Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Umayalpuram Sivaraman honoured

CHENNAI: Mridangam maestro Umayalpuram K. Sivaraman was on Sunday honoured with the Rotary lifetime achievement award at a function that also featured the premiere of the musician’s neo-classical fusion concert.

Presenting the award , N. Murali, Managing Director, The Hindu, said the concert had transported listeners to a world difficult to describe.

Mr. Sivaraman, who has accompanied legendary Carnatic and Hindustani vocalists, possessed technical virtuosity and laya prowess. In fact, Mr. Sivaraman had been described by his guru Palghat Mani Iyer as the pupil whose style of play most resembled his own, he said.

Replying to the felicitation, Mr. Sivaraman said: “The award is an honour to the divine instrument—the mridangam. It is the mridangam and my birthplace Umayalpuram that have given me my present stature in the Carnatic music.”

He said his lifetime mission was to serve the cause of music, musicians and institutions devoted to music and to constantly seek the blessings of rasikas. He recalled that once when asked after performing a concert for a fashion show, how as someone so deeply rooted in tradition he could venture into the modern, he had replied that “only a traditionalist could do anything for music.”

The core points of music represented universality and cohesion, said the musician, who is into the 62nd year of his career. The citation described Mr. Sivaraman as an “inspirational vidwan whose new techniques, innovations and creative ability in accompaniment, solo renditions and jugalbandhi programmes with pan Indian and global counterparts have earned him a ‘high priest’ status in the world of art.” The percussionist was also a “visionary who has been working for the upkeep of the traditional way of playing without sacrificing the modern impact.”

The premiere of “Cascade of Bliss,” performed by “Sangeet Sagar” and conceptualised by Mr. Sivaraman, was staged as a fund-raiser for the Rotary Club of Madras Temple City, RI District 3230.

The concert turned out to be a musical rollercoaster that transported rasikas to another world and reaffirmed Mr. Sivaraman’s genius as a staunch traditionalist and forward-looking modernist.

The ensemble led by Mr. Sivaraman featured S. Saketharaman (vocal), M. A. Sundareswaran (violin), Anil Srinivasan (piano) and B. S. Purushothaman (kanjira).

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