KOCHI: Mavelikkara P Subramaniam admires Ronaldinho, who used to weave magic with his feet and hold fans spellbound. Speaking about music, he says, it is the flamboyance of the ever-smiling Brazilian football ace as well as the rapture he draws and passes on to the spectators that one finds charming.
A puritan’s favourite, Subramaniam’s reference to Ronaldinho may make pique curiosity at once. And he says: “It’s within the rules of the game and a boundary that he executes his brilliant innovations. That makes it interesting. It’s the same with Carnatic music. Compared with other genres, Carnatic music insists you to remain in a certain framework. But when you evolve and enchant listeners with your improvisations, sticking strongly to the basics, it’s sheer joy.”
His concept of music has always stood out and the Kerala Sangeetha Nataka Akademi was the latest to acknowledge it, by presenting him with a fellowship for lifetime contribution. He received the citation from Culture Minister Saji Cherian at an event last week.
“Music is a lifeline, it has been my oxygen. I started learning music at the age of six and my day begins with a prayer song, prostration before the legends and my gurus, and a resolve to learn something new,” says Subramaniam, sitting at his house named after his favourite raga, ‘Sivasakthi’, in Tripunithura.
He has been living in the temple town since joining the RLV College of Music and Fine Arts as a music teacher on December 5, 1981. He had stints also at Swathithirunal College of Music, from where he earned his Ganabhooshanam and Ganapraveena certificates.
It’s the ‘feel’, they say, about Subrahmaniam’s rendition, which is “mellifluous and soothing”. He never compromised on compositions of great gurus, but gave them different dimensions as he evolved. As he put it, emotions were allowed to prevail over intelligence. The strong expression of love for everything that is eternal runs through his singing, while true devotion remains its ultimate aim.
Subramaniam’s compositions, too, have that signature. Once while returning in a train after a concert in Mumbai, a sight of vast greenery exhilarated him. The image of Lord Krishna came to his mind and he composed the krithi “Marakatha Manivanna Maayakanna” in the Rageshri raga.
Born in Mavelikkara to S Padmanabha Iyer and Mavelikkara Ponnammal, a renowned singer and Harikatha presenter, on September 9, 1956, Subramaniam learned Carnatic music first from his mother and later from Mavelikkara Prabhakara Varma.
He starts most of his mornings with a varnam of Lalgudi Jayarman, mostly Arunodayame in Bowli raga. His ears note only the brimming profoundness in the singing of Mehdi Hassan, Keith Whitley and G N Balasubramaniam, rather than the difference in genres. Same is the case when it comes to composers such as Madan Mohan, O P Nayyar, Ilayaraja and A R Rahman.
After all, it’s the nuances that give a musician the identity. Regarding Subramaniam, that soothing feeling of ecstasy.