It was a big day for T.N. Seshagopalan. On April 4, a function was held in Chennai to felicitate the leading carnatic vocalist to mark his fiftieth year in the field of carnatic music and on his being awarded the 'Padma Bhushan' this year.

The grand event was organised by Seshagopalan's sishyas at Narada Gana Sabha's main hall, Alwarpet, Chennai.

Several leading musicians, rasikas and Seshagopalan's childhood friends and family members were part of this warm event. And one of them was Sengotta Rajamani, who played the mridangam for Seshagopalan's first kutcheri in 1955. The vocalist gave his first concert, on Thamizh New Year's day at an Ayyapan temple in Kulathuppuzhai, Kerala. And he was seven years old then.

At the function on Sunday, the maestro's sishyas presented him a purse, a plaque and a huge garland, as rose petals were dropped from the top! An audio-visual presentation on 'TNS - the legend - timeless in time' was screened. A 20-minute presentation, this featured video clippings of Seshagopalan's kutcheris, his childhood photographs and the vocalist reminiscing about his guru Sankara Sivam. And musicians D.K. Pattammal, Haridwaramangalam Palanivel, Mandolin Srinivas, Ravikiran and Sanjay Subrahmanyam spoke about T.N.S., in this video presentation.

A souvenir was also released and a photo display was organised at the auditorium's foyer. Leading the team of disciples that put together this event were Gayathri Girish, Sribala Ramakrishnan, Raj Sitaraman, Prasad Babu, Venkatavaradhan and Ramakrishnan.