Follow on

Musings on Music
a handy music diary for writing notation by S.Rajam
Text by S.Rajam, Text assisted by "Garland" Rajagopalan, Illustration by S.Rajam

Composers


KSHETRAJNA - Poet of Divine Love: (1610-1685)

His music & lyric share the honours equally & it is in padams, Kshetrjna excelled. There is enchanting beauty & exquisite finesse in his songs of dignified sringara. A great composer who excelled in bringing out diverse emotions.

Kshetrajna was born in the last decade of the 16th century (round about 1595) in Movva. He was an ardent admirer of beauty in nature & life, a great deovtee of the Lord & a keen observer of human behaviour and excelled in portraying love-life in its entirety.

His original name appears to be Varadayya, on his own account. This prolific composer is supposed to have composed about 4,500 songs, but in spite of great effort by many, only about 350 are known to us today.
His patrons, as mentioned in some of his padams were Krishnappa Naik of Ginjee, Raghunatha Naik of Tanjavur & his son Vijayaraghava Naik.

He has composed padams in over 40 ragas, such as Khamboji, Bhairavi, Kalyani, Todi, Saveri, Bilahari & Sankarabharanam, as well as in rare ragas such as Ghantarava, Saindhavi, Khande. Kshetrajna's padams are specially suited for abhinaya & natya. Though he was great scholar in Telugu & Sanskrit, he often uses colloquial expression.


From Musings on Music - a handy music diary for writing notation by S.Rajam
Text by S.Rajam, Text assisted by "Garland" Rajagopalan, Illustration by S.Rajam