Speaking of Siva | It's not Sivamani who performs on the stage. The percussion wizard tells BHUMIKA K. that some other soul takes over his being |
— Photo: Murali Kumar K.
Sivamani: 'Rhythm gives me a high. So does my mother's heartbeat.' HE CAN'T keep his hands off things. Especially things such as chairs, tables, lamp stands, dustbins, flower vases... just about anything that can produce a sound. Maybe that's why Anandan Sivamani prefers to tuck his hands under his arms as he speaks. They itch to just tap on something to create music! Once he gets talking about music, he's almost in a trance. He says a quick hello to my tape recorder, snapping his fingers in a nippy beat. "Rhythm gives me a high. So does my mother's heartbeat. From my childhood, I don't know anything except my music," he explains, sitting snug on the bed in an orange tracksuit. With a strong Tamil accent, he speaks his mind. Did he go to school? "I think I remember sitting in a classroom sometime. That's it." Just then his luggage comes up and he asks the steward to set a big oval bag down gently. He carefully opens it, as if there was precious crystal in it. Out comes a spaceship-like grey metal thing. " This was specially designed in Switzerland. It's called the hang and is based on the steel drums of the West Indies. But I prefer calling it the navaakshara. I play it
ulta, like a ghatam," he says and flips the instrument around.
Things upside down That's Sivamani — turning things upside down, inside out, and making it look like it's real easy to make music out of it. Doing things the unorthodox way. He plays on anything ranging from the biryani kadais to empty bottles, bells and conches. It's now rather well known that when his father S.M. Anandan, noted percussionist in the Tamil film industry, refused to let his son play on the drums, Sivamani drummed around on the vessels in their kitchen when the pater was not around. After much reluctance, his father finally introduced him to drummer Noel Grant who became young Sivamani's guru. Once when he stayed at The Oberoi in Bangalore, he asked the hotel manager if he could take their brass dustbin. "I put water in it and used it in my concert. It made wonderful music. There is music in everything. In the birds that chirp in the early morning... " And perhaps that's why almost every performance of his begins with the chirping of birds. He's wacky and impulsive to the core — every time he's in Bangalore, he loves his dinner at the Windsor Manor and then plays for the waiters after the guests leave. He's played at airports for immigration and security officials to cheer up their day. He once didn't play the drums at a concert in Liverpool because a seven-month-old baby in the front row was enjoying the whistling and bird sounds he created and he thought he would scare the young listener with drums. Never ever having studied music formally, he found his "school" in the recording studios at Kodambakkam in Chennai and a godfather in S.P. Balasubramanyam, who gave him his first break when Siva, as he is fondly called, was 11. "Music is like meditation. It's a universal language," he says and immediately bursts into a mini-concert, playing Kirvani on the navaakshara. "When I step on stage, I black out. I don't know what I'm doing. Whatever comes to me I play... Actually I don't play on stage. Some soul comes into me and plays," he says with a distant look in his eyes. Wasn't it intimidating playing with greats such as Zakir Hussain and Billy Cobham, knowing he wasn't ever trained formally and he was not a classical artiste? "I don't have any fear. I play what I know, what God has given me. I don't imitate anyone. I don't want to compare myself with anyone."
Festivals to filmdom Childhood was spent playing drums at street festivals. "I never had a full drum kit... Even now I love playing in temples," he says. After playing for nearly 25 years behind the screens, in studio recordings where he was a nameless, faceless drummer, recognition came when A.R. Rahman gave all musicians individual credits in his albums. People began to recognise him. He recalls coming often to Bangalore to play here for Kannada films. "I played for the movie
Singapoorinalli Raja Kulla, my first ever Kannada film. I have worked with famous musicians such as Upendra Kumar and G.K. Venkatesh."
Drums drove him "But by the late '80s, electronic drum machines came. I was sitting like a dummy at the studios, without much work on hand. That's when I got worried and wondered why I was wasting my talent; I decided to go out and perform on stage." The modest Siva credits a number of people with having made him what he is today and refers to all of them as
Saar — be it Zakir Hussain, S.P., Ilaiyaraja, or Rahman. But he also mentions how some maestros are mired in jealousy. He also has his quarrels with organisers who invite Indian artistes to America and don't provide them with work permits or payment. "Music has to be pure and divine, where there's no jealousy, but only team work. When we play, we must play for the audience." He's busy working on his album
Sivamani and Friends with a host of artistes. "It will also have my daughter Varshika's voice and cries," says the doting father who played on his drums in the labour room as his daughter entered the world! "Music is inborn. Every baby knows sound in the mother's womb. I was born with laya, the gift of rhythm. You only have to practice and be focussed. That's what I did."
Sivamani is in the city for Bangalore Habba and will play at the grand finale concert tomorrow (December 12) at Palace Grounds along with Shankar Mahadevan as part of their group, Silk.
Edited by Qwest - 19 years ago
across the globe. His earliest experiments in fusion were with Carnatic legends, Kunnaikudi Vaidyanathan and T.V. Gopalakrishnan.
No AR Rahman music is complete without the best pair of hands in the world of percussion - Anandan Sivamani. Zakir Hussain describes him as a phenomenon that walks through this planet but once or twice in a century.. He is a must with Louis Banks, be it live shows or studio recordings. 
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