CHENNAI: Music that traces history, and a means that carries it across time – both come into view at the restored Victoria Public Hall. Here, sounds that once filled royal courts and travelled across the landscapes of the Sangam era are heard again, not as echoes but by the means.
Nearly 150 rare musical instruments are brought together and demonstrated, allowing visitors to sense how music once moved through the Tamil lands of Kurinji, Mullai and Marudham. The exhibit is assembled and guided by Manikandan, a sound engineer whose work spans research, performance and field practice.
The collection spans membranophones, aerophones, chordophones and idiophones, drawing from references in Sangam-era texts such as Silappadikaram, Thiruvaasagam, etc, alongside instruments preserved by tribal communities of Tamil Nadu. Powni, a string instrument that traces to the Marudham landscape, was built out of padi or marakka, the rice-measuring vessel. Kinnaram, shaped from bottle gourd, sits beside early instruments made from seeds, from a time before metal entered musical craft. A 300-year-old Thutheri, a brass wind instrument, points to the lineage of modern trumpets. The instruments displayed are vast, dense much like the history they carry.
Some instruments remain tied to temples, heard only in limited rituals. The Imuga mulavu is one such. Found at the Thyagarajaswamy Temple in Tiruvarur and Marundeeswarar Temple in Tiruthuraipoondi, it produces five distinct sounds. And there is jaldharangam, now rarely heard, once famously played by Kalaimamani Aanayampatti S Ganesan.
Victoria Hall itself carries musical memories. In the 1930s, it hosted summer music classes, theatre productions and early cinema recordings. As visitors move through sections, the atmosphere shifts in the aerophones section when Manikandan blows into the 12-foot-long neduntharai.
“I was doubtful at first,” Manikandan says when asked about how this exhibit would attract the crowd. “But people stood in awe. Many asked if they could learn, or even own these instruments.”
Though he owns over 200 instruments, the parai remains central to his practice.
It’s the only instrument where the artist can express both by sound and dance
Manikandan
Variations of the parai from different regions, including Iran and Ireland, are also part of the display.
Hailing from Erode, Manikandan’s engagement with music began at temple festivals. What pushed him towards research was the stigma attached to parai. “After I played it, I was isolated in school. That made me want to trace its roots,” he recalls. The pandemic became a turning point, opening conversations with traditional artistes and leading to field journeys.
In Muthur near Tirupur, an elderly Kudukuduppaikarar handed Manikandan an instrument that had belonged to his great-grandfather, unsure of who else might keep it. Moments like this, he says, shaped much of the collection now on display.