dsubrahmanyam's blog

Hello everyone again.

This photo needs no introduction I believe. Who does not know this lady? Who has not heard her famous venkateshwara suprabhatam, Vishnu Sahastranamam, Meera Bhajans, Bhajagovindam, or many of her classical renderings ? Yes my friends I am talking of M.S. Subbalakshmi, the great carnatic classical vocalist. This is a brief life sketch of M.S. and my tribute to this great lady of music.

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Madurai Shanmukhavadivu Subbulakshmi popularly known as M.S. Subbalakshmi or simply M.S was born in to a musical family on Spetember 16, 1916, in temple town Madurai, Tamilnadu. Her parents were Subramanya Iyer and Veena Vidushi Shanmukavadivu, a renowned singer and player of the veena. Her younger brother and sister also shared their mother’s love of music; her brother played the mridangam and her sister became a singer. M.S was affectionately �known as Kunjamma to the near and dear at home. M.S started learning music at a early age. She used to accompany her mother at concerts. She released her first recording at an early age of 10 years.

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Her first guru of music was her mother and then at a later stage she began her Carnatic classical music training under Semmangudi Srinivasa Iyer who taught her up to the varnam stage and then Hindustani classical training under Pandit Narayan Rao Vyas.

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By age 17, M.S. was giving concerts on her own, including major performances at the Madras Music Academy, where she made her musical debut. Since then, she performed countless musical forms in different languages such as Hindi, Bengali, Gujarati, Tamil, Malayalam, Telugu, Sanskrit and Kannada.At the age of 24, she married T. (Thyagarajan) Sadasivam who has devoted himself to advancing her career. Sadasivam, publisher and managing director of Kalki, the widely circulated and highly respected Tamil weekly, was a film director and thus particularly well situated to assist her career through that medium. Their marriage spanned over 50 years but they had no children.

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Two fortuitous events brought M.S. early into national prominence. The first was her participation in the All-India Dance Conference in Bombay, organized under the Vikramaditya Celebrations, in 1944. Every Indian musician of importance was present and her performance created a sensation. The second was her appearance in the title role of the Hindi-language film Meera, produced by her husband. �The film was produced in 1946-47 in Rajputana and the villagers in the area saw M.S as a “new Meera.� �The movie had M.S. sing the famous Meera bhajans, with Dilipkumar Roy as the music director. Those renditions by M.S. continue to enthrall listeners to this day. Although Meera was her first and only Hindi film, she has played in Tamil films both before and since, including a Tamil version of Meera.

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M.S. travelled to London, New York, Canada, the Far East, and other places as India’s cultural ambassador. Her concerts at Carnegie Hall, New York; the UN General Assembly on UN day in 1966 (while U Thant was the Secretary General); the Royal Albert Hall, London in 1982; and at the Festival of India in Moscow in 1987 were significant landmarks in her career.

In 1941 M.S and her husband visited Mahatma Gandhi at his religious retreat in Nagpur. Thereafter whenever she and he were in the same city she sang at his prayer meetings. Gandhi loved her rendition of bhajans and requested that she sing some for his 78th birthday, October 2, 1947. As she couldn’t appear in person, All India Radio suggested she record some discs and have them sent to Delhi where he was in residence. Gandhi particularly wanted to hear “Hari Tuma Haro” whose haunting refrain translates, “Oh Lord, take away the pain from mankind.” Not knowing this bhajan she suggested another singer, but he refused, saying he would rather hear her speak the words than another sing them. M.S learned and recorded the song the night of September 30th, finishing at 2 a.m. The disc, sent off by plane, was played on what was to be Gandhi’s last birthday. Three months later he was dead by an assassin’s bullet. When the announcement of his death was reported over the radio, it was followed by the playing of M.S�s recording of “Hari Tuma Haro.”

In the late 1950s, as she sang at the Ramakrishna Ashram in Delhi, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first prime minister, was among the audience. At the end of the recital he was so moved that he bowed, and said, “What am I, a mere prime minister before a queen of music (he was to repeat it in every speech of his, praising her).” He rarely missed her concerts.

Sarojini Naidu, dubbed her the “Nightingale of India,” and added: “Every child in India has heard about SUBBULAKSHMI for the beauty of her voice, the magic of her personality, and the gracious charity of her heart . . . . I want my living words to go to the utmost corners of the world so that people may realize how one great woman artist in India has been able to move the hearts of millions and millions of men and women by her songs. I believe the feelings roused in me will be roused in everyone who hears the enchanting voice of this enchanting singer who is abundantly gifted.”

While Lata Mangeshkar called her Tapaswini (the Renunciate), Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan termed her Suswaralakshmi (the goddess of musical notes), and Kishori Amonkar labeled her the ultimate eighth note or Aathuvaan Sur, which is above the seven notes basic to all music.

She was widely honored, praised and awarded. Some of them more popular ones include Padma Bhushan in 1954, Sangeetha Kalanidhi in 1968 (literally, Treasure Chest of Music. She was the first woman recipient of the title), Ramon Magsaysay award in 1974, the Padma Vibhushan in 1975, the Kalidasa Sanman in 1988, the Indira Gandhi Award for National Integration in 1990, and the Bharat Ratna in 1998 (first musician to receive this award). She was also honored as the court-singer of Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams.

Not unexpectedly, “she talks, sings and lives music twenty-four hours a day,” and is deeply religious. The puja (prayer) room in her house has three life-size portraits of Sri Chandrasekharendra Saraswathi Sankaracharya, the saint whom she calls “divinity in flesh and blood,” and who has “been instrumental in restoring the faith and religious temperament of the people of Madras and reclaiming many to the path of God” in recent years. As her guru, he selected the verses for the highly popular record she made in 1970 of the Bhajagovindam (some 30 verses composed by the poet-philosopher Sankara in praise of Lord Krishna, which are both musical and of much philosophical content) and Vishnu Sahasranamam (a musical chant of the 1,000 names of Vishnu).

The other phase of the career that has endeared SUBBULAKSHMI to her countrymen is that of using her voice to raise money for good causes. M.S. has given more than 200 benefit performances and raised well over Rs. 10,000,000 for various Indian charities.

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With the death of her husband Sadasivam in 1997, she stopped all her public performances. M.S. died on December 11, 2004 after a brief illness, due to complications relating to pneumonia and cardiac irregularities.

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Though this great personality is is no more with us, her music is with us forever. She is among those who live even after� their death. I am one of those fortunate people to see this lady at close quarters. I thank god for this opportunity.

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