Tiruvalangadu Sundaresa Iyer

[venkatakailasam]

The Hindu of 14th april 2000 carried an article on violin artist Tiruvalangadu N Sundaresa Iyer.." Uncanny sense of timing "...

``WHAT IS it to be today, civil case or criminal?'' That was Tiruvalangadu Sundaresa Iyer's jocular query to the Alathur brothers as he put on his angavastram and picked up the violin to go to the day's concert venue. He was punning on the word `cutcheri', which meant both a concert and a courthouse. ..."

read more at

http://www.hindu.com/2000/04/14/stories/0914070d.htm

[Ramasubramanian M.K]

Fine article that captured the quintessence of the Man--tall,lanky with a stoop very much like the Hunchback--spent many a moments with him attending on him whenever he came to Chennai for concert with MSAmma @ the Kalki Gardens and regrettably been an accomplice to some of the boyish silly pranks played on him during his stay at the kalki gardens.
He was very fond of sweets and if I recall Doctors had directed him to go slow on sweets because of an underlying diabetic condition but he could not stay away from sweets--whenever he was in Chennai and while staying @ kalki gardens he used to furtively "coax" the help to get him Wheat Halwa from Sasaprakash in Poonamalle High Road--a couple of miles down the road from kalki gardens. Once one of the "young" mischievous boys(not Cienu I can assure you!!!) for whom I was supposed to be mentor (and ended up with being the an accomplice in his pranks,was tormenting Sundaresa Iyer to stay away from sweets)mind you this "boy" was hardly 10 years old. He decides to play a prank and on the day of the concert,he steals the Rosin from the violin box and "substitutes" the dried wheat halwa in the box--ofcourse he had hidden the Rosin within the violin(if you have poor eyesight you could be easily fooled by the color similarities).Sundaresa Iyer--before getting ready for the concert--"tries to check out the violin and finds to his chagrin the "switch"--thank goodness he did before getting on stage. and gives the "boy' and myself an admonition(richly deserved but does not "snitch" on us to Mama and MS Amma!!).

Excellent accompanist without being intrusive and was favorite of both MS Amma" and Mama(TS). SSI was instrumental in introducing him to the Sadasivams.Unfortunately his career coincided with the "Trio"--Chowdiah,Rajamanikkam Pillai and Papa Sir whose popularity with the stalwarts of those times 'robbed" Sundaresa Iyer of opportunities--this never fazed him and he was true nadopasaka. Nobody admired MS Amma more than Sundaresa Iyer when he accompanied her letting out spontaneous Sabash during the alapanaa!!


A true artiste who did not get the recognition he deserved and he died young

[venkatakailasam]

I have posted a song by Smt MSS where he plays violin...

E SWARA-MSS 163-nin_aruL_iyambalAgumO-MSS-kAmavardhini-P sivan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G_qIcSWmvBw

[rajeshnat]

In the hindu article it is mentioned

Grandfather Viswanatha Iyer, a pariksha adhikari at the court of Tiruvananthapuram...
He had performed the elaborate vajapeya yagnam in his native village.

What is pariksha adhikari? and what is vajapeya yagnam?

[rajeshnat]

Mkr sir
Does TSI have any first or second generation disciples? Before LGJ became MMI's preferrred accompanist , I think TSI was MMI's preferred acccompanist atleast in his first half of mmi's career. I remember there are few collections of MMI-TSI-CSM , which are simply superb?

[rshankar]

What is pariksha adhikari? and what is vajapeya yagnam?

Rajesh, a literal translation would be 'examining officer'

I wondered about the vajapeya yagnam...is it 'ajapeya yagnam'? - like the ajapa we discussed earlier in the context of of ajapa naTanam..i.e., silent...

[cacm]

Vembu Iyer who I extensively queried about who was the BEST & IDEAL Accompanist for MMI told me it was undoubtedly Tiruvalangadu Sundaresa Iyer. MS Amma also was all praise for him also......Just for the record VKV

[Aditto]

About Vajapeya Yagnam

http://www.yogamag.net/archives/2007/bfeb07/vedic.shtml

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vajpayee

[shripathi_g]

Here's a concert with MMI. The Nalinakanthi is a delight.

http://www.sangeethamshare.org/kl/50-MM ... angavaram/

[semmu86]

There was this interview of KVN (Website's name is something like Narada??) where he specifically mentions about TSI, that TSI is one violinist who would play only for half the duration of what the main artiste sang and that he would still reproduce what all was sung and even more...

[mahavishnu]

Narada.org is the website created by Hemmige Srivatsan; one part of this site in honour of his guru Sri KVN.
Semmu, the interview you speak of is here: http://narada.org/kvn/intview1.html; The incident you narrate is in the second part here: http://narada.org/kvn/intview2.html

I just learned from this site that Sri Sundaresa Iyer (and PMI) accompanied KVN on his very first concert!

[semmu86]

Thank you Ramesh, for the link.