Thoughts to Music: Narayana Guru

Lesson from an experiment in Carnatic Music

Illustrated presentation by Shri S. Goplakrishnan

The presentation will try to echo the layers of insights while imagining an idea of transforming Sree Narayana Guru's philosophical poems into the Carnatic format as interpreted by T.M. Krishna. The process of selections from a repository of poems in Sanskrit, Malayalam and Tamil, the constant exchange of ideas between the musician and the team involved, the culmination at the concert stage, and the evolution of the songs thereafter. The presentation will include the speaker's own experiences in the process; a recorded interaction with T.M. Krishna on his engagement with philosophical texts vis-à-vis music; basic texts of Guru with their English translations and excerpts from the music concert. 

Shri S. Gopalakrishnan is a Delhi-based writer and broadcaster. He writes on music and culture. He won the Kerala Sahitya Akademi award for prose.