Papanasam Sivan

Papanasam Sivan (26 September 1890 – 1 October 1973) was a prominent composer of Carnatic music and a singer. He was also the foremost film score composer in Kannada cinema as well as Tamil cinema in 1930s and 1940s.

A famous composer, Sivan was also known as Tamil Thyagaraja. Using Classical South Indian as a base, Sivan created numerous hits popularised by M. K. Thyagaraja Bhagavathar and M. S. Subbulakshmi.

In 1962, he was awarded the Sangeet Natak Akademi Fellowship the highest honour conferred by Sangeet Natak Akademi, India's National Academy for Music, Dance and Drama.

Papanasam Sivan's early years were spent in the Travancore area of Kerala where the kings patronised fine arts. He was born at Polagam Village in the district of Thanjavur, which was home to the illustrious musical trinity of Carnatic music. His given name was Ramaiya. In 1897, when Ramaiya was just 7, his father died. His mother Yogambal, along with her sons, left Thanjavur and were forced to move to trivandram in 1899 to seek the aid of his uncle. At Thiruvananthapuam, Ramaiya learned Malayalam and later he joined the Maharaja Sanskrit college and obtained a degree in grammar.

Ramaiya was very religious, and with death of his mother Yogambal in 1910, when he was 20, became even more so. He wandered from place to place visiting temples and singing devotional songs. Ramaiya used to be an active participant in the devotional music sessions at the home of Neelakandasivan in Thiruvananthapuram. Thus he learned many of the musical compositions of Neelakandasivan. In this period, his wanderings would take him regularly to the temple at Papanasam, where he would smear bhasma all over his body. Hence people began to refer him as Papanasam Sivan, the name by which he was to become well known later.

He picked up his first music lessons from Noorani Mahadeva Bhagavatar, son of Parameswara Bhagavatar. Later he became the disciple of Konerirajapuram Vaidyanath Iyer, a well-known musician, under whose tutelage Sivan blossomed into a consummate artiste that he was.

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