Female percussionists are so few that their gender alone makes them the cynosure of attention. Bengaluru-based Bhagyalakshmi M. Krishna, however, has gone beyond that, earning respect for her immense skills on the morsing. She has shared the stage with Mangalampalli Balamuralikrishna, Sudha Ragunathan, Sanjay Subrahmanyan and S. Sowmya, besides many other noted musicians. Senior ghatam exponent Sukanya Ramgopal says, “Bhagyalakshmi is a confident accompanist. She attracts even lay people with her rhythmic patterns and tonal qualities. I have seen the audience approaching her after every concert to convey their appreciation. It’s a very good lecture demonstration for them.”
The first lessons
When she was 10, Bhagyalakshmi’s father, L. Bhimachar, the first artiste to play the morsing on the radio, initiated her into the instrument at the suggestion of his friend H.P. Ramachar (kanjira exponent). Ramachar conducted an all-women percussion ensemble called Karnataka Mahila Laya Madhuri, which lacked a morsing player. Bhagyalakshmi, the youngest of four siblings, had until then not formally learned music, but had nevertheless been steeped in it. “My father and brother (B. Rajasekhar) played the morsing and my eldest brother (B. Dhruvaraj) played the mridangam. My mother (late S. Jayamma) would sing at home and they would play for her too.” Bhagyalakshmi initially learned just what was needed for the ensemble performances. “It was only a few years later, when I played at a veena concert, that I realised how much more was needed to actually play for a concert.”
Besides the Indira Sivasailam Special Award 2019, the Uma Award from Kartik Fine Arts 2019 and many other awards, Bhagyalakshmi has been a constant in the senior slot of The Music Academy’s line-up since 2007, where she has won numerous awards for ‘Best Upapakkavadyam’.
Vocalist Amrutha Venkatesh narrates an instance of Bhagyalakshmi’s appeal. “The competent mridangam artiste played some complicated rhythm patterns in the tani avartanam. Bhagyalakshmi followed with an extremely sweet and aesthetic turn on the morsing. Everyone in the audience and on stage could not help but smile and enjoy the melody of the instrument. It was the biggest and warmest round of applause at the concert that day. She can handle the most complex and difficult calculations with great ease but scores every time with neat, apt and crisp playing.” After her start in Ramachar’s ensemble, Bhagyalakshmi became a regular part of senior ghatam exponent Sukanya Ramgopal’s Stree Taal Tarang group.
Playing technique
Employed far less frequently than the ghatam and the kanjira, the morsing is a unique instrument used percussively in traditional Carnatic concerts, ancillary to the mridangam. Made of metal, it has a frame with a flexible ‘tongue,’ akin to a blade, at the centre. Bhagyalakshmi explains, “The frame is held between the teeth and sound is produced by plucking the ‘tongue’ with the forefinger or middle finger, breathing out, vocalising syllables in the throat, and a combination of any of these. When holding the instrument in the mouth, the pressure applied by the teeth must be just right such that there is a gap between the edges of the frame to allow the ‘tongue’ space to vibrate. Then, keeping the tongue folded behind, one should recite jatis (the percussive syllables of what one wants to reproduce) while plucking appropriately. The skill lies in getting all these simultaneously in precise proportions.”
The pitch makes a difference in the ease or difficulty of playing the instrument — a high pitch reduces resonance, she says, requiring more vigorous plucking and harder and stronger vocalisation of the jatis. The lips and the finger used to pluck the instrument can cut and bleed after a long bout of playing, which is why one will sometimes see a morsing artiste’s finger bandaged.
Senior mridangist H.S. Sudhindra says, “An ever-smiling lady, who respects her seniors both on and off stage, Bhagyalakshmi has good musical sense. She is very sincere in preparing for concerts, understanding the sensitivities of the artistes on stage and avoiding unnecessary accompaniment. She calls me before the concert, reconfirms the sruti, discusses the pieces to be performed in the concert, and the planning of the tani avartanam. She works on new ideas with utmost dedication and takes special interest in RTPs. She is a dependable, dedicated artiste who does not resort to shortcuts.”
The author writes on classical music
and upcoming musicians.
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