![Image](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/4102iIU1toL._SL500_AA300_.jpg)
Dear Maha-rasikas,
I am one third of the way through this excellent biopic "An Incurable Romantic" on Lalgudi Jayaraman, excellently compiled and written by Lakshmi Devanath (with a MP3 disc of clips from six decades or so). I have been deeply touched by Lalgudi's music for the past five decades and discover new delights every day.
But I have a problem with the title "An Incurable Romantic". For someone brought up in a very strict tradition, a man given to relentless self-examination and development (he wrote reviews of each concert of his), someone who developed an encyclopedic view of Carnatic music by imbibing the best, who devoted huge efforts to develop a shishya parampara, I feel the adjective romantic is inappropriate. You expect a romantic to be highly emotional, unconventional, given to lapses in self control, lovable and loving but full of imperfections, definitely not a perfectionist. And Lalgudi was none of these things I listed as qualities of a romantic.
Who was a romantic, Byron or Coleridge!? Who was a romantic, Strauss or Beethoven? Turner or Monet?
Obviously Lalgudi was full of love for all his friends, disciples, and rasikas. They loved him immensely, around the world. He garnered superlative admiration and following from 1940's to now. So many stalwarts went out to 'bat for him'. Does it make him a hero or a romantic!?
I propose here that the encyclopedic grasp and kaleidoscopic delivery of his art made Lalgudi anything but 'romantic'. I welcome your thoughts!
I can surely endorse that Lakshmi Devanath is incurably romantic about Lalgudi. She has done a good job indeed.