Musick!

Madras Music Academy honours T.M. Krishna. Not everyone is impressed

- LAKSHMI SUBRAMANIAN

IN THE OTHERWISE serene world of Carnatic music, vocalist T.M. Krishna has been a polarising voice. The divide seems to have reached a crescendo with many musicians protesting The Music Academy (popularly the Madras Music Academy) conferring the prestigious Sangita Kalanidhi Award on him. Singer sisters Ranjani and Gayatri said they would boycott the Academy’s annual music festival. Instrumentalist Chitravina N. Ravikiran, who received the award in 2017, said he would return it. Vocalists Trichur Brothers—Srikrishna and Ramkumar Mohan—have withdrawn from the Academy’s annual music conference. Vocalist Vishakha Hari criticised the Academy’s decision to honour Krishna.

Soon the liberals and Dravidian leaders came in Krishna’s defence. Chief Minister M.K. Stalin, Lok Sabha member Kanimozhi and Dravida Kazhagam leader Ki Veeramani praised Krishna for his contributions. Academy’s president N. Murali replied to Ranjani and Gayatri, saying their stance was “unbecoming of artistes and in poor taste”.

It is not Krishna’s music, but his politics that triggered the controversy. He is known to be a ‘communist’ and a sympathiser of Periyar E.V. Ramasamy. Many in the Carnatic music fraternity were upset when he came out with a composition on Periyar. In 2018, when a statue of Lenin was brought down in Tripura after the BJP’s victory in the assembly elections, author Perumal Murugan wrote a poem on how statues were the symbols of different thinking. Krishna composed it in the Kalyani raga and Adhi talam. In 2023, Krishna sang another song penned by Perumal Murugan—‘Sindikka Chonnavar Periyar’ or Periyar asked us to think—and released it on the occasion of the centenary of the Vaikom Satyagraha.