Winds of Change in Kathakali Music

 Six-and-a-half decades ago, two boys joined Kalamandalam to learn Kathakali music. Both came from families that had no association with any classical dance-theatre. One was from hilly Malabar, but with ancestors from South Canara. Sankaran Embranthiri, as the name suggests, was a Karnataka Brahmin. The other budding vocalist was M. Hyderali, a Muslim. Both got enrolled at the institution near Shoranur around 1958. A third student in the batch was Madambi Subrahmanian Namboothiri, a native of Sreekrishnapuram in erstwhile Valluvanad, his moorings matched well with the ethos of Kathakali. A fourth teenager was Puliyil Narayanan. Today, Madambi, 81, alone is alive. This bunch was a grand mix of talents. The first two became popular with their innovative temperament, while Subrahmanian Namboothiri stuck to orthodoxy in Kathakali vocals. Narayanan, who gained fame as Tirur Nambissan (his native place and caste), positioned somewhere in between — collaborating with radical story-plays in Kathakali even while adhering to his inheritance from the Cheruthuruthy campus.

Embranthiri and Hyderali branched out to serve the beauty of Carnatic and Hindustani modulations respectively, while Madambi’s charm lies in his faithfulness to the classroom lessons. So, who were their gurus at Kalamandalam? Chiefly, Neelakantan Nambisan. Plus, the lesser-known Kavungal Madhava Panikkar and Lakkidi Sivaraman Nair. If Nambisan (1920-85) earned a grander place in Kathakali vocals, it was not just because of his singing talent or leading capacity. The musician got an opportunity to learn under a titan who lived just across the river flowing alongside Kalamandalam. That was Venkitakrishna Bhagavatar of Mundaya village by the Bharatapuzha. Nambisan had by then finished his formal studies under Kavasseri Swamikutty. He was a young teacher at Kalamandalam with Pulapatta Kuttan heading its Kathakali music section. In the late 1930s, Nambisan got official permission to train under Bhagavatar (1881- 1957), whose Tamil family was originally from the Cauvery basin. They had migrated from Thanjavur region as exponents of the devotional Sampradaya Bhajana. Obviously, Bhagavatar’s vocals carried plenty of elements from Carnatic. Nambisan absorbed them all and passed the features on to an army of his disciples. Kathakali music got an overall elevation

Sopanam, really?

So, what was the general nature of the system till, say, the first half of the 20th century? The vocalists fundamentally followed a more local Sopana Sangeetam system. Unlike gamakafrilled Carnatic, this Kerala form went for plain notes with a smaller pool of ragas. Sopanam flourished in temples, where the standing vocalist would render invocatory songs when the sanctorum is closed for the pujas. The vocals, which are accompanied by the handy edakka drum, employs the gong to lay out the rhythm. This metal disc is what the principal Kathakali musician, too, holds while anchoring the stage proceedings, standing the whole night. There will be an assistant, called shankidi, tapping on a pair of ilathalam cymbals. Both will be bare-chested, wearing just a pair of mundu round the waist. Two centuries ago, artistic contributions by Maharaja Swathi Thirunal (1813-46) introduced Carnatic across his Travancore and beyond.

Yet Kathakali music in that kingdom continued to be relatively uninfluenced by the classical idiom that drew vitality from a trinity led by Tyagaraja across the Western Ghats. However, unlike with Bhagavatar, no audio records are available of his southern counterpart: Iravankara Neelakantan Unnithan. A native of Mavelikara locality, Unnithan was only 39 when he became the court musician at the king’s palace in Thiruvananthapuram in 1924. His vocals earned wide praise till his death in 1957 — the same year Venkitakrishnan breathed his last. Interestingly, Unnithan’s chief guru, too, was a Tamil Brahmin: Ambakkad Parameswara Iyer, who lived in Haripad. A couple of other noted Kathakali musicians around central Travancore, too, were of Tamil descent: Aymanam Appu Iyer and Kayamkulam Surya Pattar.

Yet none of them adopted Carnatic style. Be it singing for popular stories such as Nalacharitham and Kuchelavritham or the finely-choreographed Kalyanasougandhikam or Kalakeyavadham in central Kerala, Sopana Sangeetam used to define the sound of Kathakali verses even up north of Kannur. Be it Kadathanattu Govindan Nambisan or Payyannur Kunjambu Poduval of Malabar, or Thakazhi Kuttan Pillai or Mudakkal Gopinathan Nair of Travancore, the defining style was Sopanam. That trend changed, first with Bhagavatar and, soon, through his pupil Nambisan. They infused Carnatic elements, spreading colourful Kathakali music across the state ahead of the second half of the 20th century. Into the 1950s, this kind of rendition began making inroads into the south and north of Kerala. By then microphones came in to amplify human voice, thereby giving scope to nuances from even a feeble throat.

Popular influences

Popular influences Just as Neelakantan Nambisan’s disciples began to bloom in the mid-1960s, Kerala saw the rise of a film musician who went on to gain an iconic status. K.J. Yesudas emerged as a household name for Malayalis, bringing in fresh concepts about voice modulation. Some of the emerging promises in Kathakali music, too, got enchanted by his crooning. Topping them were Kalamandalam Hyderali (1946- 2006) and Venmani Haridas (1946-2005). Embranthiri, too, was particular about clean voice and correct diction, though his idols were Carnatic stalwarts such as Madurai Mani Iyer and M. Balamuralikrishna. Embranthiri (1944-2007) was among the pioneers of Kathakali music collaborating with Carnatic on public platforms. His jugalbandis with maestro Neyyattinkara Vasudevan and Hindustani exponent Ramesh Narayan in the 1990s won massive appreciation. Even so, the credit of presenting Kathakali music as a concert (devoid of the dancing characters) perhaps goes to Nambisan. Such experiments have a history starting from the 1960s, when the two vocalists would sit cross-legged with percussive accompaniment by the chenda and maddalam artistes positioned sideways on chairs.

When it came to Embranthiri, he sometimes opted for the violin and mridangam as accompaniments. Both types of Kathakali Pada kacheris continue today. Prominent among the present crop of musicians are middle-agers led by Kottakkal Madhu. The generation he represents has quite a few A-graders such as Babu Namboodiri, Manayathattu Hareesh, Kalanilayam Rajeevan, Kalamandalam Vinod, and Nedumbally Rammohan. Even while being progressive, these practitioners have a love for tradition. This reflects in their admiration for Madambi and the even more illustrious Kalamandalam Gangadharan, known for his heavy voice as well as admirable imagination. Gangadharan (1936-2015) was Nambisan’s first disciple from Travancore, having reached Kalamandalam all the way from near Kottarakara and assimilating the essence of central Kerala’s Kalluvazhi style. A generation later came Kalanilayam Unnikrishnan of Thakazhi, scripting a similar track-record at Irinjalakuda near Thrissur. Next was Pathiyoor Sankarankutty from near Kayamkulam; he upgraded skills at Kalamandalam under Gangadharan. Cherthala Kuttappa Kurup (1914-84) of the south was a maverick genius, while his disciple Thankappa Panikkar (1927- 2023) learned also from Nambisan.

Their contemporaries Thanneermukkam Viswambharan and Tiruvalla Gopikuttan of Travancore were noted for their sonority. Present-day Kathakali has sexagenarian Kottakkal Narayanan keeping aloft the ideals of the old school. His vocals often sound closest to that of his guru Nambisan, while the farthest from the mainstream perhaps flows from all-rounder Sadanam K Harikumar, also a Carnatic vocalist-composer who keenly follows several genres of music the world over. Harikumar’s disciples Sadanam Shyamalan and Kollengode Sivadas display key traits of their school. The most revolutionary Kathakali musician has been Kottakal P.D. Namboodiri, with his unorthodox ideas and their extempore application. Among the younger prospects are Jyothish Babu, Jishnu Namboodiripad, Kalamandalam Viswas, Krishna Kumar, Kalamandalam Yashwant, Sai Kumar, and Abhijith Varma.

A seminal Kathakali musician who made a meteoric appearance was Unnikrishna Kurup. As the prime disciple of Nambisan, bohemian Kurup (1931-88) carried tasteful influences of his family’s tryst with the ritual art of Kalampattu. Kurup has flag-bearers in Palanad Divakaran and, for a brief period, Maruthorvattam Appu. Divakaran’s daughter Deepa Palanad is currently a strong presence among female vocalists in Kathakali. She finds able support from Meera Rammohan (also a Carnatic vocalist), Adrija Varma, and Hridya Mundanat et al. Deepa and Meera also cooperate in fusion music, in contrast to pioneering female vocalists starting from Sadanam Sisters (Padmini-Nalini) to Kumari Varma, who anchored path-breaking shows of a ladies’ troupe in Tripunithura near Kochi since the 1970s. Today, freelance vocalists from other fields widely deliver Kathakali songs such as Ajita hare (Shri raga) and Entiha manmanase (Hindolam). This century has seen Kathakali music increasingly borrowing melodies from not just from Carnatic, but north Indian khayal as well. Adoption of ragas unfamiliar to Kathakali implies not just a novel audio experience; they cater to the chanting visual tastes too. For, background music decides the entire mood of a scene