British-Indian violinist Jyotsna Srikanth recalls her several meetings with Mandolin Shrinivas. She says the stalwart gave a new dimension to the concept of porutham, a kind of kalpana swara (rhythmic improvisation)
I am yet to come to terms with the sad fact that Mandolin Shrinivas is no more. Memories of his extremely brilliant raga Kanakangi have been coming to me.
My mind has been restlessly wandering in the long passages of the last three decades in which I had 30 odd opportunities to interact with him, listen to him. My emotional side was stuck with the baby face, a nine-year-old Shrinivas churning out endless sequences of extremely creative, highly difficult, unimaginable passages of one of the toughest ragas. The self-taught child prodigy’s fire-brand Kanakangi took me by total surprise and I knew for sure that he would grow up to be an extraordinary musician.
As a child myself, I was a big fan of his melodic experiments. Given a choice between Mandolin Shrinivas’ concert and a vacation, I used to choose his concert. I was quite awestruck when I first saw his nimble fingers speeding over the modified fretless fingerboard of the western instrument.
His name became synonymous with the instrument. He modified the small fretted instrument into a five stringed non-fretted instrument to help him produce the best of the gamakas or glissando playing of Indian classical music. His music appealed both to musicians, non-musicians and the masses.
Shrinivas revolutionised South Indian classical music by delivering the rarest of ragas with complicated grammar with absolute comfort. He made it appear so easy; I would return from the concert and try these nuances; hearing him was equal to giga-bytes of parental advice to practise music. Colourful and yet rare ragas like Jingla, Bindumalini, Malavi were taken for a detailed treatment in the Carnatic term.
He stormed the Carnatic classical scene as a small boy with huge repertoire with many unheard ragas. His contributions are unparalleled; besides the melodic concepts — his rhythmic patterns were aesthetic, mathematical and appealing to purists and others.
He gave a new dimension to the concept of porutham, a kind of kalpana swara (rhythmic improvisation) and brought in a new trend of improvisational music. He had a prodigious musical-mathematical brain. Can’t forget those years, those cassettes era; where you would rewind a few dozen times to understand the concepts of his calculations, which are so central to Carnatic music genre. In 1980s, I would record select live concerts in an audio-cassette recorder to replay and practice.
Of the many concerts I had the privilege to attend in my early years; I specifically remember one concert of Shrinivas’ with Mysore Nagaraj on the violin and Vellore Ramabhadran on the mridangam in Malleshwaram Sangeetha Sabha. It changed my perception about Carnatic music and drew me closer to its folds. In his concerts notes would be transformed into three dimensional dancing objects. It’s funny how the organisers had a no-recording policy and I tried my luck, kept the cassette recorder in a lunch box and took it inside. Even today I listen to that particular recording. In that concert he played a memorable Ragam Tanam Pallavi in the raga Bindumalini. Tears flowed from nearly every music connoisseur’s eyes around me.
One couldn’t imagine a child performing to such high standards. His recent inclusion in the popular group Shakthi brought in a fresh lease of life to the group. He was adept in collaborating with the greatest of world musicians and fuse his music with theirs. Shrinivas was a very compassionate human being. Fame and stardom never stuck his head.
He was down to earth. It is very rare to see a big star without any whims and fancies. I knew him and his father. They lived a very simple life. They had to face many difficulties to come from a village Palakol in Andhra Pradesh to a city like Chennai, where the giants in Carnatic music were in full form, settle down and create a big name.
As the artistic director of london International Arts Festival, I was working to invite him to our festival and was in talks with him to perform at the festival, next year.
His sudden demise is definitely a huge loss to Indian classical music. It is very difficult to find a replacement to Mandolin Shrinivas. I hope his brother Rajesh and student Mandolin Raju will take forward his legacy. May his soul rest in peace, I wish that he will be reborn as another Mandolin Shrinivas. His music was pure and divine.