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MUSIC
TRINITY
Eternal India
encyclopedia
Thyagaraja's
ancestors
came
from
Kurnool district of Andhra. Following the
fall of the Vijayanagar empire at the end of
the 16th century a number of Telugu families
migrated to the South. Thyagaraja's ances-
tors formed part of one such migration.
Thyagaraja was bom in 1767, in Tiruvarur
in the. Tanjavur district of Tamilnadu, to.
Kakarla Ramabrahman and his wife,
Seetamma, who was the daughter of Girija
Kavi, a poet-composer attached to the
Tanjavur court. Their son was named Thyaga-
raja, after Lord Thyagaraja, the deity of
Tiruvarur.
Ramabrahman shifted to Tiruvayyuru
from Tiruvarur. The king of Tanjore had
gifted him a house in this village on the banks
of the Cauvery where 1’hyagaraja spent the
rest of his life.
At the age of 18 he married a girl called
Parvati who died without any children. He
then married her sister Kanakamba. A daugh-
ter, Seetalakshmi, was born to them.
The majority of Thyagaraja's composi-
tions are in Telugu, his mother tongue, al-
though he composed a number of songs in
Sanskrit. He was a highly trained musician
having been the disciple of Sonthi Ve-
nkataramanayya, one of the foremost singers
of the day.
Apart from thousands of songs of the
kriti
type he created two operas. Thyagaraja was
a great Rama bhakta. There was not a moment
of his life which was not filled with Rama.
His songs are of Rama. Thyagaraja took
sanyasa
towards the end of his life and
attained
samadhi
in 1847. After Purandaradasa ,he is
the greatest figure in Kamatak music. He
revolutionised and gave a new direction to
Kamatak music.
Shyama Shastri, like Thyagaraja, was the
offspring of ancestors who moved South after
the fall of Vijayanagar. To Viswanatha Iyer,
a priest in the service of Raja Tulajaji of
Tiruvarur, was born in 1762 a son named Ve-
nkata Subramania who later came to be known
as Shyama Shastri. When he was 18, the
family was shifted to Tanjavur. A holy man
from Andhra, Sangeeta Swami, who visited
the house saw the boy and sensed the musical
talent he had in him. He requested the father
to send his son to him for training in music.
After initial training the Swami suggested that
the boy should associate himself with Pac-
chimiriyam Adiyappayya, the court musician
of Tanjavur.
Though Shyama Shastry was a great
composer his works have not received as wide
an acclaim as the other members of the Trin-
ity. While Thyagaraja's music has an emo-
tional appeal, Shyama Shastry's musical tech-
nique is intricate and difficult.
It is believed that it was he who initiated
his contemporary Muthuswami Dikshitar,
into Sri Vidya, a form of worship of the
Goddess. By nature he was aloof and con-
tented. He kept the company of scholars and
musicians and amongst them was the immor-
tal Thyagaraja whom he often visited at
Tiruvaiyam.
His defeating the redoubtable Kesavayya
of Bobbili (in Andhra) is a much publicised
legend. Kesavayya in one of his all conquer-
ing musical contests came to Tanjavur. No
musician of the town dared to meet him in a
competition. Finally Shyama Sastry accepted
the challenge. He sang a pallavi in sarabhanan-
dana tala which had 79 aksaras to a cycle, with
complicated internal divisions. Kesavayya
could not match this performance and was
declared defeated.
Muthuswami Dikshitar was born in 1775
in Tiruvarur to Ramaswami and his wife
Subbammal. His ancestors had migrated to
the South before the march of invading ar-
mies. Ramaswami was a trained musician and
it was under him that his son learnt his music.
Ramaswami
was
patronised
by
Muthukrishna Mudaliar who made him a
court musician. Ramaswami was asked by his
guru Chidambaranatha Yogi to send his son
with him on his pilgrimage.. Ramaswami re-
luctantly agreed.
Muthuswami was in Kasi for six years
mastering Sanskrit literature and grammar,
philosophy and
tantra yoga.
On the eve of his
departure from Varanasi, Chidambaram Yogi
told him, "Go and have a bath in the Ganga
before you leave. You will be blessed." He
complied.
While in the Ganga a veena with the words
"Rama" inscribed on it came to him from the
waters. He took it to his guru who blessed him
saying: "This is a divine gift. You will be a
master of the veena and a great composer."
Carrying the veena Muthuswami left Kasi for
home. This veena is believed to be preserved
till this day by his brother Baluswamy.
After returning to Manali, he visited Tiru-
tanni, Tiruvarur, Tanjavur and other places,
finally reaching Ettiyapuram. At the request
of the king he settled there and became his
guru until his death in 1834.
Muthuswami Dikshitar composed several
hundreds of songs mainly
kritis
besides a few
raga-malikas.
Among the better known are
his
Tiruttani kritis, Navavarana kritis
and
Navgraha kritis.
His disciple, Vadivelu was
an adept at the violin at the court of Maharaja
Swati Tirunal Rama Varma of Travancore.
From then it became an accepted instrument
in Kamatak music.