|
|
|
|
"My happiness and sorrow are all reflected
in terms of Music" – T.N. Seshagopalan |
A child prodigy, a Mother's disciple and an untaught
student of many a guru. That is Madurai T.N.Seshagopalan
for you. A stickler to tradition, life revolves
around music for him. The senior vocalist opens
up his mind in an exclusive interview with Sudha
Jagannathan. Here are the excerpts.
You have a come a long. What does music mean to
you? What have you got from it? What have you given
it back? What is it that you want to achieve? You
might have achieved in terms of winning awards.
I am not asking you from the award angle. |
 |
TNS: In my view,
a child begins to understand and demand a thing
at the age of 2 to two-and half years. A child starts
demanding this or that from that age. That is the
age it starts understanding something other than
basic feelings. I had the perplexity of music from
that age itself.
I used to sing well from the age of three. My mother
Tiruvenkadavalli began to teach me Raghuveera Gadyam,
Tiruppavai, Tiruvenpavai and Tirupalliyezuchi from
that age itself. My mother used to say that I sang
Nalangu in marriages in the manner of a child's
prattle. From that early age, the `music feeling'
took a predominant role in me along with the playfulness
and other feelings of a normal child. To me, any
event or any activity in my life is only in the
background of music. They are only in terms of music.
That is how it has become for me. It has become
an inseparable feeling in my body. It has become
a dominant feeling. What it means to me? It means
everything to me. Instead of saying I breath music,
I will say music is more than breath for me. I see
music always. Music is my friend. Music is my entertainment.
Music is recreation. Music is my living. Music is
my pravirthi. Music is my humour. My happiness and
sorrow are all reflected only in terms of music.
I don't know anything other than music. I know nothing
without music.
Even after such a long journey in music, do I know
much? I will say no. It is impossible to know all
about music. Like the Tamil saying "Kalvi karai
alla" "karpavai naal sila", a single
birth is not enough to learn. It needs several births.
When you know a little about something, then only
you realize that you don't know many aspects of
it (music). When you understand a thing, you have
a feeling that you don't know several other aspects.
Then you begin to have the feeling of longing for
more information. We begin to wonder how much more
knowledge you would acquire in this birth. How justifiable
are you going to be? All these thoughts instill
a sense of fear as you age. Should the thought that
we have achieved something cross our mind any time,
mere thinking of things to be achieved will make
us realize how we have wasted life. To avoid this
regret, we don't even entertain any thinking that
we have achieved.
What have you given it back to music?
TNS: Music is an expression of human feelings.
It can be conveyed in many forms, catering to the
tastes of others' instincts. For those who have
chosen classical music as their idiom or abstract
language, their prime duty is to define and display
divinity felt by them. This should be conveyed to
the audience or listeners. Music is not only to
ears. It is also to the hearts. It is to the brain
as well. It is to the soul. That is why it is called
the easiest path or boat to attain salvation. Music
should show the God. The God whom I have seen should
also fill the hearts and minds of others. What many
a religious head could not do, we should do through
this Nada Upasana. That is our duty.
This is true if somebody takes Carnatic music as
a profession. If we start worshiping the stage as
a professional, the fruits of the worship should
not only reach us but all those who see and listen.
On the stage once the sruthi is on, I go on a different
trance. I don't worry about the payment I receive
and the audience before me. I go beyond this materialism.
It is an entirely different equilibrium. At some
places, I got fully and emotionally involved. Others
would not have noticed. Later, I returned to reality.
If listeners also reach the same status, stage and
the divine constant as I have at any given concert
- then I think I have touched the first footstep
of achievement. If I am able to take along with
me the entire audience to see God as I do all through
my rendition, then only I will say that I have worshiped
the God in the right way and my prayers have fallen
into HIS ears.
Have you ever felt that way in any of your kutcheri?
TNS: There have been good experiences.
Many stories can be told on that. The audience participation
I am talking about is a higher level one. At that
point, the audience doesn't applaud, does not go
into instant `sabhash saying,' doesn't speak and
doesn't even know if the kutcheri has ended. You
reach a standstill stage. You should realise only
after you come out of the concert hall.
Do you have a music background?
TNS:
My mother used to sing through listening knowledge.
She was involved in Nama Sankeerthanam. She was
an expert. There was none in our immediate past
generation who had taken classical music as a profession
and learnt it the way it was meant to be.
Do you think a Guru is required for a child prodigy
like you?
TNS: There is nothing
without a guru. It holds true for any art. It does
not mean that one should go through the gurukulavasam
and involve in guru service. He may not have taught
you. Yet, he can be your `maanaseeka guru'. We learn
what to do from some. We also learn what not to
do from some others. Even that needs to be taught.
Only when you know one good thing, you realise that
10 others are wrong. For arts like Veda, Ghana et
al, guru alone can take us to the right way. We
may have acquired the talent to travel. But it is
the guru who guides us to the right way. What we
think, what we talk and what we do (they say this
as manasa, vaacha and karmana) - if all these three
have to come in the right way, you need the help
of a guru. You will wander all over and reach the
right place at the evening of your life. By then,
you would have wasted all your time, in the process.
A guru will correct your journey in the beginning
itself.
Who is your `maanaseeka' guru?
TNS:
Other than my mother, all those learned people whose
kutcheries I had attended were my `maanaseeka gurus'.
I had a lot of good associations in Madurai. Nama
Sangeetham - Thirupugazh and Thevaram. Then Sanskrit.
Then the college. I used to go to a number of Kutcheries.
When I was in Madurai, it was sort of a golden time
with all the branches of music blossoming well.
My parents had given me training to exploit the
Madurai surroundings. Further, the school I studied,
the association I had developed and fellow people
- all of them have blessed me. It was a gift of
God to me. From whomsoever I had learnt the good
- they were my gurus until the age of 16 when I
joined Ramanathapuram Sankara Sivam.
From gurukulavasam to teacher visiting students
and now the Internet mode of learning - What is
your view?
TNS: Communication
for information is a happy thing to have happened.
Time was when there was no communication. To take
out any information from a place, one has to suffer
a lot. People never easily parted information. That
was when students thought it to be disrespectful
to ask a guru about any doubt. They just watched
the guru, read him and got clarified. They used
to assimilate materials as they came by their way
and tried to adopt them to their needs. Thanks to
technology, however, information is available these
days.
At the same time, if you start asking `why' for
everything, he will miss out on things you ought
to know. You must know a lot of things, understand
them, assimilate them and then only try to differentiate.
If you ask `why' at that stage, then it is reasonable.
A doubt should come at a later point and not at
the beginning. You must first obey, understand,
assimilate and then scrutinize yourself as to what
you have learnt. You ask questions only after doing
all these. Then alone you will get a clear idea.
If you start asking questions without learning,
it will only upset the equilibrium of a teacher.
A child may not have the intelligence to know how
to employ the freedom and right. Only after a level
of learning, the child begins to understand this.
Traditions and conventions are by definition do
not mean `superficial acts'. To say that one should
follow all that had been done by our ancestors is
a wrong explanation. Tradition is the result of
a constant research made over decades or centuries.
The final thing, which is termed to be permanent
- stood, it stands and will stand. It had withstood
the test of time. So we can't just simply ignore
tradition.
Parents these days want their children reach the
stage fast. What is your view?
TNS:
Everything is fast in modern days. The rate of intelligence
is moving up fast in line with the time. There is
nothing wrong. But you must deserve and then decide.
If you deserve and achieve that - then there is
nothing wrong in giving that privilege to a child.
If you start doing this to all children just because
you have done it to a child, then comes the danger.
People say we need half-hour duration kutcheries.
There is nothing wrong to think of giving one-hour
concerts to kids. If you let all kids participate
in a concert since it is just for an hour, then
it is wrong. For a one-hour concert, you can have
a package just like preparing for an exam and vomiting.
Here the art form is missing. This is a big malady
and is spreading like a virus. This is a danger
for the Carnatic music.
Don't you think that this helps clear the stage
fear in a child
TNS: People
who come to see get the fear. They may fear that
the Carnatic music will disappear. In former times,
only those who were too keen to take music as a
profession went to gurukulavasam and, hence, were
ready to do service to the teacher. Gurus also knew
that their wards had talent. They would correct
their wards as they learn. They went to gurukulavasam
those days to do multi-PHDs and not for basic learning.
My Guru went to Muthiah Bagavathar to do gurukulavasam
at the age of 16. By then, he had learnt a lot of
kritis and become an expert on `layam'. The gurukulavasam
teaches quite a number of other things in life.
Besides study time, a student should spend some
hours every morning for a few years with the guru.
He should get his doubts cleared with his guru.
He should devote time for practice. If one can use
and exploit all the information and facilities of
modern techniques and media - then there is nothing
like a better gurukulavasm in the current day. I
will say it is possible. But all these should happen
under strict observation.
Music is all about creativity. In the name of creativity,
upcoming artistes do quite a lot of things and throw
up innovations like fusion music. What is your view?
TNS: Without crossing the traditional
border, one can express his/her mind and style through
creative singing. This is known as style creativity.
Big creative artistes will keep cropping up in huge
numbers for many years to come. We welcome such
creative artistes and we need more of them. But
discovery of new ragas and the like stuffs - if
you are telling something new, you should know the
old completely. If we can learn the kritis composed
by great saints and render them properly that will
alone be suffice.
To attempt composing something similar or even better
than them ... Many greats - incarnations of God
- have already done that. If you still want to do
something, you need to know those existing already.
I concur with Semmangudi Srinivasa Iyer in this
regard. Our predecessors have dug up many wells
that can give nectar. We have not been to drink
them fully yet in this birth. Where is the need
for digging a fresh well to discover the nectar?
One can claim to have discovered a new raga. One
should have known the old in its entirety. The new
one should have either the influence of the old
or independent stature of its own to gain stability.
One should do a composition and the `raga swarupam'
should be familiar and sung by many even after several
decades.
Only then can it claim to have stood the test of
time. One can legitimately claim to have discovered
something only after that. If Marugesa Muthiah Bagavathar
created a raga, people sang it even in those days.
Within 20 years, people began singing those ragas
and they become popular. Even Tyagaraja Swami did
not have that luck. Tyagaraja kritis had come to
light a long after his demise. For others, the luck
came a little early.
What do you think of fusion music?
TNS:
Fusion is a venture to show something differently
to the audience. Within Indian music, they are number
places where the fuse goes off between two systems.
Ours is a raga sangeetam. If swaras come in an octave
where raga is affected, the raga will lose its life.
Some ragas in Carnatic music should come with `gamakkam'.
Only then will we be able to identify with certainty
the raga. If you sing in `suddha swaram' without
the gamakkam, the right raga will not be heard.
It will just be a skeleton. It will have no life.
If anyone tries to do harmony with swaras without
`gamakkam,' it will not jell with carnatic music.
But people wish to see something new always - whether
good or bad. How many fusion programmes are happening
these days? Fusion music providers basically exploit
the inquisitiveness of the people. If it is successful,
it should keep happening. Why is it not coming back?
This goes to prove that it is not correct.
Long duration kutcheries were quite in vogue in
those days. Do you think the trend will return?
TNS: Only in Chennai people advertise
the four-hour kutcheries. Most mofussil kutcheries
I sing are for four hours. In 2000, for Vaikunda
Ekadesi, I had sung 12 hours non-stop.
Madurai means Mani Iyer. Now it is you. Can you
share some experience about him?
TNS: Mani Iyer is a Nada Yogi. Despite his physical
disability, he had some distinct qualities. He had
the uncanny ability to convert any sound into music.
He had that `yoga stage.' He had that `siddhi.'
Nobody asked if he had sung this or that. But they
all listened and accepted what he sang as music.
Even as he sang that simple, he used to sing simple
nava varnams. He would do it in his own simple but
great style.
Do you think music has become less divine these
days?
TNS: Music for the sake
of music. The divinity and depth will come only
if this comes to the mind. If it is done for professional
sake or to win a few applauds, then the true swarupa
and greatness of music will diminish.
What to do to prevent?
TNS:
I don't compromise for others. If I feel correct,
I will do that.
Is packaged way of giving music right to bring more
people into the fold?
TNS:
It does not mean that you compromise on quality.
You can tell in a simple manner. But you have to
say it in a great way. If you have chosen to tell
it in a great way, then you will have to prepare
them to understand. Then only will they be ready
to take it.
Do you think the current crop of musicians have
patience to teach?
TNS: The
profession tends to become sound even at a very
initial stage. Who are going to really matter in
the field and who are going to stand in the end
- only the time and their effort alone will decide.
One has also to see how these youngsters are going
to manage the pressures by organising themselves.
Post your comments
Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail
|
|
|
|
|
|
