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Vol. XXV No. 17, December 16-31, 2015
Should the floods wash away the Music Season?
By A Special Correspondent
It is very unlikely that in other circumstances the Madras Music Season would have occupied centre stage like the way it did recently. It is after all an event that involves a miniscule percentage of our city’s population, though it does have an inordinately huge public profile. The floods and the suffering they caused gave rise to a huge controversy (huge by Carnatic Music/Bharata Natyam standards that is), which even had the national media having a story on what it termed as the Margali Music Season.
At the heart of it all was a debate on whether the Season really needs to be held at a time when so many people had suffered so much. A couple of top-ranking artistes, at least one of whom had his home affected by the flood, cancelled their concerts. What followed was a call from mainly the dance community, for cancelling the entire December season. This was rather cleverly done, for dance programmes begin in January and not December, by when no doubt, the artistes reasoned, the flood would be forgotten.
Does the Season have to go on at a time when even clubs have called off Christmas and New Year celebrations? I would say ‘yes’, because the music season is not an entertainment gala but what many would think is a serious exposition of the classical arts, which are primarily religious by nature. If prayers have the power to heal, why not music also? Secondly, the ecology of the arts, to quote from a phrase heard over the television, is not just about the top ranking stars. The entire music season has a whole lot of people dependent on it – accompanists who perform practically the whole month and so receive additional income, hotels, transport operators, microphone and sound technicians, make-up men, dressmakers and several others. All of them stand to lose if the Season is called off and these are all people who have already lost much in the floods. If they do not earn to recoup, how else will they manage? Also suffering losses would be the Non Resident Indians who, let us admit, are a big support to the event. They invariably book their tickets months in advance, on the basis of no-cancellation fares. If the season were not to be held, it would shake their confidence about the December events in future.
That the organisers are sensitive to the sufferings of the public is amply manifest from the joint statement issued by nine big Sabhas who have said that a significant portion of their earnings during the Season will be set aside for flood relief. What is more heartening is the way several performing musicians have been spending time on flood relief work. S Sowmya, who is one of the seniors in the field, has been leading a team comprising several younger performers such as Bharat Sundar and Ashwath Narayan to remote slums in South Chennai and distributing relief material. These people have thought nothing about standing in ankle deep sludge during the day and then coming back to perform concerts in the evening. Sanjay Subrahmanyan, who by virtue of being the Sangita Kalanidhi designate at the Music Academy and therefore the star of the year, has lent a helping hand in packing and distributing relief material. Kunnakkudi Balamuralikrishna and Anil Srinivasan have been active in rehabilitation efforts. Young performer Rithvik Raja along with others has been regularly visiting North Chennai where the team, protected with gloves and masks, has been distributing relief material. To him, the beauty of George Town’s architecture has contrasted with the chaos at ground level. He feels that the way everyone involved, political parties, government agencies and volunteer teams, worked in tandem in North Chennai, ought to be an example for the rest of the city. Mridangist Trivandrum Balaji has announced that he views concerts as a prayer and that some of his earnings would go to flood relief. The Lalgudi siblings, GJR Krishnan and Vijayalakshmi have gone a step further and announced that all their earnings in December would be donated.
Musicians have therefore showed that their heart is in the right place. Why then should they be denied the right to perform, especially when much of the proceeds are going towards flood relief? Can we not take an example from people like Dame Vera Lynn and Marlene Dietrich who showed that it was important to entertain people during World War II? Troubled times are also opportunities to show our spirit. Let the Season have its way.
