I remember my uncertainties in the darkness after many cramped hours in flight on the plane to Madras in September 1980. I had been to India for several months in 1970. and again briefly in 1977, but this time I had a specific academic task and a long-range goal – to conduct research for my Harvard University Ph.D. thesis. The topic was to be the life and works of Tyagaraja, the great singer-saint who composed hundreds of memorable songs, raising Carnatic music to new heights of artistic achievement and devotional power.

Would I meet the right guides? Would they look kindly upon me and agree to give me the help I would require to enter the culture? Did I have enough language training to be accepted and get started in this very traditional-conscious region of the earth? I felt at the mercy of a different social world and had no idea how my first large-scale research project would turn out to be. So far from home with only new acquaintances to call on, I tried to stop worrying and to hope for the best.

I need not have worried that night. The new names and addresses I had received from knowledgeable Madrasis I had met in America would start and propel my 18-month-long research project. One of those names was T. Sankaran, given to me by Jon Higgins when I visited Wesleyan University. “Your view of Tyagaraja will be very different from mine,” Jon Higgins had said. “Because you study religion and I am a musicologist. But Sankaran will help you. Higgins, who was already well known in Madras, where he was sometimes called Higgins Bhagavatar for being able to sing Tyagaraja songs in the traditional manner, took me to Prof. T. Viswanathan, also at Wesleyan, and he gave me helpful information about Tyagaraja, and told me to contact his cousin, T. Sankaran, in Madras.

In Madras, after finding a place to stay, my wife Marcia and I went to look up for Sankaran. We went into an impressive antique building into an office with high ceilings and lazily turning ceiling fans, and found the office of T. Sankaran, who was the director of the Tamil Isai Sangam.

He was a small man, less than five feet tall, and he had grey hair, but he was very friendly, with a large heart and a youthful spirit. He was dressed in crisp white clothes with a scarf flung over his shoulder, which gave him an artistic flair. Sankaran was the grandson of Veena Dhanammal.

He took me directly to T.S. Parthasarathy when I told him I wanted to work on translating Tyagaraja’s lyrics. That was the beginning of a series of introductions he gave me which were very helpful in learning about South Indian culture. He opened doors to the worlds of Carnatic music giving me the ideas and providing personal guidance without ever asking for anything in return.

After a concert Sankaran showed me a book which was the text of Oriental Music in Staff Notation, by Chinnaswami Mudaliar. He told me: “Jon Higgins was going to try to take the great book published so long ago, with all the music to many of Tyagaraja’s songs, back to America to have them copied, but in the end they were a massive pile and were disintergrating too much and he had to abandon the idea. At least you can take a copy of the introduction.” I thanked him and later found that Harvard had a copy of the rare book.

Sankaran told us he was going to be travelling to Chidambaram for a conference, and invited us to travel with him, and then visit Tyagaraja’s home village, Tiruvaiyaru.

We got down at Chidambaram and had breakfast, and Sankaran took us for darshan at the great Siva temple of Tillai Nataraja to see the lingam of ether. We were two skinny men, one short and one tall, humbly worshipping in the ancient temple where the invisible form of Siva is revealed.

After the conference, Sankaran took us by bus to Tiruvaiyaru, where we went right through the village to the Tyagaraja Samadhi, a white marble building in a pleasant clearing. Sankaran spoke with the priest, a Smartha Brahmin who lived in a hut on the site there with his family. The priest unlocked the samadhi and Sankaran joyfully sang Tyagaraja songs, including Paramatmudu. “This was Tyagaraja’s swansong,” he explained afterwards. The priest offered Tyagaraja Sanskrit prayers and flowers and other offerings in the samadhi, while Sankaran’s Tyagaraja songs in Telugu echoed in the cool marble hall.

When we left, Sankaran said: “It is my opinion that if you heard Tyagaraja sing it would surprise you, the kind of voice he had was probably not like the voices of the most popular singers today.” He also said that according to an oral tradition he had heard, just before dying, Tyagaraja requested a large amount of salt be put in the grave in which his body was to be buried. In the morning, Sankaran took me to the Kaveri river, and we walked down stone stairs to bathe, with little fish tickling our ankles and calves as they nibbled at out skin. There in the dusk with spindly, cheerful Sankaran, it is easy to imagine Tyagaraja wading into the river at dawn and dusk, repeating the Gayatri mantra. We visited the old temple in the village, dedicated to Panchanadeeswara. It is said that in one hall of the temple Tyagaraja used to spend afternoons reciting his Rama mantra.

We visited the house where Tyagaraja lived, kept as a memorial to him. I was struck by its narrowness – shaped like some linked boxcars. “See, the division of the household really happened – Tyagaraja’s brother got the other half!” At the back of the house was a typical courtyard with a well and a grinding stone. I made a sketch and pictured Thyagaraja and his disciples playing their music there.

As I took in the mood of the rooms I had the idea that someday I would like to write a historical novel based loosely on the life of Tyagaraja and his contemporaries in the region later known as Thanjavur District. Later, on return trips when I attended the annual Tyagaraja festival, the place would be familiar to me; at those times, parts of it would be decked out for festivities and crowds of people would throng the narrow streets and lanes, of course.

While we were in Tiruvaiyaru, Sankaran told the moving story of Bangalore Nagaratnammal. He remembered her fondly from his youth days how she faced her family sorrows, became a great artiste and devotee, how she travelled in trains with her portable veena to the places where she performed. She was spiritually inspired, dreaming of Tyagaraja, accepting the mission of making his rundown gravesite worthy of the saint’s memory. She was the one who bought the land surrounding the Tyagaraja Samadhi and helped the factionalised followers of Thyagaraja’s music join together to honour him at an annual festival.

Back in the United States, working on my thesis at Harvard in 1983, I wrote to Sankaran to ask him to write something I might include in a spectrum of voices of Madrasis on Tyagaraja. Sankaran responded by writing a letter conveying his appreciation of Tyagaraja’s contributions. He stressed the ways Tyagaraja was a composer-saint who transcended many boundaries and stereotypes. His views were grounded in historical and sociological events and evidence, and on his own wide experience.

Sankaran pointed out that during the period of history in which World War II took place, and Indian Independence and the linguistic division of India occurred, there were many changes and readjustments that had to be made by the people of India. He noted, for example, that one of the chief original planks of the annual Tyagaraja Aradhana festival was mass feeding of Brahmins. But wartime rationing caused a cutback of this practice, and with the attainment of national independence and the consequent democratisation of society and values, the feeding became “cosmopolitan” on multi-caste basis. With the raising of linguistic consciousness, the dominance of Telugu lyrics in song and dance performances in Tamil Nadu was resented, and the Dravidian movement increased affection for and pride in the Tamil language. Yet Sankaran also noted that “government may come and go, but Tyagaraja goes on forever.” He pointed out that Tyagaraja’s “empire” of songs had spread to other countries, where his works are performed and his life is celebrated. Thus, Tyagaraja, unlike many other regional composers, has become a state- and nation-transcending figure.

Sankaran said he believed that much gratitude was owed to Tyagaraja for propagating and promoting the greatness of Tamil music, and that the Tamil people affectionately felt indebted to him. Tyagaraja never received any “royalty” for the public performance of his songs, and no one can claim payment on his behalf; so, it is a gift, according to Sankaran, a legacy free and accessible to all who wish to claim it. The music of Tyagaraja, he said, “has simplicity as a shining point. Everyone sings it for its aesthetic appeal and for its moral values.”

Noting that Tyagaraja is very popular as a composer in our era, Sankaran pointed out the extent to which the saint’s music has “even invaded the dance repertoire. Tyagaraja is a money-spinner to the music industry of the modern world, because of his sterling reputation and his great popularity and the demand this creates; in every linguistic area, including north Indian ones, promoters attempt to make capital out of Tyagaraja’s appeal. The law of supply and demand holds sway, and articles, books, films, and other media programmes are produced by both the learned culture makers and the business-minded entrepreneurs.” Sankaran noted that the “wireless service,” for example All India Radio, serves as a great patron of music, and Tyagaraja’s songs enjoy a wide patronage through radio programmes. In this format and others, Tyagaraja is the favoured composer of classical South Indian music in the modern age.

The social restrictions which used to prohibit women (other than those of the traditional professional musician class) to make music and to dance are no longer valid. The dance profession and the nagaswara-playing profession are presently in the hands of performers who would not defy or neglect Tyagaraja, but honour him. Sankaran noted that in the late 1950s a Brahmin playing the nagaswaram would have been unthinkable. Today “even sensitive young girls” play that instrument, and dancers may come from the highest castes. With all the changes occurring in the 20th Century, Sankaran asserted, the fortunes of Tyagaraja have only risen, and his religious vitality increased.

(Courtesy: Sruti)