The Subbulakshmi Epoch in Karnatic Music

The Subbulakshmi epoch in Karnatic music commenced more than four decades ago. One of the outstanding figures in the sphere of music in post-Independence India, Subbulakshmi has perhaps done more to enrich her country’s musical heritage than any one else in her generation. Few musicians have endeared themselves to the large mass of concert-going and music-loving public as much as Subbulakshmi. A classical musician’s appeal is to the limited few but the great mass of people turn away from him. A popular star may have a fantastic following among the masses but may be anathema to the Pundits. Subbulakshmi’s reputation cuts right across such musical boundaries. It is not versatility but a measure of the range of her talent. She can satisfy the most exacting demands of a Mylapore audience as well as sway mammoth gatherings in Delhi or Jullunder.

Her reputation today can be compared to that of Om Kulsum’s in the Middle East. Neither has a world reputation like Yehudi Menuhin but in their own spheres, both have left stronger imprints. Subbulakshmi has taken the music of India around the world as an embodiment of her country’s greatness. She is known in Pakistan, Ceylon, Nepal, Malaya, Burma and the Africas and wherever there is an Indian community like Mauritius and Fiji. Her voice has been heard in the U. K., in Europe, in the U.A.R., and in America. Her success is based on a number of factors–an enchanting voice, a natural talent, versatility, character and the humility to learn at all times and from all people. Finally, that indefinable gift in her which few possess and which alone transforms song into memorable music.

Her unquestioned supremacy in the music field is neither an accident nor a fortuitous coincidence. Prodigious effort, supported by a whole set of gifts bestowed on her by God, and a mighty stream of musical and artistic elements have gone to the making of her art. Wonderfully assimilating and adapting, she pressed them into service for her purposes. Acquaintances with new forms of musical art and new individualities have been the experience of her development. The results are an incomparable melodic richness and taste, with a spiritual flexibility, and an assurance and clarity that have no equal in the realm of Indian music.

Exceptionally musical from her childhood and gifted with an uncommonly fine soprano voice, her precocity was in evidence before she was ten. It was an age of giants in the music field in South India and hers was a home where musicians and votaries of music gathered. Subbulakshmi commenced her singing career by providing vocal accompaniment when her mother, the celebrated Shanmukhavadivu of Madurai, played Veena concerts. She soon started giving full-fledged vocal recitals of her own and within a few years, she was a front rank concert artiste in her own right.

Her marriage with Mr. T. Sadasivam in 1940 marked the beginning of a new and purposeful chapter in her life as well as in her career as a musician. Realizing her almost unlimited potentialities for development, he, with his fostering care and guidance, helped her to cultivate her art to its full possibilities. Subbulakshmi is blessed with a voice that reminds one of the words of a Neapolitan music critic about Enrico Caruso, the world-famous Italian tenor. “His is a voice with which Apollo (the God of Music) blesses a mortal once in a millennium. Blessed are they who are fortunate to be his contemporaries.” But its wealth had to be assessed and its timbre and volume harnessed to produce music that will satisfy the high-brow critic and provide joy to the common man. Her repertoire was enlarged to make it rich and varied and the musical versions of compositions checked for their classical purity and authenticity. Subbulakshmi sings songs in seven or eight languages including Tamil, Telugu, Sanskrit, Kannada, Malayalam, Hindi and Bengali and the enunciation of each word of the Sahitya had to be made perfect. But there was no uncertain groping after perfection and every exercise was only an attempt to improve on the results achieved.

Subbulakshmi’s devotion to music can only be described as a ‘Tapasya’ which connotes much more than the commonplace expression ‘dedication.’ Her repertoire grew richer over the years and every piece sung by her became the song of the season, If he took up a new piece, its structure was studied, its Sangatis analysed and the composition was finally moulded into her own characteristic style till it shone like a polished gem. The eagerness of a student has never left her and even today she is receptive to new compositions and new Ragas with an insatiable curiosity.

Once a piece was reconstructed in her way and sung, it caught the imagination of the music-loving public. It was ‘Bhavayami’ in one season and ‘Srirangapura vihara’ or ‘O Rangasayi’ in another. The chiselled version, bearing the stamp of ‘M S’ on it, became the version sought after by all. Musical ideas flowed into her from various sources and she responded to them all with some side of her genius and absorbed them in her composite style.

In 1941 the Sadasivams were proceeding to Calcutta from Bombay where Subbulakshmi was to play the role of Narada in the Tamil film, “Savitri”. They broke their journey at Nagpur and spent an evening at Sevagram, where Subbulakshmi had the privilege of singing a few Bhajans in Hindi before Gandhiji. In subsequent years Subbulakshmi had sung on many occasions in the presence of Bapu. In September 1947 Gandhiji expressed a desire to hear his favourite Meera Bhajan, “Hari Tuma Haro” sung by Subbulakshmi. The song was recorded by Subbulakshml at Madras and flown to Delhi on October 2. Mahatmaji heard the song that evening which happened to be his birthday. In the Tamil film, “Savitri” Subbulakshmi had sung a Sanskrit Bhajan, “Bruhi Mukundeti,” composed by Sadasiva Brahmendra and this became the rage of South India for quite sometime. Earlier Subbulakshmi had played leading roles in two Tamil films, “Seva Sadan” and “Sakuntala” flooding them with music of memorable sweetness.

1944 saw a landmark in her career when she sang before the All-India Music Conference at Bombay in the presence of an audience which consisted of every musician in India that mattered. Her reputation had now been enlarged into a nation-wide one.

It was the Hindi version of the film ‘Meera’, released in 1947, that projected her personality before millions of men and women of India. Commending Subbulakshmi to the people of the North, Sarojini Naidu described her as the “one great woman artiste in India who moved the hearts of millions by her songs. It may not be known to many that the golden voice is an instrument of great causes.” By the end of 1972, Subbulakshmi had given over 1500 performances, 250 of which were benefit concerts in support of public causes giving them financial help to the extent of sixty lakhs of rupees. Kasturiba Memorial Fund, the Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Fund, the Ramakrishna Mission, the Kamala Nehru Hospital Fund and the Tyagaraja Centenary Fund were only a few among the causes in aid of which the enchanting voice sang. A cause dear to the hearts of South Indian music lovers was the erecting of a fitting memorial to the Trimurti of Karnatic music, Tyagaraja, Dikshitar and Syama Sastrl at Tiruvarur where, by coincidence, all the three were born. An influential committee was formed to implement the project and with the aid of finances raised by Subbulakshmi’s concerts, the houses in which the three composers lived have already been acquired for conversion into monuments.

‘Meera’ also revealed that she was the unsurpassed singer of Bhajans in the country. Her repertoire of Bhajans was enlarged to include those of Surdas, Tulasidas, Narsi Mehta, Sadasiva Brahmendra and Narayana Tirtha. Even the classical pieces sung at a Karnatic music concert are invariably devotional in character but Subbulakshmi includes uncommon compositions like the ‘Bhaja Govindam’ of Adi Sankara and a benediction specially compos by the present Kamakoti Acharya to be sung by her before the United Nations. In 1972, she regaled the International Sanskrit Conference held at Delhi with a concert entirely comprising Sanskrit compositions.

The honours and awards she received were but a natural corollary to her rising stature in the music world. In 1954, she received the ‘Padma Bhushan’ title and two years later, the President’s award for classical Karnatic music. Her trip to Europe, in 1963, to participate in the Edinburgh International Festival brought her in touch with great personalities like Lord Harewood and Om Kulsum, the prima donna of the Arab world. U. K. does not have a sympathetic ear for Karnatic music but the response to Subbulakshmi’s performance from the audience and the critics came as a surprise to the organisers of the Festival. Critics waxed eloquent about her technical virtuosity and emotional absorption in the music, not to speak of the ‘appealing timbre’ of her voice. Her music was recorded by the B. B. C. and there were special recitals in London and later in several European cities before she returned home.
Subbulakshmi’s concert under the auspices of the United Nations in October 1966 was a great experience to herself more than to the august audience consisting of representatives of many nations of the world. This unique performance, the only one of its kind in the annals of the United Nations, was followed by recitals at fifteen centres in the U.S.A. and a number of private concerts. American audiences are more familiar with Indian music, particularly instrumental music, but the ‘spell’ cast bySubbulakshmi’s vocal recital was unexpected. Critics went ecstatic at what they called ‘musical wizardry’ and described the music as the ‘peak of educated and pedigreed singing.’

A different kind of honour, but a coveted one by Karnatic musicians, was conferred on her bythe Madras Music Academy when it ejected her as President of its Annual Conference in 1968 and made her a ‘Sangita Kalanidhi’. Her presidential address before the learned body was characteristic of her utter humility and was full of sentiments of gratitude to those who made her what she is today. It also contained precious advice, baled on the ripeness of her art and her unrivalled experience, to the younger generation of musicians.

The Ramon Magsaysay Award (1974) for public service recently won by her came as the crowning event in her dedicated life. These awards, named after the late Philippine President, are Asia’s version of the Noble Prize and are given annually in recognition of greatness of spirit in service to the people. From this angle, it is perhaps the one honour she would cherish most.

‘M. S.’ is intensely religious by nature and apart from her recordings of devotional music, she has recorded Stotras like the Suprabhatam of Lord Venkateswara and the Vishnu Sahasranama donating the proceeds to deserving cause. In recent years, practically all the collections from her concerts in many parts of India are gifted away to local causes.

Behind these achievements, stupendous by any standards, lie a childlike simplicity and an artless nature that take all honours in their stride. It is a blessing that she was not lured into the latter-day craze for breaking away from tradition into uncharted areas of improvisation. At 57, she continues to be the perennial student, seeking still greater perfection in her art and searching for deeper and more enduring values in music which has become an inseparable part of the very core of her being. Dccades of ‘Nadopasana’ has turned her into a spiritually evolved person and her music today is no longer the mere functioning of the larynx but the expression of the hidden soul within. There is no divorce between her life and her art; song is Sadhana.