There is nothing unusual about 71-year-old B.M. Sundar Rao, flautist, flute maker and singer. Everything he does and says is measured.
Sitting in his small room on the second floor, this Karnataka Kalashree (2001) awardee is probably one of the handful flute makers in the country.
“I started playing the flute when I was seven years old. I came to Bangalore from Kolar Gold Fields in 1958 to learn music. It was a few years later that I met my guru T.R. Mahalingam, who used to live in Sadashivanagar,” he said.
Mr. Rao claimed that he was the eccentric flautist’s last disciple in Bangalore. “He did not want to teach me. But that did not stop me from serving him. I looked after his farm in Devanahalli for about five years. One day, he woke me up at 2 a.m. and took me to Sankey Tank. There, he made me sit in the cold water and gave me my first lesson,” he said.
He said that it was Mahalingam who asked him to learn to make flutes. “There are very few good flute makers in the country, he told me once and asked me to learn how to make flutes. I learnt to do so only because my guru asked me to and have made flutes since.”
Mr. Rao said that he goes to collect bamboo from the forests in Nagarkoil, Tirunelveli and Theni in Tamil Nadu. “Making flutes is a long and laborious process. It is also very scientific. If the measurements are not intact, the flute will just become a bamboo pipe with holes.”
He also said that fine tuning a flute is an integral process in flute making. “For 100 flutes made, only about 10 have good ‘nada.’ The other flutes need a bit of hard work,” he added.
Awards and felicitations have come to Mr. Rao. The civic authority has even constructed an open air auditorium in Vyalikaval and named it after him. “I requested the authorities to name it after Mahalingam. He lived here for over 35 years and even used to say that he was a Kannadiga. They refused to do so on the grounds that he was a Tamilian.” However, for the past seven years, the auditorium has not been inaugurated.
Mr. Rao gets an honorarium of Rs. 2,000 from the Union Government and Rs. 1,000 from the State Government. He now gives lessons in flute, violin, keyboard, mridanga and vocal music. “I give lessons free. Mahalingam, whom I cared for during the last days of his life, gave me the gift of music. I want to pass it on to others and enrich their lives.”
The septuagenarian wishes to set up a music school and name it after his guru. He said he had requested the Government to give him a site in the city where he could set up the music school. He claimed that even after going from pillar to post, his request fell on deaf ears. “I will not give up. I will do my best to set up the school. Music is the purpose of my life, and it is what is keeping me alive,” he said.
Mr. Rao can be contacted on 094483-11418.
