As unpredictable as expected

Turned on its head, T.M. Krishna’s concert bore his distinct stamp

T.M.Krishna performing at Chennaiyil Thiruvaiyaru at Kamarajar Arangham in Chennai

Now that T.M. Krishna has gotten his fans to expect the unexpected, the collapse of structure in his concerts is no longer like one accidentally stepping on a hot iron. So, when TMK takes up Viriboni varnam after an alapana and tanam of Bhairavi, rasikas smile at each other as if to say, “That is Krishna.”

There is no doubt that TMK’s concerts, unfettered by convention, are a marvel in spontaneous creativity. The music flows out of a free spirit, bound only by the raga grammar, nothing else. This was evident in the Bhairavi that the singer took up, as the second element of his concert (after teeing off with Tyagaraja’s ‘Rama Bana’ in Saveri.)

The Bhairavi alapana, (which was, thankfully, the regular version of the raga and not the ‘Dikshitar school’ version that the vocalist usually opts for) rang out slow and soothing, with just a smattering of brigas. The alapana did shape up like a bell curve, but TMK stopped abruptly and gestured to the violinist, R. Hemalatha, to carry on from that point. It was only after the violin began that the audience realised that the alapana had ended and broke into an applause.

All the while, the vocalist sat half-turned towards the violinist seated next to him, as though singing for her. Nothing wrong, after all, it is the music that the rasikas have come for, but the artiste does run the risk of being misunderstood as being indifferent to the audience. Anyway, the Bhairavi was good, even if not too imaginative, and the senior violinist did a good job on her part.

When Hemalatha ended her raga sketch, TMK began a tanam, delivered in such long sequences that they ended up punctuated by his loud intakes of breath. The tanam was divided into three sections, the most enjoyable was the middle, and in the end, the singer took up the Ata tala varnam, ‘Viriboni.’ In the middle of the muktayi swaras, he broke into kalpanaswara, all under the baseline ‘sa,’ delving deeper into the second lower ‘sa,’ in dead-slow pace, with no accompanying sound other than the tap of B. Sivakumar’s mridangam, a very long sequence for a full three-and-a-half minutes, and finally hitching up back to the varnam at the point ‘ma ma pa pa da da ni ni.’

Outstanding Bhairavi

Then came the charanam and chittaiswaras, and once again kalpanaswaras. Had something like that been attempted by a genius less than TMK, it would have fallen flat, but it turned out to be an outstanding Bhairavi. Sivakumar and ghatam artiste Hariharasubramanian played a brief thani.

The other notable element of the concert was again a short but delectable Kapi (‘Jagadodharana,’ Purandara Dasa), presented without an alapana. The swaras made an entry at the point ‘Purandara Vittalana,’ in which Krishna once again sang the upper and lower ‘ni’ back to back, which bore testimony to his incredible talent.

In between there was a tillana in Behag and a Tamil poem followed by an Arunagirinathar Tiruppugazh (‘Nilayada samuddiramana’) in Chenjurutti. Towards the end, came a brief tanam in Arabi tailed by Tyagaraja’s Pancharatna masterpiece, ‘Saadinchine.’ That is indeed Krishna.