Nonagenarian vocalist S. Krishnamurthy, grandson of renowned composer Mysore Vasudevacharya, passed away on Saturday morning at his residence in the city. He was suffering from lung congestion for the last few weeks.

Krishnamurthy, who retired as the Station Director of Dharwad Akashavani in 1980, had served AIR for more than three decades at various places in Karnataka and outside. After he retired from Akashavani in 1980, he served at the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan as its programme director.

Born in 1922 in Mysuru, Krishnamurthy was an economics graduate who spent nearly four decades with his grandfather Mysore Vasudevachar who was then the Mysore Palace Vidwan. After his graduation, when he was supposed to go over to Bombay to take up a job, it was Vasudevacharya who had requested the Mysuru king Jayachamaraja Wadiyar to provide him a job in the city. That was how he came to be appointed in Akashavani Mysore as Additional Programme Assistant, a job created specially for him then.

“My father’s sense for music was paramount as he was not just a Carnatic vocalist but a trained Western Classical musician too,” says his daughter Kusuma, an art and craft enthusiast. At the palace, young Krishnamurthy had been trained in Western Classical by musicians of the London Trinity School. He also played the piano and the jal-tarang. He was adept at the English numbers played by the western music orchestra there.

It was this kind of variety musical nurturing that earned him a unique place during Jayachamaraja Wadiyar’s time when Krishnamurthy helped translate several musical lessons from Vasudevacharya into Western staff notations for the king.

Musician S. Shankar recalled that his Krishnamurthy’s English transliteration of Mysore Vasudevachar’s kritis was released only recently. One of S. Krishnamurthy’s close colleagues in AIR, N.S. Krishnamurthy, recalled the time when he and Krishnamurthy, with stalwarts such as R.K. Srikantan and Selvapillai Iyengar, delved into newer formats and experimentations when radio was a new medium.

While Krishnamurthy’s distinguishing career saw him producing several musical programmes, directed ensembles and musical-dramas, he also wrote several books. His “Vaggeyakara Vasudevacharya” is a well-known book.

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Bengaluru / by Ranjani Govind / Bengaluru – December 05th, 2015