Kunnakudi: A colossus in the field of music

Chennai, Sep 9 (UNI) Eminent Violin Maestro Kunnakudi Vaidyanathan, who died here after a brief illness last night, was a perfectionist to the core, handling the instrument with consummate ease and amazing felicity.

Holding the instrument steady with one arm, the other would move the bow like quicksilver over the strings, bringing the violin to life in a cascade of sound sometimes as gentle as a stream and sometimes as powerful as a roaring river.

There would not be a moment of ennui, whether in a solo rendition or in accompanying some stalwart vocalist. Truism it may be, but one can only say that Kunnakudi, as he was popularly known, who was instrumental in popularising violin among the masses, strode like a colossus in the field of music.

Known for his skilful and fast rendition of the stringed instrument, Kunnakudi, who had won more than 200 awards including the Padma Shri and Sangeetha Mamani, invoked the rain gods in 1982 to end water scarcity in Chennai by playing Raga Amirthavarshini standing in ankle-deep water in the nearly parched Red Hills Reservoir.

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