Wary of Carnatic Music? Saint Thyagaraja Will Change Your Mind

Saint Thyagraja revolutionised the world of music and made classical music accessible to all.

With just a thambura by his side, Saint Thyagaraja composed thousands of beautiful songs that renewed the world of carnatic music and took it to the masses. 

(Photo Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons)

Saint Thyagaraja so revolutionised the world of Carnatic music that music before the composer is now mere speculation. His compositions brought classical music to the common man. Today, regardless of whether one is a trained musician or even exposed to classical music, one will find that all of the 700 ‘kritis’ of Thyagaraja are imminently ‘hummable’.

Akshay Padmanabhan, a trained classical musician and composer from Chennai demonstrates in this video.

This article was first published on 4 May 2016. It is being reposted from The Quint’s archives on the December Music festival.