R Ashwath Narayanan was born on July 4, 1991 to Sri N Rajagopal and Smt Jayanthi Rajagopal who initiated him to music at the age of 4. Ashwath hails from a family of musically oriented people who have a vast knowledge about carnatic music and he grew up in an atmosphere of musical critics who guided him to improve upon his music constantly. Ashwath’s first Guru was Smt Jayalakshmi Sundararajan, from whom he had training for 2 years on the basics. Soon after that in 1998, Ashwath started learning directly from Sangeetha Kalanidhi Palghat Sri K V Narayanaswamy, who is one of the greatest maestros of all times in carnatic music. His guru saw the raw talent hiding in him and polished it to bring out its true colours. He had 4 years of rigorous training under Sri K V Narayanaswamy until his demise in April 2002. Since then, Ashwath has been learning under his aunt and guru Smt. Padma Narayanaswamy (W/ O Sri K V Narayanaswamy). Intensive training under his Aunt and Guru Smt. Padma Narayanaswamy has made him what he is today. He is a B.tech graduate in Industrial Biotechnology from SASTRA University, Thanjavur.
Questionnaire to the Musician
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1) When was your first learning of Carnatic music and were you passionate to learn this art?
My first formal learning of basics started at 6 years. As a child, I used to hum tunes and picked up any melody after I heard it. My parents saw this musical nature in me and took me to learn from my Aunt who is my current Guru. I feel lucky that I am born in a musically oriented family and my parents rightly identified my talent to put me under the right guidance at the right time.
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2) Who are your Gurus and inspirations?
My very first Guru was Smt Jayalakshmi Sundararajan, from who trained me for 2 years on the basics from 1997-1998.
In 1998, I started learning directly from Sangeetha Kalanidhi Palghat Sri K V Narayanaswamy, who is one of the greatest maestros of all times in Carnatic music. from where the real rigour of learning this art form hit me hard. Learning from Sri K V Narayanaswamy gave an extremely strong foundation and his teaching methodology was so amazing that he exactly knew how to bring out the true colours out of his students. I had 4 years of rigorous training under Sri K V Narayanaswamy until his demise in April 2002. While I started learning from Sri K V Narayanaswamy, I had also simultaneously started learning under my aunt and guru Smt. Padma Narayanaswamy (W/O Sri K V Narayanaswamy). I have been under her tutelage for the last 19 years now and intensive training under her has made me what I am today.
I derive my inspiration from a wide spectrum of musicians ranging across different genres of music. It is a huge list to enlist. But my underlying idea is that I try to be open-minded and non-conservative when listening to any form of music to let it flow through me to find inspiration in it.
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3) How do you prepare yourselves for concerts?
Depending on my mood on the day of the concert, I make a mental picture of how that particular day's concert to sound. Also according to my accompanists, the kind of audience, the organisation, my voice condition, etc I make a list of compositions/Ragams/Thalams etc in my head. But 90% of the cases I never end up singing the prepared list. What drives me mostly on stage is the energy exchange with my accompanying musicians and the audience So It becomes impromptu attempts on stage.
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4) What are your current artistic challenges?
As new gen artistes, I think we all have a lot of performance opportunities to such an extent of even over performing. I feel like the maestros of the yesteryears were able to develop so much of their own unique styles in spite of having very successful performing carriers themselves because they never over performed .They spent a lot of time on creating their individual musical styles and techniques. With more opportunities means less time in developing ideas and less internalisation on what we can do as performers to make each performance a unique experience for myself, my team and the audience.
Q 5)How important is practising and following specific techniques for achieving your musical goals?
As a performer, I think one must work on regular practise of basic rudiments, voice culture exercises, repertoire building, and a lot of listening to old masters and maestros of today as well. Learning and assimilating as much music as possible is very important part of developing a musical style. These are really important things all musicians should be doing, not just me. I learnt this from my gurus and by seeking advice from other great musicians .
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6) How do you balance your work profession and music?
I am lucky to have a day job that completely understand my musical career and its demands. Otherwise, this would have been really tough. Multitasking has its own pros and cons. I’m not the kind who can pursue a single activity for a long period, and find the need to divert my attention in another field. Also, in my opinion, artists are generally extremely sensitive and emotional people, having another profession (like analytics) which gives the opportunity to balance, as per convenience.
A reason for me to pursue two professions. However, Focus is the key to success. If you focus on something and do well, you achieve success with hope.
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7) Any inspiring suggestions to children in any specific performing art on this children’s day?
- a) Pursue any art form that you have an affinity towards, with all your heart
- b) Put in all the efforts to strive for excellence in it
- c) Be sincere to it and practise it well
- d) Be sure of creating something of your own within the canvas of the art form you like, and make sure you pass it on to others too.
