SVK mama

When ram sent me the message by sms at around 11 pm on the 15th of February 2007, i was only hoping it was a dream. so much so that, i checked and re-checked and re-re-checked the sms to make sure i was reading the right message the right way and i couldnt sleep at all for about an hour. thought may be he was playing a prank on me as well.

the next morning, i made sure i went and bought a copy of The Hindu myself to check the obituary column. Yes, it was the truth. Sri S V Krishnan, Convenor, Nada Inbam, had passed away on 15th February 2007 in the evening.

It is taking me a long time to come to terms with it. i m still sad for the loss of such a great man, who has been responsible for most of my musical tastes. I had always banked on him for the best music. I wanted to go to Raga Sudha and see the man's family and also SVK mama one last time, i couldnt get enough courage to do that. So much so that, i actually drove all the way to Luz Avenue and went past Raga Sudha Hall, but couldnt get myself to stop, enter and look the man without life and hence drove back. The image of him speaking on the mike 'sabhaiyOrgaLE' would never leave my mind. The last time i heard him speak that was for the violin duet of RK Shriram Kumar & S Varadarajan.

SVK mama, as i wish to refer to him, was a man of strong views. He was quite a stubborn personality in some issues, for which i actually do like him. His musical tastes were of the highest quality. He would never have the concert of a person who he did not feel was worth giving an opportunity, which needs a lot of courage given the kind of pressures and recommendations any well known sabha gets in giving concerts. Also, he was never shy of giving the correct slot for a deserving artist. His subtle smile and ways of talking are all things one can never forget. The big smile with which he cordially but yet firmly turns down requests for concerts, or for adjusting sound levels during concerts or even to some remarks made, are all specialities of this man.

Every day was a music season at Raga Sudha. If there was no reason, he would invent some reason and have concerts as frequently as he could. Not that he needed reasons, in any event. There were many concerts which dint have an occasion but happened. His was the organisation which let students of music, enter without a ticket during ticketed concerts, for he believed that, this way they could learn something. There were many occasions when he would walk upto me and ask, 'yellam seriya' with just hand jesters. On most occasions, he would remind of some really good and interesting music concert that was to come up and tell me not to miss it at all. He would promptly pass-on pamphlets of up coming concerts and let me know which of them, one should not miss at all.

Infact, around 7:30 on that day of the www.rasikas.org meet at TV Ramprasadh concert, a few others and i who were sitting next to each other were talking about Sri SVK and also about koniyADina nApai kriti, while the main kAmbhOji AlApanai was being sung. I was told SVK was talking about this kriti to some leading performing artist, before his last moments...

Who else is going to feature people like T K Govinda Rao, R K Srikantan, Kalpakam Swaminathan, Alamelu Mani, T G Badri Narayanan, G Seethalakshmi? The long list of veterans who were performing almost exclusively only at raga sudha is endless. Who else calls them?

Its not just them, the long and ever increasing list of young and talented-but-yet-not-at-all-influential-with-no-big-names-to-tag musicians who all could conveniently go to SVK mama and earn a slot will have to loose all there hopes.

I can go on and on and keep writing. All of which can no way get the feelings nulled. What we have lost is something which cannot be replaced. A permanent void.

I am now standing in the middle of no where. where do i go to get good music???