Gopalakrishna Bharathi

In 1810, Gopalakrishna Bharathi was born in the nearby village of Narimanam. He grew up in Mudikondan, a town close to Thiruvarur. After few years, he shifted to the village of Anandathandavapuram, close to Mayavaram, where he spent the entirety of his life practically. His father, grandpa, and great-grandfather were all Sanskrit intellectuals who played the vena. He worked as a cook at a temple after losing his parents at a young age. After that, he encountered Govinda Yati, who taught him Hindu text, and later, Ramdas, a musician, who introduced him to Hindustani music. Following his discovery of a patron named Annu Iyer, Gopalakrishna began his professional career. Tamil poet and Carnatic music composer Gopalakrishna Bharathi was also a composer.

He wrote the Kathakalakshepam Nandanar Charitram (Tamil), two more pieces of this kind, and numerous standalone kritis . Thyagaraja's contemporary Bharathi is believed to have asked him if he had written anything in the raga AbhOgi, prompting Bharathi to write Sabhaapatikku value, one of his most well-known kritis in up aka tALa, in one night. The eminent Tamil author U. V. Swaminatha Iyer created two sources for the life of Bharati: a biography of the composer and his autobiography, which makes mention of Bharathi, who served as his musical mentor. Several kritis on the Advaita philosophy were written by Gopalakrishna Bharathi. The public reacted very favorably to Gopalakrishna Bharathi's kritis, which depicted a variety of musical fronts and was performed throughout several performances during his lifetime. Many musicians approached Gopalakrishna Bharathi as a result of this.

The musicians would propose a new kirtan, and Bharathi would always comply and write a song to suit their needs. The Nandanar Caritram is an example of a Kathakalakshepam, a style of musically accompanied religious storytelling that was common in Tamil Nadu in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, before the invention of film, particularly talkies. The story of Nandanar, also known as TirunAlaippOvAr NayanAr, a prayer (Dalit or "untouchable"), served as the basis for Nandan Caritiram. He yearned to go to Chidambaram, the most splendid Siva temple because he was such a great devotee of Siva. He was terrified that his caste would bar him from the temple, but his devotion overcame this hurdle, and he could fulfill his wish, merging bodily with Siva in a blaze of light. The story in Sekkizhar's Periya Puranam is developed in Bharati's NantanAr Carittiram.

He is commended for his ability to convey dialect and popular expressiveness, and he featured a variety of Tamil regional music styles. Meenakshisundaram Pillai, a renowned expert on Tamil literature, criticized him for straying from the story's historical facts and grammatical errors. In his compositions, Gopalakrishna Bharati employed his mudra (signature). Famous kritis such as Varukalamo (raga manji), Varuvaro (sama), and Enneramam are among them (raga Devagandhari).