D. K. Jayaraman hailed from Kanchipuram. From his teen years to
his forties he gave concerts with his sister and guru, Smt. D.K.
Pattamal. After his family moved to Madras in the 1940's, young
Jayaraman furthered his musical skills by learning from several well
known masters like Ariyakudi Ramanuja Iyengar, Madurai Mani Iyer,
Muthiah Bhagavatar, Rajaratnam Pillai, Papanasam Sivan, Koteeswara Iyer
and others.
D.K.Jayaraman was able to establish his individuality as a musician
when he started giving solo concerts. He demonstrated singular
creativity when rendering songs. By constant practice and singing,
he acquired a pliable voice which he used to its fullest range. Rather
shy by nature, he was a down-to-earth, simple man, not given to fanfare.
In fact, he used to feel bashful if a large number of his admirers were
around him. He was most comfortable in small gathering. Always accomodative,
he was thoughtful of his accompanying artistes. He planned his concert
well and it is said, he would rehearse his pallavi very thoroughly.
DKJ had a large stock of Muthuswami Dikshitar's, Shyama Sastri's plus Tyagaraja's kritis. Like Kanchipuram Naina Pillai, DKJ used to sing uncommon kritis in rare ragas. A few examples come to mind:
Parvati ninnu - Kalgada (Syama Sastri)
Natimata marachitivo- Devakriya (Tyagaraja),
Shanka-chakra-gadha panim -Purnachandrika (Muthuswami Dikshitar)
Samayamide- Budhamanohari (Muthiah Bhagavatar)
Accolades and honours came to him one after another and the most
coveted was the title of Sangita Kalanidhi from the Madras
Music
Academy. Unfortunately, he did not live long to cherish the recognition
he got from the Music Academy. He died within a month after the title was
conferred on him.
His concert repertoire included many Tamil songs. He was instrumental
in popularizing compositions of many modern composers like Papanasam
Sivan, Periasami Tooran, Tanjavur Sankara Iyer, Surajananda,
Neela Ramamurthy, Srivatsa and others. He had a large number
of rasikas and trained several disciples. His daughter and
his disciple, Sukanya gave vocal support to him in many of his concerts.
Other prominant disciples include Vijay Siva, Balaji Shankar and violinist,
R. K. Shriramkumar. His son, J. Vaidyanathan is a leading mrudangist.
Rasikas often felt happy listening to DKJ's concert as he could
feel the pulse of the audience and modify his presentation.
He was
willing to render songs requested by rasikas.
Written by Ashok Madhav