As you walk down the Tirumanjana Veedhi in Tiruvaiyaru, where Tyagaraja lived all his life, a small cutting to your left as you face the river takes you to Muthu Naicken Street that runs parallel to the riverbank.
This is a thoroughfare that has retained its Nayak/Maratha style arched facades almost in its entirety. Breaking their regularity is a temple in Dravidian style dedicated to Panduranga and Ragumayi, the presiding deities of Pandharpur. This incongruity in architecture considering the Maratha connect is explained by the fact that the shrine’s exterior was completely changed during a consecration that took place under the auspices of the Kanchi Math a few years ago. The small interior however, though much marred by modern tiling, retains its Maratha style wagon-vaulted roof. The deities are in a sanctum that faces east.
What is unique is that the southern side of the shrine has a set of steps leading you directly to the river. This is now closed with a door that is opened on request. Above this entrance is a series of arches and above that an alcove that houses stucco statuettes of the Marathi bhakti movement poets.
Just around ninety years before the birth of Tyagaraja, the Thanjavur kingdom, which was already a melting pot of Tamil and Telugu cultures, had Marathi added to it.
Ekoji I may have come ostensibly to restore the rule of the Thanajavur Nayaks but he chose to stay on, founding a dynasty that reigned absolutely till 1799 and in name till 1855. The Maratha rulers brought their own religious beliefs, culture and traditions with them and enriched the prevailing atmosphere. Among the many aspects of South Indian life that was impacted, music was perhaps the biggest beneficiary.
As for the Panduranga temple, local legend has it that one of the Maratha rulers, married a princess from the Pandharpur area and brought her to Thanjavur ‘around 300 years ago’. This was most likely Serfoji I, who ruled between 1712 and 1729.
The girl missed worshipping Panduranga on a regular basis and also the abhangs that were performed for the Lord there. In order to satisfy her, the ruler built a tiny replica of the original shrine, on the banks of the Kaveri, thereby making it the local equivalent of the Chandrabhaga River at Pandharpur. Bhajans were regularly performed here, as were abhangs. In Tyagaraja’s time, this place must have been full of music, much of it audible from the composer’s house. Did this, and the prevalent Marathi music, influence him in any way in terms of the songs he composed? We have no definitive proof. There is a theory that Tyagaraja fashioned the raga Nalinakanti directly inspired by Marathi theatre music. He was definitely the first to compose in that raga. A more direct proof of his being familiar with the Marathi musical tradition comes from the opening verses of his opera — ‘Prahlada Bhakti Vijayamu’. The preamble to the work is true to the Marathi pattern of kirtan almost in its entirety.
It begins with an obeisance to Narada, the musical sage. This is in keeping with what is known as the Naradiya Kirtan Paddhathi in Maharashtra. Then, having paid his respects to Tulasidas, as we saw in an earlier instalment in this series, Tyagaraja moves on to two other heroes of his — Purandara Dasa and Bhadrachalam Ramadasa, on whom more in a later instalment. He then states that having worshipped his personal deities, meditated on the guru and praised the faith of earlier devotees, he salutes Panduranga, Namadeva, Jnanadeva, Sahadeva, Jayadeva and Tukaram. It is interesting that the deity is mentioned first, followed by all the devotees.
Jayadeva evidently refers to the composer of the ashtapadis, a familiar set of verses in 18th century Thanjavur. Muthuswami Dikshitar’s father Ramaswami Dikshitar is said to have rendered these regularly. Namadeva or Namdeo was a 13th century Marathi saint. His songs as those of Tukaram, are central to the Varkari singing tradition of Maharashtra. Jnanadeva is Sant Jnaneshwar, who is revered in the Maharashtra region for his work, the ‘Jnaneshwari’ or the ‘Bhavartha Dipika’. He, along with his siblings Nivritti, Sopana and Muktabai ushered in the Bhakti movement in Maharashtra in the 13th century. In the bhajan tradition of Thanjavur their names are invoked even today.
Sahadeva was an astrologer who was discriminated against by others in his profession owing to the lowly circumstances of his birth but his devotion triumphed.
Tukaram had lived just around 150 years prior to Tyagaraja.
He was evidently a role model, for the composer of kritis too fashioned his life on musical devotion, with many pithy observations on daily life in his songs, just as the composer of abhangs did.
