01/04/2026
In our search for the Kuzhal, the wind instrument central to Kadar song and ritual, it was Chandrika chechi who gently guided us to Vijayan chettan in Malakkapara.
A man of few words and quiet grace, he asked his daughter to bring out his Kuzhal. We sat beneath a towering wild jack tree as he carefully fashioned a fresh mouthpiece using tender fronds from the fish tail palm, drawn from a small, well-worn wooden box he carried with him.
He told us of how he had learnt to craft and play the instrument from his father; of the different tunes that belong to different occasions, each with its own purpose, its own memory.
As if the experience wasn't already special, another layer of beauty was unfolding softly on our friend Meenaxi’s notepad... watercolour strokes of Vijayan chettan and his Kuzhal, as if the music had found another form of expression.
sankaran .in
.summer.rain
,
