Semmangudi Mama was a great teacher. He was very patient and never thought twice about teaching you something again or repeating something a number of times. If I said “Mama, can you sing that again” he would say “I will sing it even 10 times.” That was the care he took when he taught. This also revealed his perfectionist attitude to music. He will never let you go to the next line till you sang the sangathi or gamakam perfectly. Here, I have to relate a story. I was learning Koluvaiyunnade in Bhairavi from Mama and one afternoon, when I had just finished learning the krithi and was singing it when M.S. Amma (Smt M.S.Subbulakshmi) came to see Mama. When she realized that class was in progress, she asked us to continue so we started sing the krithi again and M.S. Amma joined in. It was astounding to me that the patantharam was so intact, that every sangathi that M.S. Amma sang was identical to what Semmengudi mama had taught me. M.S. Amma would have learnt the krithi from Semmangudi mama at least 40 years before he taught me but the patanthara was the same. This was a real eye opener to me.
