WThis is a list of Carnatic instrumentalists: musicians famous for playing the carnatic music of South India. Musicians are listed by the instrument they have played.
WA. V. Anand is a Carnatic musician and mridangam player. Anand was taught to play mridangam by ghatam player K. S. Manjunath from a young age and has worked as an accompanist for Carnatic musicians, including Chowdiah, Chembai, T. R. Mahalingam, Sundaram Balachander. and Doraiswamy Iyengar, since the 1950s.
WThe Kasim-Babu Brothers are the grandsons and disciples of the Nadhaswaram Maestro Dr. Sheik Chinna Moulana. Today, Kasim-Babu are the front ranking Nadhaswaram artists and torch bearers of Chinna Moulana's tradition. Kasim and Babu are noted for both the raga alapana and kriti rendering, especially Dhikhshithar kritis.
WChembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavatar a.k.a. Vaidyanatha Iyer was a Carnatic music singer from Palakkad. Known by his village name Chembai, or simply as Bhagavatar, he was born to Anantha Bhagavatar and Parvati Ammal in 1896, into a Tamil Brahmin family at Kottayi-I/II near Palakkad on Janmashtami day. Chembai was noted for his powerful voice and majestic style of singing. His first public performance was in 1904, when he was nine. A recipient of several titles and honours, he was known for his encouragement of upcoming musicians and ability to spot new talent. He was responsible for popularising compositions like Rakshamam Saranagatam and Pavana Guru, among others. The music critic 'Aeolus' described him as "the musician who has meant the most to Carnatic Music in the first fifty years of the 20th century." His prominent disciples include Chembai Narayana Bhagavathar, Mangu Thampuran, Guruvayur Ponnammal, T. V. Gopalakrishnan, V. V. Subramaniam, P. Leela, K. G. Jayan, K. G. Vijayan, K. J. Yesudas, Kudumaru Venkataraman and Babu Parameswaran, among others. He also mentored many young accompanists, including Palghat Mani Iyer, Lalgudi Jayaraman, M. S. Gopalakrishnan, T. N. Krishnan, Palani Subramaniam Pillai and L. Subramaniam. Memorial music festivals have been held in his honour annually since his death in 1974, the most important being the annually celebrated Chembai Sangeetholsavam.
WRajesh Cherthala is a professional musician and flutist from Cherthala, Kerala, in India, who has been recorded on more than 150 Indian film songs. He is known for his live performances of fusion music incorporating a variety of genres like Western, Carnatic and Hindustani.
WVenkateswaran Dakshinamoorthy was a veteran carnatic musician and composer and music director of Malayalam, Tamil and Hindi films, predominantly in Malayalam films. He has set scores for the songs in over 125 films. He composed as many as 1400 songs over a period of 63 years. Fondly known as Swami, he was instrumental in pioneering classical music-based film songs. Revered as one of the forefathers of the Malayalam music industry, he has mentored many of the renowned contemporary singers and composers.
WSeetha Doraiswamy, commonly known as Madisaar Maami, was a renowned Carnatic multi-instrumentalist. She was the last recognised female exponent of a dying Indian instrument, the jal tarang. She was the first female musician ever to be awarded the Gold Medal of Honour from The Music Academy, the first Carnatic music Institute. She is the only Jal Tarang exponent to have ever received the Kalaimamani award by Government of Tamil Nadu in 2001 with the citation reading "(Seetha) has tirelessly worked to prevent the jalatharangam from becoming extinct and is often recognized only for that; it is time to bring to notice the fact that she championed for the cause of equal female representation during a time where our cultural norms may have not. Additionally, her theoretical knowledge was the foundation for many of the modern concepts of Carnatic music as we know it today."
WDr. Kadri Gopalnath was an Indian alto saxophonist and one of the pioneers of Carnatic music for that instrument.
WSubramanian Jaya Jananiy, also known as Cuddalore Janani and S. J. Janani, is an Indian musician, singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and composer based in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. She was bestowed with National Child Award for Exceptional Achievement in 2001 by Government of India. Jananiy was also awarded with Kalai Ilamani Award in 2003 by Government of Tamil Nadu. Jananiy is trained in Carnatic classical music, Hindustani classical music and Western Classical Music. She is also a keyboardist and pianist and plays violin, veena and guitar for studio recording. Jananiy is a B HIGH Grade Artiste at All India Radio.
WSrirangam Kannan is an Indian musician and artist, known for playing the morsing. He has a degree in mathematics.
WPalavesam Arunachalam was a popular nadaswaram player. He was popularly known as Karukurichi Arunachalam after Karukurichi, his native village in the Tirunelveli District of Tamil Nadu.
WBidaram Krishnappa (1866–1931) was a musician and composer of Carnatic Indian music in the court of King Chamaraja Wodeyar IX (1862–1894) and King Krishna Raja Wadiyar IV (1884–1940) of the Kingdom of Mysore.
WMangalam Muthuswamy (1937–2007) was one of the notable vainikas in recent times. Mangalam was born in a musical family at Sivaganga. She received initial training in the Veena from her own mother, Smt. Lakshmibai Ammal, a disciple of Sri Pallavi Ramaswamy Raju.
WK. P. Parameswaran (Tamil: கே.பி.பரமேஸ்வரன் ) is a professional mridangam artiste .He is a prime disciple of Sangeetha Kalanidhi Dr.T.K.Murthy. He has performed all over India and abroad with various stalwarts of Carnatic Music. He is a torch bearer of the Thanjavur style of mridangam playing.
WR. Prasanna, is a pioneer in performing Carnatic music on the guitar. He also plays jazz, progressive rock, and world fusion.
WTaufiq Qureshi is an Indian classical musician. He is a percussionist and a composer.
WRaghavendran Rajasekaran Tamil: ராகவேந்திரன் ராஜசேகரன் Devanagari Script: राघवेन्द्रन् राजशेखरन् listen (help·info), popularly known as Ragha, is a classical flautist based in Singapore. Though trained in the traditional Indian baani, he is an avid western performer and experiments with different genres of music.
WAswathi Thirunal Rama Varma, better known as Prince Rama Varma, is an Indian classical musician and a member of the erstwhile Royal Family of Travancore. He is a Carnatic vocalist as well as an exponent of the Veena. He is also recognised as a music teacher, musicologist, writer and orator. He has given concerts and conducted music workshops all over India and in several other countries including USA, UK, Netherlands, France, UAE, Malaysia and Singapore. YouTube videos of his concerts, classes and lecdems are popular among music lovers, music students and professional musicians alike, and have exceeded 50 lakh views.
WPantula Rama is a singer and instrumentalist who performs Carnatic music.
WV. Ramarathnam (1917–2008) was a Carnatic musician, author, teacher and composer known under the mudra Rama. His career spanned approximately 70 years until his death in 2008.
WGingger Shankar is an Indian American singer, composer and multi-instrumentalist. She has scored several films, including Circumstance.
WH. Ramachandra Shastry was an Indian Carnatic flautist. He belonged to the bani of Sarabha Sastri and learned music from Palladam Sanjiva Rao, a direct disciple of Sastri].
WThalainayar Narayanaswamy Sivakumar (T. N. Sivakumar) ,(Telugu: తీ. ఎం. శివకుమార్) is a visually challenged carnatic flutist guru from Chennai. He is a disciple of Sri T. R. Mahalingam. He has performed in various cultural concerts across the globe. He was told by Kanchi Paramacharyar H.H.Chandrashekara saraswathy that he would be leading the rest of his life with a bamboo stick;. Sri. Sivakumar lost his father at an early age and was brought up by his mother. His mother was very well versed in carnatic music who was his first teacher. Sri.Sivakumar started learning vocal music from his mother and started learning the flute from the age of seventeen. He started learning many songs just by listening to the radio. She contributed a lot by taking her visually challenged son everywhere to learn music taught him to play songs in a particular style. He mastered many songs composed in a way his mother sang.
WUppalapu Srinivas was an Indian mandolin player in Carnatic classical music and composer. Because he was a child prodigy, he was sometimes called the Mozart of classical Indian music.
WSmt. Pushpa Srivatsan is an ardent worshipper of Sadguru Sri Tyagabrahmam of Tiruvaiyaru, Tamil Nadu. She is a Sarasvati Veena artiste. Pushpa picked up the rudiments of the Veena Dhanammal technique from Sri R. Rangaramanuja Ayyangar, a great admirer of Veena Dhanammal and her disciple for 12 years. Reclusive by nature, Pushpa does not give public performances. For her music is worship. Her veena music and singing are entirely for her Sadguru. She has written prolifically on the Sadguru in chaste Sanskrit. She has also projected onto the Sadguru her ecstatic experiences in the Himalayas, the Ganga and the majestic sea – again in Sanskrit prose and poetry. All her writings contain her own English and Tamil translations.
WRoopa Revathi, also known as Roopa K.R., is an Indian playback singer and Violinist from Kerala. She started her career as a playback singer in the Malayalam movie Madampi in 2008. She has also recorded songs for Tamil and Kannada films. She was the winner of the reality show Amrita TV Super Star Global, a musical talent hunt show hosted by Amrita TV.