Melbourne Veena Festival: Meet the twins making music Down Under

The veena is not often on that list, and two Indian brothers now based in Australia, Ramnath Iyer and Gopinath Iyer, are working to change that.

The Iyer twins, now 62, are both professional veena artists who have played and loved the instrument since they were 16. Trained as mechanical engineers, Ramnath moved to Melbourne in 1986 and Gopinath in 1993. As they built their careers in the tech industry, they began to promote Carnatic music, specifically the veena, in their adopted city.

This ancient plucked-string instrument with recorded origins dating to 1700 BC was considered the queen of Indian classical music instruments, but has suffered a decline in popularity due to the time and effort required to learn it, and the lack of exposure to it, particularly among the youth.

“Patronage worldwide has been dwindling over the last two decades. With the demise of many stalwarts, veena concerts have reduced, the audience is dwindling. The number of top-quality artistes and teachers has also been declining,” says Ramnath.

In 1990, the Iyer brothers established the Pichumani School of Carnatic Music in Melbourne (named for their guru), which offers training in veena and vocal. Over the years, the brothers built networks with local artists as well as visiting Indian musicians. In 2017, they launched the Melbourne Veena Festival, to take the veena to a wider audience and provide performance opportunities to veena artistes.

It started small, Gopinath remembers, with just seven artistes from Melbourne and Sydney performing at the first edition. Fortunately, veena maestro Mudikondan Ramesh was visiting Australia at the time and performed at the festival too; that gave it greater visibility. The festival has since featured artistes from Australia, New Zealand, the US and India. This year’s virtual edition (October 22 to 24) featured 13 artistes, including Indian maestros Kalyani Sharma and R Subbalekshmi. Attendee figures have risen from 150 in 2017 to about 250 in 2019.

“With interest and uptake of Carnatic music, particularly instrumental music, dwindling, such festivals serve to increase awareness and strengthens our vainika fraternity as a whole,” says Hari Sivanesan, a British veena artist now living in Melbourne who has participated in the festival. “Further, the festival provides a much-needed outlet for Carnatic musicians in Australia. With participants coming from around the world, it also facilitates networking amongst the international veena fraternity.”

The local community has been pitching in too. For three years, The Boite, an art house, has been partnering with the Iyer brothers, providing financial and marketing support. “We recognise and respect the ancient and venerable nature of veena-playing and the history of the instrument,” says acting managing director Therese Virtue. “We also recognise the value of bringing it to an audience beyond the South Indian Australians who already understand and revere that music. We wish to bring the music to a larger audience, many of whom would not have heard Carnatic music until then.”

That is the Iyer brothers’ aim too: to place the veena on the world map.