Dr. S.T. Rao, the founding father and backbone behind the Chicago Tyagaraja Utsavam passed away on 1 Feb, 2011 at 2:30am at Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Let us join together to share our grief and condolences with his family (Mrs Lalitha Rao, Venkatesh(son), Revathi (daughter-in-law), Asha (daughter), Hariprasad(son-in-law) and grand children.
I would like to share with you all some of my personal reminiscences and his key role in being very instrumental to steering CTU’s course of action virtually from 1977 till 1990.
Dr. S.T. Rao and Mrs. Lalitha Rao with flautist Dr. N. Ramani at CTU 2007
My association with Dr. S.T. Rao dates back to 1969. It was a long trip from Cleveland to Chicago. In his car besides Tyagaraja Rao and Lalitha Rao, we were two (TES and Usha) and we also had, Swamy (Madison) & Venkatesh Athreya. The entire trip was spent listening to Madurai Somu’s full concert with Lalgudi in a cassette player blasting in full volume. He dropped us at our apartment in 5500 South Shore Drive, Flamingo. He was making a move from Case Western Reserve University to Madison, Wisconsin as a new faculty member in the dept of Biochemistry. All I knew in that 6 hour trip was that he is from Tanjavoor, his pet choice was the music of Mali, His classmate from school was flutist Ramani, he was a friend of my classmate T. Parthasarathy at Cleveland. In two weeks he visited us in Chicago to exchange musical interests. I had no musical possessions other than the 45 rpm records of Balamurali (Nagumomu, Devadideva, Neerajadala Lochani), , Ne Podagonte(MSG), Mokshamugalada (Lagudi), Yamihe (Natabhairavi), Hindola tillana ( Balamurali with Lagudi on violin-78 rpm), Salamad- Nazakat- Bhoop and Malkauns (33rpm), Pithukkuli ( Nadalola thimikita, 33rpm), Chittibabu (Kuil song + ??33rpm) , I never possessed any record player and I had just moved to USA from England with these records. I was too possessive to part with them and he said, we should visit him where he has a record player, and a tape recorder to play tapes etc. He was renting a 2 bedroom apartment .
Within two months my friend T. Parthasarathy with Ranjani visited us with his friends Nair, Radha Nair, Shankar, Santhanam and we all decided to visit S.T. Rao in Madison in Pacha’s car. Only Pacha and Nair knew any driving and we took 7 full hours to reach Madison. We made several iterations before we could get out of Chicago. Rao’s were waiting patiently for us to arrive and we had a feast, that I cannot forget in my life. Only men folks could go as there was no space in the car for all.
In 1971 he moved to Purdue University as part of a sabbatical deal and my visit to Rao’s apartment increased more, roughly once every three weeks. Panju, Vittal Rao, Kannan , Radhakrishnan (the person who knew MDR and who took me to MDR’s house ) were all ardent music fans and so many were part of our musical association. In 1971 Ramani, and Lalgudi were visiting USA on a concert tour for the first time and Dr K. S Rajan helped us to organize their program as part of IIT (Indian) cultural program. Ramani stayed with us in our apartment ( South Commons 2921) and needless to say the music related conversation lasted from 8pm till 4am and we were all itching to talk to the great musician and his normal life and Ramani being Rao’s schoolmate from Tiruvaroor school, we were simply excited to hear him play casually ragas like Chandrajyoti, Punnagavarali, and what not. Lalgudi’s Arabhi start in the private concert simply thrilled us and so was Ramani’s nagumomu and their Desh and so on.. Rao was keen on attending their concert in Ann Arbor and I was excited and with perhaps Panju we went to Ann Arbor, MI and stayed with CM Venkatachalam a close friend of Rao. I had heated arguments with Venkatachalam and Rao was trying to pacify both sides. For me Balamurali was the musical ultimate while Venkatachalam, formally musically trained and drawn to totally conservative music was all in all for Semmangudi. Having been exposed to Hindustani musicians and their music, I could not find any one closer to them in voice and emotions among Carnatic musicians other than Balamurali.
The period 1972-77 was full of social activities and we used to spend virtually every alternate week in Madison and they will visit us in Forest Park and Oak Park apartments invariably in the last week of each month. .
After I returned from my Sabbatical in 1976, Rao was very keen on initiating formal musical programs and he said why not we celebrate Tyagaraja Utsavam. While I loved concerts, I had very little exposure the notions of a kriti, sangati, and peculiarities of the ghamakas in our music. However from my school days I had exposure through listening to great musicians and doyens like Ariyakkudi ( at leat 5 concerts), GNB with Lagudi ( Parthasarathy temple, Triplicane Cultural academy etc 6 or 7 concerts for sure), Alathoor Bros ( 3 concerts), Maharajapuram Viswanatha Iyer ( 4 concerts) MLV ( two concerts), Vedaranyam Vedamurthy, Karukurichy and so on. I heard Chemmangudi (1964) for the first time in Calcutta, Somu in Calcutta (1963), Mali ( 4 concerts, one in GT Madras amman Kovil- Bommulu Iyer Street, Elephant gate) and a few more like Radha Jayalakshmi, Pappa, Chowdiah, and at least 10 concerts of Madurai Mani Iyer ( all Big street Pilliar Kovil or Kapali kovil concerts).
Rao called me one day in 1977, during close to bahula panchami time and said his house is there for me to plan and Lalitha is there to feed all guests for a lunch and dinner.
I decided to take his gesture and simply used the stencil pink copies to make 50 copies and mail it to music loving friends in Chicago area. People like SA Balakrishnan, Savitri Subramaniam, Usha Bala, Sharada Venkatraman, Dr Rangaraj (Sridevi), T Partahasarathy, my student Bapat, KS Rajans, Seshadris (Saroja), Krishnamachari, AVL , may be Dr Vidhyasagars and a few more I am unable to remember all went to Madison to be part of the first ever Utsavam. He played the pancharatna kritis on tape, and we all chimed the last phrase each time. No one knew fully even one pancharatnam and we had succulent lunch and dinner. There was one Narasinga Rao from Andhra who had a superb voice like Jesudoss and he was the ace performer for 20 minutes. I organized USK based on Balamurali’s AIR recording ( Ranjani, Kalyani, Saroja Seshadri, Usha) were the singers with me and Bapat gave Harmonium support. This was a surprise program . Rao was very very happy to have done this and we dissected every one’s performance and the next day we were leaving half heartedly to Chicago.
It was on his personal advice that I decided to move the Utsavam permanently to Chicago as the main audience was only from greater Chicago. But WestBend Subramaniam, Swamy, Sakti, Sridharan and students from Madison were all part of the Utsavam and from 1982 on and it settled to Memorial Day weekend with the name Chicago Tyagaraja Utsavam.
While Hema Rajagopal with her very first set of 4 or 5 students organized Sadinchane in 1979 (CTU at Vivekananda Vedanta society basement), from 1982 dance became a major aspect of the Utsavam . Rao liked the idea of keeping dance and adding new themes each year.
The Friday night of the Utsavam weekend was the most exciting thing to all of us. His family will arrive by 8PM and so will Swamy, Neela, Sakti Prabha and Subramaniam. We really felt we were part of a big family. We were simply one family separated by a mere distance of 137 miles. Crossing 12/18 Madison and the Whitney way exit with its TV towers was virtually like heaven and it brought so much happiness to us and in particular to Deepa and Tara as kids going to Madison. People like BN Sridharan, Lakshmi Sridharan, Krishna Athreya and many other people from Milwaukee etc used to become part of CTU.
In 1984 it was Rao who decided to bring out CTU brochure and he managed to convince Dr BN Sridharan to print them as gratis by Sridharan of Xerox Corporation. Thanks to Rao’s great initiation, and thanks to BN Sridharan’s help we used to virtually continue this till 1996 or 1997. This meant we will visit Madison and even spend the night at Sridharan’s house or Swamy’s house or Rao’s house ( By we I mean: TES, with MG, or TES with Sadagopan or TES with MG and Sadagopan).
It was Rao who wanted us to formally register CTU as a not for profit organization and needless to say Lalitha, and Rao were the first two to sign. I was not ( and still I am not) a citizen, I could not sign the application and Chellam, SA Balakrishnan, KG, and Sharada Venkatraman were all part of those activities.
It was Rao who said we should encourage local teachers by elevating them as CTU teachers no matter what they teach and what their musical levels are . We should leave that judgment to parents who choose to seek them as teachers for their children’s musical training . This notion of CTU teachers picked up great momentum and we now see what it is. One of the ace singers in those days was Dr Vijaya Sastri, who stunned us by performing all the pancharatna kritis in 1978 ( West Bend, Wisconsin CTU) and over the years we realize how much it has grown .
The phone conversations about the Utsavam and organization, the fixing of menu for the year, the order in which music will go, how much to charge as donation, in all such things Rao played a major role and I simply respected his personal judgment We used to have long hours of discussions and phone conversations that are now crystallized to CTU meetings.
It was Rao who started the idea of serving Banana chips (nendrangai varuval) for the Utsavam. He will buy a carton of Nendrangais and spend two to 3 days with Laalitha Rao making them at home and let us sample right after their Friday arrival. It was Swamy who will make the tastiest Mysore Pak each year for the Utsavam. It was Sridharan who will get the brochure printed free of cost. It was Sakti who will cut the pumpkin (night 1am) for the Sambar or More kuzhambu to be made for all. Sakti and Valathoor shared the cleaning responsibilities at the hall and everywhere. CN Krishnaswamy, Chari with grad students from Wisconsin shared front desk collections. Prabha Subramaniam will make a new and surprise sweet each year. Male guests at my house went to KG s house if necessary for morning ablutions. For all practical purposes, Rao coordinated efforts from Wisconsin side. I tried to coordinate from Chicago side. For all practical purpose we could call it Chicago_Madison Tyagaraja Utsavam.
While his health deteriorated after moving to Columbus Ohio, even there he quickly initiated the so called Columbus, Music society and gave a real boost to run it efficiently by hosting all visiting musicians to pass through Columbus. Even with serious health conditions he made it a point to drive from Columbus to Chicago to attend CTU. Recently when his health further deteriorated, he moved to Chapel Hill, to spend his last days with his son Tesh, He had to make complex dialysis arrangements to spend a week with daughter Asha.
Recently when we went to Durham, I spent one whole day with Rao and Lalitha and Tesh and his usual sense of humor was quite fertile. We were talking about the bygone days.
I wanted some music of S. Kalyana Raman that Rajalakshmi Mami wanted and he made it a point to copy some concerts of him. He considered Kalyanaraman as a musician’s musician. In his worst health conditions he wanted to make sure my request is immediately attended.
Academically Rao was a brilliant student of the famous physicist Prof. G.N. Ramachandran, his BSC Hons (Physics) record in Madras University will speak for itself. Of course Prof. S. Chandrasekhar’s total score was just higher. Rao was admired as a brilliant crystallographer by many researchers all over the world and many people around the Physics community from GNR’s group will miss him.
CTU has lost its founding father.
I have lost a close friend, virtually a brother.
My children have lost a loving Rao uncle.
In grief
TES Raghavan.