In the summer of 1910, British national Thomas John Theobald Noble, a recording expert for the French Pathe Company, braved the heat of Madras and went around town looking for ‘native’ artists whom he could record on the gramophone. Venturing into the alleys of Thambuchetty Street in George Town, the city’s Devadasi stronghold, he was led to a house whose interior was constructed of marble with a delightful interplay of colours that provided a warm and seductive feeling.
The house, donated by a patron and costing Rs. 1,80,000, belonged to one of the earliest Carnatic musicians who recorded in South India -- Salem Godavari. The Pathe Company recorded 16 titles for a sum of Rs. 300 per song, which she and her agent haggled and eventually secured for Rs. 900 per record! She came to the studios decked in gold and precious stones from head to toe, with her accompanists and a retinue of seven servants. When Noble wanted to photograph her, to his surprise she insisted on removing all the jewellery.
She sang exceptionally well with her loud and high cadenzas that were particularly favourable for the Acoustic era, when in the absence of microphones, artists had to scream into horns fitted on walls in order to record. In three minutes, which is all that a single gramophone disc could hold, Godavari sang her heart out to many a soulful Alapana, Tyagaraja and Dikshitar kritis, sensuous padams and javalis, devotional and Tamil folk songs that were best-sellers till the end of the 1920s. One finds a tilt towards Tyagaraja kritis in her repertoire indicating she must have learnt under someone of the saint’s lineage.
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Little is known about this pioneering Carnatic musician who first recorded for the Gramophone Company in 1904-05. Rajaji is supposed to have attended a party in Salem hosted by the famous advocate Vijayaraghavachariar and was captivated by Godavari’s performance. In 1910, she hosted the diva Gauhar Jaan of Calcutta at her residence when Jaan came to Madras for a performance.
The Hindu dated November 1, 1911, reported Salem Godavari’s death on October 20 1911, with several bequests made in her will to institutions such as the Pachaiyappa College, Society for Protection of Children, Annanda Samajam, Salem College, Vedic School attached to Salem Theosophical Society and temple cars and a rest house for pilgrims at a Siva Temple in Salem.
Today, as a forgotten footnote, Godavari evokes no memory in most Carnatic musicians or rasikas. Her records, though, are scattered across flea markets and with scrap dealers. To hear one of the earliest recorded Carnatic voices,
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(The writer is a Bangalore-based author/historian and Sahitya Akademi award winner. He is the founder of India's first online digital sound archive - Archive of Indian Music (AIM) and is the Executive Director of the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA)- Southern Regional Centre.)