It may be the month of Christmas, followed by New Year’s Eve. But in Chennai, December is the season of music, for music lovers who flock to the city, from across the globe. The Margazhi season as it is referred is a festival where silk sarees are taken out and worn with pride. It is a festival where the cultural associations are in demand for the tickets, where the ‘canteens’ are judged and menu card are given ratings. Welcome to Chennai’s Margazhi Festival.

In December 1927, the Indian National Congress held the first All India Music Conference in Chennai. The festival was to showcase traditional Carnatic Music and Bharatanatyam to a larger audience. This desire has come true over the years as the Margazhi festival as it is known is today, one of the world’s largest cultural festival. Over a thousand performances take place during the Margazhi festival which stretches from early December up to end-January.

Yet the origin of Carnatic music goes back in time. The earliest known songs are the Panns composed by Karaikal Ammaiyar in the fifth century. Since then there were many composers from Chidambaram, Tirunelveli, Madurai, Cudappah, Hyderabad, Mysore, Trivandrum, were all centres of Carnatic Music and Dance but Thanjavur was/is special.

Generations of musicians, in and around Thanjavur, have enjoyed the patronage of the royal dynasties that ruled there. In the environs of Thanjavur flourished many families of skilled nadaswara vidwans and temple dancers. In the eighteenth–nineteenth century the famous three, the trinity of Carnatic music, lived and composed music in Tiruvaiyaaru – Thiyagaraja, Muthuswamy Dikshitar, and Syama Sastri.

Most famous are Thiyagaraja’s Telugu compositions on Rama, renowned for their simplicity and Bhakti. Dikshitar’s music was dedicated to the Devi predominantly and the songs are known for their complex structure and mystically worded Sanskrit lines. In comparison not many songs of Syama Sastri’s have been recovered. The richest exposition of music that is being sung today owes to what has been got from this trinity.

At the same time as this trinity, there were four brothers in the Thanjavur region, known as the Thanjavur Quartette – Chinnaya, Ponnaiya, Sivanandam and Vadivelu. They learnt composing from Muthuswamy Dikshithar and performed for the kings of Travancore, Mysore and Thanjavur.

There is the other trinity – the Tamil Three (Tamizh Muvar)- Muthu Thandavar, Marimutha Pillai and Arunachala kavi – who lived between sixteenth and eighteenth centuries. Of these the last two were born in Thanjavur District and Muthuthandavar was from Chidambaram. Muthu Thandavar was responsible for creating the modern song format. He was also heavily influenced by Bharatanatyam and composed many Padams—as the dance sequences are known.

In fact these composers are so revered that, every January, the Margazhi festival culminates in a tribute, which has music lovers congregating at Tiruvaiyaru and paying their respect to arguably the greatest Carnatic composer, Saint Thiyagaraja.

Continuing the tradition that began almost nine decades ago, sabhas (bodies that organise performances) rope in artists both new and established. With over 2000 performances scheduled for the Margazhi festival, artists irrespective of their age and experience consider the Kutcheries ( performances) as an opportunity to reach out to aficionados of Carnatic music from India and abroad.

Priya sisters
Despite performing for the past 18 years, Haripriya and Shanmukhapriya, better known as Priya sisters in the world of Carnatic music, look forward to the music season with the same vigour, year after year.

Though they have been performing in more than 2000 concerts that include shows in the USA, Canada and within India, the sisters admit that the Margazhi season is always something to look forward to.

“It is always a challenge to do concerts during the Margazhi festival. We always come up with new compositions for the audience. The rasikas (music audience) are well informed and understand music and its intricacies. That encourages us as performers and we strive to bring out the best in us as singers. It is an exercise for enrichment, for us,” they say.

The duo that began their career in the world of music with ‘Spirit of Freedom’ concert in New Delhi in the eighties, says that performing together happened naturally. “We began learning music together under the tutelage of our father who is a singer himself. We have always involved each other in whatever we do, so it was only natural that we started performing in concerts together,” they say.

The sisters who hail from East Godavari district Andhra Pradesh turn to coded gesturing during concerts. “Audience hear and see us as one, so it is important for us to work on our coordination. Sometimes we have to whisper in each other’s ear, too,” they smile.

OS Arun
“Today’s audience are more interactive than earlier days’. They like to sing along and request compositions. It is quite an unlikely feature in classical music concerts; you get to see them only during light music programmes,” laughs OS Arun.

With a prime time slot in every Margazhi season, OS Arun, who is known for his fusion works within the grammar of music, is happy that the current breed of rasikas are open to experiments.

He says, “They appreciate good music, which encourages musicians to explore within the realms of Carnatic music. That acceptance is far more important than the critic’s opinion, for a musician.”

He recollects some memorable performances, with eminent musicians and singers being part of the audience. “It was during one such programme in music season, that renowned playback singer S Janaki came on stage and showered lavish praise on me. M Balamuralikrishna, another legend in his own right, remarked that it was as if Sage Narada had sung, after a show for Vipanchi, the music and dance school, which is part of the Carnatic legend’s trust MKB,” he says.

MS Lavanya
She made waves when she appeared on India’s Got Talent, 2009, a reality show, with her sister MS Subbalakshmi . Though she has been performing for a very long time even before the show, the stint made her a popular face among Indian audience.

She has a rich music repertoire that includes Carnatic music, Hindustani, Western classical, Hindi, Tamil movie songs and jazz. Lavanya is a regular in every music season. Trained by none other than Kadri Gopalnath, Lavanya performs as a solo artist, too, and her shows. Though this season, Lavanya is not performing extensively in Chennai, she is determined to be part of the Margazhi concert in a small way. “This season I might not be performing in many shows. I have some programmes in and outside India. However, I am still part of the season in a small way. I am doing a show for a TV channel that will be aired during this Margazhi season,” she says.

While she admits that instrumentalists usually get upstaged by vocalists, she says that is where the challenge lies. “We have artists like Kadri sir (my guru) and Kunnakudi Vaidyanathan who as instrumentalists, made a huge mark in the world of music,” she says.

by Janani Sampath and Shubashree Desikan