The Subhash Chandran Memorial Award for Excellence in Percussion was presented to mridangam maestro and guru T. K. Murthy at an event organised here on Sunday by the Sankara Academy of Music and Arts and Subhash Chandran Foundation.
T. H. Subhash Chandran, who was born on April 25, 1946 and passed away in June 2020, played and taught several instruments, including ghatam, mridangam, kanjira and morsing.
Ghatam vidwan and guru T. H. Vikku Vinayakram, the elder brother of Subhash Chandran, presented the award at Gurusmaran, a musical evening dedicated to Subhash Chandran, at Vani Mahal.
Speaking after receiving the award, Mr. Murthy said Subhash’s father Harihara Sharma had also learnt from his teacher. “He loved and respected me very much. Subhash played the ghatam for several concerts of L. Subramaniam when I played the mridangam. His performance would remind me of the great masters in konnakol. He was a very kind-hearted person and helped so many families in need,” he said.
Veena Vidushi E. Gayathri said she knew Subhash Anna, as she referred to him, from 1969. “I was just 10 then. He and V.R. Lakshminarayanan, Lakshmi to me, used to play the mridangam for me when I was Baby Gayathri. Though his voice was raspy, it would open up when he started saying the konnakol.”
V. V. Sundaram of the Cleveland Thyagaraja Festival presented the Sangeetha Rathnakara Award to Subhash Chandran posthumously. He handed over the shawl, a plaque and a bracelet to his son S. Harikrishnan, Carnatic keyboard player. “We had asked him to accept the award in 2018 when we honoured Pandit Ravishankar and T. H. Vikku Vinayakram. However, he said it wouldn’t be apt for him to share the stage with his elder brother and he would receive the award the next year. But it was not to be,” he said.
Chitravina N. Ravikiran released a CD titled SwaraArpanam of Mr. Harikrishnan. The first copy was received by Mr. Vikku Vinayakram. Earlier, musicians, including Ramakrishnan Neelamani, Akshay Ananthapadmanabhan, V. Selva Ganesh, N. Ganesh Kumar, Dr. S. Karthick, G. Chandrashekara Sharma, R. Raman and A. Ganesan, presented a ‘Laya Vandhanam’ to their guru Subhash Chandran.
The event began with the Mangala Vadhya Isai by thavil Rajaraman and party. The evening came to an end with a performance by Pandit Vishwa Mohan Bhatt (mohan veena), Mr. Ravikiran (chitravina), Thiruvarur Bhaktavatsalam (mridangam), Himanshu Mahanth (tabla) and Chandrasekara Sharma (ghatam).
