsible for Prahlada bhakti vijayam and Nauka charitam, musical narratives of myths in the operatic style. Most of his compositions were in Telugu, a language brought to Tanjavur from migrants from Vijayanagar in present-day Andhra Pradesh.

His pancharatna kritis are five compositions in the ghana ragas Nattai, Gowlai, Arabhi, Sriragam and Varali, which crown the annual Tyagaraja Aradhana at Tiruvaiyaru where his samadhi or final resting place is situated.

Tyagaraja sang his compositions facing Rama’s idol while his disciples wrote the lyrics down on palm leaves, which were handed down to future generations of disciples in an unbroken thread. Though he is said to have composed thousands of songs, only some 800 or so have survived.

SOME TRIBUTES TO TYAGARAJA

Dr S Radhakrishnan says in his preface to The Spiritual Heritage of Tyagaraja by Sri C Ramanujachari:

“The name Tyagaraja means the prince of renouncers, of those who give up worldly desires. Tyaga or renunciation is the way to mental peace and freedom. In one of his songs Tera tiyagarada? Tyagaraja says, “O Supreme Being, Tirupati Venkataramana, could you not remove the screen of pride and envy, which is taking a firm stand within me, keeping me out of the reach of dharma and the like.”

“Tyagaraja was a person of great humility. He expresses the truths of the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita in simple and appealing language. He addresses the Supreme as Rama. The kingdom of God acquired through devotion is the greatest of all treasures: Rama bhakti samrajyamu.

 “If we have faith in the Divine, there is no need to worry: ma kelara vicharamu.

“The secular must be invaded by the spiritual; only then is life dignified. Self-realisation is through self-giving.”

In the Introductory Thesis of the same book, Dr V Raghavan says Tyagaraja is probably the greatest of the great music-makers of south India.

He attributes his success to his powerful genius that comprehended the varied excellences of the early masters as well as his own brilliant contemporaries. 

He compares Tyagaraja with Purandaradasa and Kshetrayya for sheer volume of output; he calls him a second Bhadrachala Ramadasa in his anguished appeals to Rama; he finds him as lyrical as Kshetrayya; in devotion, religious fervour and reformatory zeal, he considers him an equal of Purandaradasa again, and so on and so forth.

“From plain Divyanama sankirtana, full of words, epithets and long and difficult compounds, he soars to artistic creations in which, into a few words, an eddying flood of music is thrown.”

Dr Raghavan speaks of the poetic excellence and spiritual value of Tyagaraja’s compositions. He describes his creativity as the consummation of fragrant gold as in the works of Jayadeva, Purandaradasa and Kshetrayya. However, while praising his sangita, he also speaks of his sahitya as “a treasure of thought the contemplation of which would make one forget everything about his music.”

An article in Issue 41 of Sruti by N.S. Srinivasan, a producer at AIR-Hyderabad and a flautist trained by Mali, titled Tyagaraja As Composer: More Human Than Divine argues that Tyagaraja’s music is a product of great musical intelligence and acumen, not the handiwork of Providence alone.

Srinivasan asks if the bhava which is said to be the lifeblood of Tyagaraja’s kritis is sahitya bhava or sangita bhava.

He maintains that the musical mood conveys the meaning of a song even when the singer mutilates the lyrics, as in the case of classical musicians who do not know Telugu.

They may mispronounce words or split them ridiculously when they sing Tyagaraja’s songs, sometimes unwittingly conveying inappropriate meaning in the process, but the emotional appeal of the music is still intact.

He stresses that not sahitya alone but music also contributes to the bhava of a composition. “It has been rightly said that a song is a fusion (samyuktam) of notes (datu) and words (matu). This fusion is indeed one of the secrets of Tyagaraja’s success.”

Tyagaraja was a Rama bhakta but also a composer par excellence. To call his compositions the products of divine ecstasy is to ascribe his genius to his heart and take away credit from his brilliant mind.

Tyagaraja expressed sorrow and turmoil with great musical beauty. He handled ragas rare and common, even vakra ragas, with ease, intimating the raga in a flash and painting its whole picture in the very first line. His kritis show perfect balance between form and structure. To place too much emphasis on his bhakti alone is an injustice to his musical genius.

According to his biographer William Jackson, Tyagaraja represents an archetype, a symbol in which opposites unite dynamically. 

He may be accessible, even popular in his musical outpourings, but he is inwardly a mystic with the power that emanates from self-realisation. 

His songs, steeped in the essence of over 200 ragas, including some he created, draw from a reservoir of collective memory and wisdom. In turn, he made a lasting impression on the collective memory of south India.

Sangita Kalanidhi TV Subba Rao as quoted by Jackson, said, “Tyagaraja united the apparently opposite qualities of conservatism and progress, of reverence for antiquity and impatience of restraint, of the prejudices of the heart and the revolt of intellect. He is a classic romanticist and a conservative radical. His life in ethics and aesthetics is the evolution of perfect harmony and attunement from the discordant principles of thought and action. Nothing short of the absolute universality of his mind could have succeeded in saturating his songs with that spirit of sweetness, peace and bliss which lingers in our soul long after the sounds have faded away.”

No wonder Tyagaraja’s anniversary has been commemorated for over 160 years—now in several parts of the world. For this we must thank the thousands of humble devotees who have selflessly contributed time and effort, as well as money, to show their reverence to the saint composer through music.

Ragas and Me

 V Ramnarayan

The first song I learnt in Todi was the varnam Eranapai, which my sister and cousin had to sing over and over again until their teacher, the pattu vadyar who came home, nodded his approval. Kalyani was of course Kamalambam bhajare in my mother's lovely voice, as she sat before the family deities on Friday evenings.

Soon I learnt to recognize Hindolam through Bhajare Gopalam and its Hindustani equivalent Malkauns through Man tarpat, the Mohammad Rafi song from Baiju Bawra. Chalamelara in Margahindolam was a favourite as Amma sang it regularly, but I did not know the name of the raga then, nor did I know that Vijayambike was in Vijayanagari, though I knew both songs backwards. I was all of nine or ten.

I knew of Tyagaraja and Dikshitar, because Tyagaraja signed his songs with his name and Dikshitar gave away the name of the raga within the song (Guruguha did not enter my consciousness yet), but Syama Sastri and other composers were strangers to me still, even though Brovavamma in Manji and Amma's voice cast a spell on all of us.

I knew Mohanam and Bhairavi through varnams in the ragas, and Hamsadhwani by Vatapi Ganapatim bhaje, but also a strange assortment of compositions in Ramanannu brovara (but had no idea it was in Harikambhoji), Munnu Ravana (I knew it was Todi, because I already knew the varnam in that raga), Saranam, saranam (I knew it was Asaveri, and could vaguely identify songs in that raga on the rare occasions I heard them in concert or on the radio), Sangita gnanamu in Dhanyasi and Sarasijanabha sodari (I could recognize both ragas thanks to these two songs; they made such a strong aural impression that a couple of years ago I was able to correct a senior vidwan who mistook a Nagagandhari alapana for an exploration of Jaunpuri during a concert, purely on the basis of my memory).

I knew some other ragas, too, but on the basis of film songs, not necessarily of the uplifting kind. For instatnce, ! recognized Arabhi from Erikkarai mele poravale pennmayile, Suddhadhanyasi from Brindavanamum Nandakumaranum and Shanmukhapriya from Kurangilirindu pirandavan manidan.

I also managed to learn ragas like Surati and Chenchurutti through some Tiruppavai songs my periappa Sundaresan tuned, for us youngsters, to learn for a competition at the Balasubramania Swami temple at Teynampet. Even though the field was not very competitive, I managed to do badly, thanks to a violent attack of nerves.

The famous ragamalika Bhavayami Raghuramam was doing the concert rounds in the 1960s when I was entering college. I was always drawn to the Nattaikurinji segment of the song, but for years did not even know the name of the raga, and even after learning it, tended to forget it all the time -somewhat like a besotted young man unable to recall the face of the object of his affections. Whenever I heard the raga again, I was always reminded of the words Dinakaranvaya tilakam while struggling to recall the raga's name.

Surprisingly I could tell Anandabhairavi and Reetigaula apart without much effort unlike some of my more knowledgeable friends, but Purvikalyani and Pantuvarali always posed a few problems, as did a whole host of Shanmukhapriya-like ragas. Latangi and Kiravani, I was glad to learn, can stump at least one famous musician - by his own admission.

Just in case I have impressed the reader by the use of the past tense in the foregoing paragraphs, let me confess: I still practice good old hit and miss when it comes to raga identification, but happily, I can enjoy any raga, lose myself in any raga, even if I can't put a name to it. There are few that I dislike, in fact none, thanks to the sheer beauty of raga music and the marvelous way good musicians treat ragas. Listening to lec-dems on ragas, ragalakshana and ragabhava by the likes of R Vedavaili, R K Shriramkumar and Sriram Parasuram has enhanced the raganubhava several fold for me.

To make another confession, Hindi film music, especially songs during the decades from the 1950s to the 1980s made a much deeper impression on me than Tamil film songs, and may I be forgiven for this act of blasphemy. Naushad, Chitragupt, Shanker-Jaikishen, Khayyam, Roshan, C Ramachandra, Salil Chaudhuri, Hemant Kumar, S D Burman and Sardar Malik provided hours and hours of delight, especially through their more melodious numbers based on ragas. Listening to Vividh Bharati during the lazy afternoons of summer vacations was sheer heaven, as was the delightful introduction to ragas that the station provided through its iconic programme Sangeet Sarita. It was through Vividh Bharati that I came to know that sitar maestro Ravi Shankar was a first rate music director in films, starting from Satyajit Ray's Apu trilogy, and peaking with the Hrishikesh Mukherjee classic Anuradha. Hayere voh din kyun na aaye in the raga Janasammohini (a Valaji clone), by Lata Mangeshkar was one of the many film songs of the era that rose to the highest levels of aesthetic excellence.

So, here I am, the editor of a premier magazine on the performing arts, but with a strong grounding in film music. If I stand before you, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, charged with treason to the cause of classical music, so be it. I plead guilty.

(The author is Editor-in-Chief of Sruti magazine)

Of crows... and cartoons

FROM THE ARCHIVES OF FRONTLINE

Interview with R.K. Laxman. 

by gowri ramnarayan

JANUARY 31, 1992

"LOOK, I am tired of interviews. I don't want to explain yet again that I still don't know where I get ideas for my cartoons." That is Rasipuram Krishnaswamy Laxman, who has been tirelessly reflecting the bewil­derment of the mute millions of this country through his check-coated common man, a daily witness to the Indian political panorama. Over the past four decades the cartoonist's animadversions have continued to be witty, satirical and wholly funny.

Laxman's talent for drawing and painting surfaced in childhood and enabled him to illustrate elder broth­er R.K. Narayan's articles and stories (in The Hindu) while still at the Maharaja's College, Mysore, study­ing politics, economics and philoso­phy. He drew political cartoons for Swatantra, edited by Khasa Subba Rao. For six months, he was part of an animated film unit at Gemini Stu­dios in Madras before shifting to Bombay. After brief stints with Blitz and The Free Press Journal, Laxman ensconced himself as the editorial cartoonist in The Times of India.

After the explanation, "I want to talk about your crows, not cartoons," the eyes gleam, the smile appears and Laxman's irritation is replaced by interest. What follows is an up­roarious session. "You said it, Mr Laxman," even more zany, irrepress­ible and wide-ranging than could have been planned. These excerpts from that rambling talk the artist had with this writer focus on the car­toonist's passion for the common crow, a repeated subject of his pop­ular paintings.

Since when did you become interested in crows as a subject for your paintings?

As far back as I can remember from childhood, the crow attracted me more than any other bird because it was so alive on the landscape. In our garden it stood out against the green of the trees or the blue of the sky, against the red earth or the cream compound wall. Other birds are afraid and get camouflaged.

But this canny scavenger could look after itself very well indeed. As a three-year-old I observed it carefully, my hands always itching to sketch its antics. My mother noticed that I was becoming rather good at drawing crows and encouraged me because the crow is the avian mode of transport for Saturn, Saniswara of the Hindu pantheon. By drawing his mount was I averting his evil eye? Of course, I ignored this religious in­terpretation. For me looking at the crow affords pure aesthetic pleasure.

Granted, the crow is a perky thing to watch, but how does it generate aesthetic pleasure? It h

as no colour scheme or dainty shape, no beauty or grace to speak of.

It is beautiful for an artist. To me the peacock seems a very ugly crea­ture. I cannot bear its overdeveloped harsh shades. Its colour separation is an inexpert job. Perhaps the great Creator, after shaping all the beings of the world, used the leftovers to make this hideous thing as a joke. Otherwise, is it at all reasonable to find a front blue, a rear you cannot make out, and that great sweep, the train, an imitation broomstick? It can't fly much with that trailing tail, nor walk properly. This tail must have been an afterthought to feed vanity. And when it begins to dance, to me it appears most uncouth.

How much of your knowledge is backed by any ornithological study?

I know the birds, one picks up information as one reads and observ­es. But my main preoccupation is not scientific. I know that crows differ in colour and size in different regions, even within India. In Kashmir, the smaller, rather brownish crow has a call totally distinctive. Why, even in places near Bombay, crows have beaks bent at the tip like eagles. Some crow-fanciers swear that each locality in a city has its own brand—the Dadar crow is distin­guishable from the Warden Road crow. As I see it, the crow is the only bird with a gregarious, vivacious na­ture. It is the only bird which gathers before sunset on rooftops in rows for friendly chitchat.

Do you think crows have a sense of humour?

I think they are nearer human beings than other birds. And they are terribly intelligent. They keep an eye on arrivals and departures. That is why perhaps we believe a single crow caws to announce visitors. And do you know, a crow will come very close to an infant to steal its food. But it knows that after the age of four, a man-child spells danger.

Have you made friends and established wider contacts through a shared love of crows?

People keep sending me articles and clippings on the subject from many sources, from many places. Like the Station Director of AIR, Bangalore, after my radio talk on crows. Many others seemed im­pressed enough by my comments and observations to write to me. For instance, crows are adept at stealing the soft lengths of wire used to tie high-tension wires above electric trains. They are nesting material for the thieves who take them away as many times as they are replaced. An official told me that this causes a loss of six to seven lakhs of rupees each year to the railways.

Aha! I can see you falling a prey to crow lore! That is why I said let me talk about something more interest­ing than my cartoons!

Just how many crow paintings have you done over the years? Have you

drawn other birds besides crows?

I can draw any bird, of course. But I can't work them up into a se­ries. Owls, eagles, storks and hens are just birds—they have no character, no stories, no drama. I have painted hundreds of crows—singletons, pairs, threesomes, whole murders of crows (Don't look so horrified! That is the collective noun, not a bloody scene!). I have sketched crows from different perspectives, from near and far. In many moods, too. The crow has great pliability and flexibility for varied treatment.

An artist makes viewers aware of the common things around us which go unobserved, in the human face, in light and shade, in a tree, in a land­scape, mountainscape.... I want to bring those unnoticed aspects of the crow to viewer attention. And I think I have succeeded in making people see the crow as an essential part of our lives in this country. Visitors to India—diplomats and representa­tives of multinational corporations— often approach me for a crow or two because that bird is their most vivid memory of the country. One of my crows hangs in Iceland now.

Is your fascination for crows in any way related to your instinct for drama, for liveliness, for vivid humour as a cartoonist?

Well... I haven't thought about it that way. True, cartooning is not a dead art, it hits the eye as does the crow. If you can stretch your imag­ination and bend your logic, you may say there is a connection between my crows and my cartoons!

Do you enjoy modern art?

I am a great admirer of the Im­pressionists. I used to like contempo­rary art, but they all look the same to me now. The eye is gouged out of a child or woman, the figures are dis­torted into impossible postures. I humbly admit that I don't under­stand them and I don't know how anyone can derive pleasure out of such compositions, colours, arrange­ments, themes. As for more abstract work, that is totally confusing. Be­cause printing technology has im­proved so much, you find that such abstractions have crept into maga­zines and newspapers—to illustrate articles about water scarcity, floods or communal rioting! Somehow the editors have felt that symbolic repre­sentations would be far better than straightforward illustrations. This has led to irresponsibility among art­ists. They toss off anything—a stroke here, a smear there, and declare, "This is my vision of the Mandal Commission report."

Is it that you dislike abstraction and distortion? Do you prefer realism?

It is a question of suitability and beauty, of how you do it. Our gods, our heroes, our demons, our mythic forms, have all been conceived in ab­straction. Whether you go to Dwara-ka or Udupi, you find the temple idol has a dynamic and powerful stance. The temple sculptors took liberties with reality, but retained the quality of Indianness and infused beauty in­to their forms. I have studied their deeply ingrained sense of proportion and originality at Hampi, Konark, Khajuraho, Belur, Badami....

I find their work radiant! What a splendid figure of action the Natara-ja makes with hair flying, leg up­raised! Or take Ganesha. Where can you find such an exciting and unique design? It has humour and a sense of pure mischief too. And what a con­trast they offer! You strike a silence before Nataraja but chuckle when you see the elephant-headed god.

(Breaks off to look at a sari-clad Westerner passing by.) Just look at that. That sari is beautiful. But it is out of place on that large occidental frame, just as that brown and green clash with white skin and blonde hair. So, there is satire everywhere. You have to note it and shape it when you want it!

With your varied interests and zest for life do you sometimes feel oppressed by the fact of having to turn out a new cartoon each day as you have been doing for the last 42 years?

Not sometimes. Always. Every day I grumble, I plan to resign as I drag myself to the office. By the time I come home I like my work.

A multifaceted genius

or.

It wouldn't be an exaggeration to call the late Sundaram Rajam a multifaceted genius, said V Ramnarayan, for­mer cricketer and editor-in-chief of Sruti Magazine, speaking at the Narada Gana Sabha Mini Hall recently. Titled 'Remembering Sangita Kala Acharya S Rajam', the event recalled Rajam's avatars including that of a musician, painter, photographer, music teacher and an actRajam, who is the elder brother of renowned veena player S Balachander, has the credit of popularising kritis of Ko-teeswara Iyer, besides promoting kshetra keerthanas and vivadhi ragas."He was never an Agmark Mylapore maama. He enjoyed smoking cigarettes and eating non-vegetarian food. When he talked toyou, he made you feel like you knew as much as he did. He lived an extraordinary life," said Ramnarayan. "He guided the carnatic community with his rational and logical way of explaining his approach to music," he added.

On the other hand, Lalithaa Ram, biographer, focused on the artistic side of the legend. "He has done many series of water colours and illustrations, which had been published in magazines and books. In fact, the portrait of Sangeetha Mumoorthigal (Dikshitar, Thyagaraja and Syama Sastrigal) was originally created by him, but he never felt the need to patent his work," said Lalithaa Ram. He ran through a few PowerPoint slides, which showed Rajam's phenomenal con­tribution in the field of both music and painting. He was one of the rare gems who never indulged in self promotion. It's hard to see a wonderful human being like him," said Lalithaa Ram.

Vocalist Dr Vijayalakshmi Subramaniam, who has learnt music from Rajam, reminisced his penchant for effortless singing, "It has been five years since he passed away but I still hold a few memories of him close to my heart. He was always interested in exploring the lesser-known aspects of music. His paintings, which were deeply rooted in culture and philosophy, showed that he was a true performing ar­tiste," she said. S Rajam's son Ramamoorthy felicitated Ramnarayan and Lalithaa Ram towards the end of the event. The evening also saw a music concert by Dr Prema Rangarajan on vocal, Usha Rajagopalan on violin and Kallidaikurichi Sivakumar on mridangam.

— Express Features

Rashid Khan at the Music Academy

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