Lessons from a T.M. Krishna concert

I received some information last week from PJN about a concert that was happening at ISB by T. M. Krishna. I knew of T. M. Krishna, the activist, and had briefly listened to his music on Spotify but never really paid much attention. I decided to attend this concert out of curiosity and also because I thought my wife, a trained carnatic singer, would enjoy it. It would also be a good outing for my music-loving mom who was visiting us. 

I will try to keep this short but when people say "I am not political" or "I keep politics out of my work", it is not really the flex that people think it is. Why I say this will be apparent in a bit. 

T.M. Krishna started off with a Tyagaraja composition that is not sung very often. It was immediately apparent that we were in the presence of a top-class musician. I am an amateur western classical pianist. I attended some carnatic concerts as a child but found them boring. I preferred western classical music which is rich in harmony and dynamics. This concert gave me a completely new perspective on how emotive carnatic music can be in the right hands. T.M. Krishna has a strong clear voice that he uses to implement some really intricate dynamics in his singing. The last time I experienced music-induced goosebumps (the technical term is frisson) was when I was in a practice session of the symphonic choir at OSU and we sang Brahms' Requiem for the first time with the orchestra. T.M. Krishna lingered on notes and lyrics that required contemplation from the audience. His effective use of dynamics led us to exactly that contemplative state and I experienced frisson again after many years.  

The highlight of the concert for me was the second song, a contemporary composition about manual scavenging. The lyrics were written by Perumal Murugan. T.M. Krishna learned about the tragic reality of manual scavenging from Bezwada Wilson who won the Magsaysay award in 2016 along with T.M. Krishna himself. He introduced the song by talking about the lyrics and the nuance required to choose between the equivalent of faeces and shit in Tamil. The former is an escape from what it really is. The latter is the right word. And then, he started singing. What ensued was a display of the same prowess of handling dynamics as in the Tyagaraja composition, but this time to hold the mirror in front of our faces. The first subtlety I noticed in the composition was where he sang "Hands are gifts from God, we pray and bow" and then paused while the mridangam played a few soft notes and lingered over the lyrics inviting us to really think about what hands are meant to do. The part where the song hits the hardest is when the voice drifts off alone as the accompanying musicians dropped off to let the voice speak to us. We listened with rapt attention as Krishna went to the lowest register of his range to take us into the depths of the sewers. He left us there for a while. Society deserves to be left there for a while to really understand what we are doing to people. 

The rest of the concert involved a few popular compositions, a jugalbandhi between the percussionists, and another impressive and educational performance to end the show. T.M. Krishna told us about the national anthem and how the original has 5 verses. He called upon us to go examine those stanzas and said that they would speak to us in ways that are relevant for current times. If you're still reading this, please check it out, you will not be disappointed. He then performed a reimagined version of the anthem written at the behest of Subhash Chandra Bose. The song really is about the plurality of our land that makes it great. It is not about the landmass that is India but about its people. The people make the country. This is what we miss out on by singing just the first verse of the Tagore version. 

Finally, a word about the accompanying musicians Dr. Hemalatha on the violin, Sunil Kumar S on the kanjira, and Praveen Sparsh on the mridangam. Every single one of them is a master of their instrument but more importantly, they are extremely intelligent musicians who actively listen to each other. The violin was impeccable and played the supporting role it was meant to play. There was not a single note out of place. Similarly, the mridangam enhanced Krishna's vocal dynamics and never played an unnecessary note. The Kanjira player is evidently a virtuoso and also played his part to perfection. 

I have seen Bobby McFerrin, Brad Mehldau, Zubin Mehta, Richard Bona, Maurizio Pollini, etc live in performance but I think this TM Krishna concert was definitely top-3 for me. 

T.M. Krishna's art is beautiful because of his activism and not in spite of it. He has successfully used an art form traditionally considered to be brahmanical to fight against casteism and discrimination. So, why did I say at the outset that saying that we keep politics out of our work is not a flex? Even if you try to keep politics out, it never really works. Even in the realm of science, politics is part of everyday life. It is better to be aware of all the ways in which politics affects our day-to-day life than to be wilfully ignorant of it. Who knows, it may even enhance the impact of our work someday. So I go to bed tonight greatly inspired by the artist and intellectual, T.M. Krishna.