Guruvayur Dorai is one of India's senior-most exponents of the South Indian classical percussion instrument, the mridangam. He had his initial training under Palghat Subba Iyer and E.P. Narayana Pisharody, and later from the legendary master Pazhani Subramanium Pillai. Initiating his concert performances at the tender age of eight, Guruvayur Dorai has performed on the concert platform for the past 60 years. His wide range of efforts in the field of mridangam and music have helped propogate the art around the globe.

Guruvayur Dorai has carved a unique style for himself as a senior mridangist. Hailing from the Pudukottai school of mridangam, Dorai has been highly influenced by its soft, subtle, and highly rhythmic technique.
 

Dorai's embellishments during songs are quite simply exquisite. He has the capability of literally presenting the song on the mridangam. Every phrase and sangathi is matched by bold strokes on his mridangam. Due to his vast experience on the concert platform, Dorai's anticipation is uncannily superb.

Dorai's use of the thoppi is what is most striking and distinct: he is capable of playing seperate and continuous passages on the thoppi alone. He has a special "thoppi nadam," or tone to his bass side. Furthermore, Dorai collaborated with mridangam maestro T.K.Murthy several year back and created a novel type of gumki technique; it is elongated and similar to the tabla gumki. This is a technique that requires rigorous practice to master, but is highly pleasing and adds immensely to a mridangam performance.

The thani avarthanams (solos) of Dorai are highly structured and generally contain at least one nadai variation. His solos not only incoporate patterns he abosorbed from past masters but also his own novel ideas. His style is the perfect blend between the old and new traditions.

Two distinct features exist in Dorai's playing, one being his masterful and fluent pats on the thoppi, including his exquiste gumkis. Second being his style during lighter pieces, known as thukkadas. Predominantly incorporating the tabla style, he has become a trendsetter in this aspect for all mridangists.

ACCOMPANIED...

Dorai performed with nearly all the eminent artists even at a young age, including Musiri Subramania Iyer, M.D.Ramanathan, Semmengudi Srinivasa Iyer, M.S.Subhalakshmi (it was Dorai who performed with her in Carnegie Hall, New York), Radha & Jayalaksmi, G.N.Balasubramanium, Dwaram Venkatswamy Naidu, Veena S. Balachander, Chitti Babu, Flute Mali, Mysore T. Chowdiah, Palghat Ghatam Sundaram, Alangudi Ramachandran, G. Harishankar, etc. Moreover, he is one of the few mridangists who has performed with nagaswaram wizards, namely T.N.Rajarathnam Pillai (in 1956, Rama Seva Mandali, Bangalore. P. Bhuvaneswariah was violin, Bangalore Venkatram -ghatam, and also a khanjira artist), Thiruvengadu Subramanium Pillai in 1951, and Namagiripettai Krishnan (from the 1960's onwards). He has also performed with leading present-day artists including T.V.Sankaranarayanan, T.N.Seshagopalan, Neyveli Santhanagopalan, Chitraveena N. Ravikiran, etc.
 

Furthermore, he has performed with leading Hindustani artists like Bhimsen Joshi, Bismallah Khan, Ravi Shankar, Allah Rakha, Zakir Hussain, etc.

TOURS

Dorai has performed in the USA, the UK, Russia, Canada, Malaysia, etc., beginning his trips abroad in 1958. He has served as visiting scholar in prestigous universities like the University of Washington, Seattle (1977-78) and Western Michigan University (2001 and 2002).

AWARDS

• He has received a host of awards and titles, amongst them are the "Kalaimamani" title from the Tamilnadu government
  
• "Asthana Vidwan" of the Kanchi Kamakoti Peetam
  
• "Sangeet Natak Academy Award," and "Mridangam Maestro Palghat Mani Iyer Award" from the Percussive Arts Center in Bangalore, India.
  
• Most recently, Dorai was awarded the title of "Laya Chakravarthy" in Austin, Texas.
  

DISCIPLES

He has produced several well known students in the field of Indian classical percussion, including Manaragudi Easwaran (who went to Dorai for advanced training), Rohan Krishnamurthy, S.V.Ramani (mridangam and ghatam), etc.