CHENNAI: Far from the pages of fat textbooks and impersonal accounts, history finds better life among people — in the lay of the land, their way of life, their tongue and their stories. And in objects; from everyday necessities to cherished pieces of treasure, there is a story carried through. It was a special brand of story-carriers that drew Tharun Sekar in; instruments of Indian folk music lost to common memory or finding themselves headed that way.
What began as a singular search led the 23-year-old architecture student to a treasure trove of art and precision, and the met iculous craf t of luthiers (one who builds and repairs string instruments). An elegant yazh, one that seems to have stepped out of the Sangam era, is the latest of Tharun’s work. He is now a member of Uru, a company that has devoted itself to bringing vanishing instruments back to life. Six years ago, Tharun’s first step into the arena was as humble as they come. When his quest for a lap steel guitar (a Hawaiian folk instrument) led him nowhere, he decided to turn to YouTube and rely on his own, hitherto unexplored skills. One instrument and a couple of years later, this journey had landed him in Auroville, Puducherry, for an inter nship in instrument- making.
Cajon and string instruments are now his domain. “I got a great opportunity to learn from luthier Erisa Neogy, who is well-known in India. He has been making guitars for over 30 years in Auroville. I picked up the technical aspects and the traditional way of building an instrument, learning the basic understanding of how an instrument works and how the structures are dealt with in an instrument from him. He also showed me some of the unusual Tamil woods with good tonal qualities for instrumentmaking. He still guides me in all of my projects,” shares Tharun, a self-taught luthier, guitarist, and vocalist.
A sound business After completing his course in 2019 at Hosur, Tharun, along with some students from his college and some from NID, Ahmedabad, collectively started a community called ‘Kolam’ in October 2019. One of their projects was an instrumentbuilding company called Uru. “I always felt that by tweaking the designs of an instrument according to how people use and maintain it today, it can be preserved for ages. That was lacking in our culture. By this time, I also met Siva, a professor at Thyagaraja College, Madurai, who wanted to build a yazh, an instrument that was considered extinct for over 2,000 years,” shares Tharun, who calls it a life-changing experience.
The duo researched about the instrument and gathered some information from Pathupattu — poems in Sangam literature. There were also some pieces in the Egmore museum, which helped them figure out the structure. “We had to redesign its playability and music theory completely to global standards. We have made the playability similar to that of a lyre, which is widely used. There were also some design changes with respect to its maintenance. We used eastern red cedar for the build which is also not the traditional selection for wood. Red cedar resonated better than the wood from jackfruit tree. Having studied architecture, I know the design process — which starts from case studies, research, finding the problem, solving it through the design and executing it,” he shares.
On a musical journey
He involves himself in the process of wood selection, the study of wood in terms of the tone, reverberation, and the study of aesthetics of an instrument. It’s a slow process and there are challenges every day. Sourcing the materials is a huge problem, he says. Tharun works with instruments six hours a day. It takes around two to three months to complete each one. “It involves hundreds of detailed processes that the consumer may not notice. The team procures raw materials from different parts of Tamil Nadu. I also collaborate with artisans from Madurai.
There are specific places to source certain types of woods. For example, we get jackfruit tree wood from Panrutti, Khaya from Auroville, and red cedar from Puducherry. Parts for the instruments are mostly sourced from Germany or the USA. We certainly look for the best quality raw materials, because this quality shows up in the final product,” explains Tharun, who intends to make percussion instruments next. Apart from Uru, Tharun has been a part of a Tamil indie band called Othasevuru since 2019.
He and his mate Pravekha had performed in Chennai, Madurai, and Hosur for the past three years, before forming the band. For Uru, he’s planning to go on a tour across India to study Indian folk instruments, by visiting the makers’ places. For the project, he has selected 10 vanishing folk instruments that have better qualities for reconstruction. (For details, call: 9080375543; visit Instagram page: Uru Official)