Music: An internal part of his life

KOCHI: M K Prakash, a Motor Vehicle Inspector started his journey with devotional songs ten years ago. Though he was fond of music right since childhood, he says he didn’t imagine that it would become such an integral part of his life.“Though I used to participate at youth festivals at school, I never thought I would take up devotional songs. I started writing at the age of thirty two and it has been ten years now.” He says his upbringing surely played a part in it. “My house was near a temple. It always gave me the opportunity to visit it every day. Maybe that has inculcated in me a strong sense of spirituality,” he says. Prakash says that he used to visit temples of deities like Ayyappan, Sreekrishnan, Sivan and Ganapathy. It was his hurdle to get a job that made him come up with his first lines in praise of Ganapathi. “ I got a job. But I could not get the appointment due to many legal hassles. In order to remove those difficulties, I started going on pilgrimages. That’s how my first devotional song ‘Gajamukharupante thrippadiyiludaykkuvan Nalikeram nadayil vechu’ in praise of Ganapathi happened. It gave me a fresh lease of life,” Prakash says. So far, he has written twenty four songs. Prakash usually pens down his song on his way back after visiting temples. “All my songs are my offerings to God. It is my pleas to god which has taken the shape of songs,” he says. His first album got released six months back. “I never thought of releasing my songs. Once my friend, who is also a singer told me that he would like to make my songs into an album. This album consisted of four songs,” he says. It was his close ties with the Sabarimala former Chief Priest A R Raman Namboodiri, that helped him release his second album without any hindrance. “I used to take part in Bhaktigana Sandhya which was held under the leadership of Raman Namboodiri. I showed him some of my works and he felt I should turn my songs into an album,” he says.While composing the lines and the music, he says he’s never been overly concerned about how the songs would appear to others. “ I am writing this purely for myself and to ease my tension. This is a passion which I would like to pursue without any conditions. Hence its production part has not bothered me all that much,” he says. M K Prakash lives with his wife and three daughters in Perumbavoor.