Tiruvasagam

Ilaiyaraja's Symphony in Oratorio

I don't know what is Symphony, I don't know what is Oratorio. Not just that I don't know, I don't care to know. For music gives me that freedom to not know but just close my eyes and feel it moving within me. Listening to Ilaiyaraja's Tiruvasagam Symphony in Oratorio was exactly such an experience.
It was the most crowded function I have ever gone to. I was lucky to just be there and not take any notes. So I could relax. It was an occasion when theists and atheists were together on stage to discuss Spirituality transcending religion.
The story is this. Ilaiyaraja got this idea of doing a piece on Tiruvasagam when he was circumambulating the Girivalam in Tiruvannamalai. The divine that gave him the thought for such a composition also finds the people to accomplish it. Father Jegath Gaspar Raj, a catholic priest and founder of Tamil Maiyam came into the picture. He has been nursing a love for Tiruvasagam since his childhood.
It became a great synergy with musicians from Budapest rendering the soulful background for six verses from Tiruvasagam.
Music Academy in Chennai was seamlessly bursting with Ilaiyaraja fans thronging the programme. Chairs replaced vehicles in the parking lots and I had to park my bike in a neighbouring street with a houseowner threatening that she would remove the air of my tyres. (With God's grace, it remained just a vain threat!)
Amid all the shoving and pushing, I got a seat in the second row and had a good view on a large screen before me as a bonus to the stage. When Bhavadharini, Ilaiyaraja's daughter began an invocation with 'Om Namah Shivaya - Shiva shakthya yukto - Adi Sankara's Soundarya Lahari and then concluded with Janani Janani,' the waves of a spiritual gathering actually began to manifest, thought there was a lot of noise, fighting and hooting by some Raja fans in the balcony.
Dakshinamurthi Swamigal, Ilaiyaraja's Guru, blessed his Sishya in a feeble voice that he may live many many years to produce more and more works such as this.
Soon the CD was released. The ruckus that continued on the balcony was temporarily silenced by the police who intervened. But bits from Raja's Tiruvasagam 'Nama sivaya vazhga nathan thazh vazhga,' did the trick. While the general audience drew into pin drop silence, the more perceptive ones could feel the waves reverberating. The music makes the eyes close, the fingers draw into a chin mudra and the body is quiet in meditation.
It was an exciting day, when atheists almost spoke about the presence of God, the power of Tiruvasagam almost manifested through each speaker MDMK leader Vaiko, actors Kamal Hassan, Rajnikanth, director Bharathiraja, Balamurali Krishna....
The purpose of the sacred oratorio: "So that I will not have another birth," says Ilaiyaraja. But his fans want him back, again and again and again.

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