Fifty years of keying into the right tune for Chennai man

CHENNAI: It’s not often that you meet someone from the city who plays the accordion, a niche instrument. Devanathan Parthasarathy, a 70-year-old, has been playing the piano accordion — an instrument with both, bellows and a small vertical keyboard — for five decades. The septuagenarian who can play almost any song  from Carnatic, western to film songs talks about his melodious journey.

“My father played the leg harmonium, my mother played the veena and my sisters learned Carnatic music. So music and musicality were innate. Though I didn’t have any training in my formative years, I caught up in my early 20s,” shares Devanathan, seated in his Madanandapuram residence. In the late 60s, when his elder brother moved to Canada for higher education, Devanathan got a surprise. “I started playing my father’s harmonium and parallelly developed an interest in the accordion. I was talking to my brother about it and he said that he had an accordion which he would bring during his visit to India,” recalls the electrical engineer.

By 1969, Devanathan completed his education and started working for English Electric in Pallavaram. “I had the piano accordion by then and started playing it. Shankar-Jaikishan songs were such an inspiration. Most of their songs, other Hindi songs, and several Tamil film songs had recurring accordion pieces in them. Along with a few friends, I studied western music under Vaseegaran, a musician from Mandaveli who also taught the accordion,” he says.

After 10 months of intensive training, Devanathan was ready to take his talent across platforms. He played for orchestras and popular troupes like Kamesh and Rajamani, Shankar Ganesh and MSV. “Kamesh and Rajamani’s troupe was at its peak and very popular in the 70s. We used to have 20-odd performances a month and sometimes even two or three in a single day. Theatres like Devi and Star used to give their space for orchestra performances,” he recalls.  

While art and music as therapy have gained momentum in the last couple of years, Devanathan was part of a music therapy project way back in the 80s. “I worked along with physiologist Dr P Bharathi as a synthesiser to create and record music for a healthy living. It focuses on different ailments,” he shares.
His eyes light up as he talks about performing with Ilaiyaraaja and his association with RK Shekhar. “We have performed together quite a few times. I was closely associated with RK Shekhar, AR Rahman’s father, who had a music equipment rental. I remember a young Rahman — then known as Dileep — who excitedly used to show me instruments,” he smiles.

Devanathan has his own Facebook page ‘Unofficial: Deva’, and a YouTube channel Devanathan Parthasarathy where he shares all his works. “I create my own karaoke — I have all the equipment and software to do it. I spend hours on it. Then, I play the piano accordion along with the karaoke mix,” he shares.He is open to teaching the instrument, but one needs to have their own instrument. “It is difficult to practice and learn without the instrument,” he says.