Guinness record holder turns to carpentry

Guinness record holder turns to carpentry

Ramavarman T@timesgroup.com

Thrissur:02.10.2021

“Images do not matter…My family’s hunger will not end if I play flute to them,’’ says Murali Narayanan, a flautist who once set a Guinness World Record for playing flute continuously for 108 hours but now working as a carpenter to eke out a living ever since the pandemic rendered him jobless.

Curiously, it is Murali Narayanan a disciple of the flautist himself who is teaching him carpentry. Murali lives in a small house at a rehabilitation colony at Thalikulam with his aged mother, wife and three children. He had studied up to Class X, but could not continue studies as he had to look after his mother and sisters after his father died at an early age.

He had initially studied painting, and then trained in vocals as well as Nadaswaram, which he picked up under the Gurukula system by staying at the house of his teacher Engandiyur Krishnankutty Asan. Murali developed an interest in flute after he listened to sessions conducted by Nandakumar, Krishnankutty Asan’s son.

Murali set the record by playing flute for 108 hours at Thekkinkadu Maidan on December 28, 2019. The earlier record was in the name of a British woman Catherine Brook who had played for 27 hours 32 and minutes.

Murali has been a part of the dance troupes of Kalamandalam Kshemavathi and Manju Warrier. He has also conducted programmes in Germany, Estonia, Philippines and in the Gulf countries.

“I have not been able to go for any programmes in 2018, as I had to prepare for the marathon flute recital. It was scheduled to be held on August 2018, but then the floods came. In 2019 too I was jobless. The Guinness Record programme itself saddled me with a debt of Rs 15 lakh. Personally I have a debt of another Rs 10 lakh,’’ says Murali, adding that he waited long for the Covid to end. “But eventually I realised that I unless get some work, I would not be able to support my family. I was ready even to work even as a sanitation worker,’’ he says.

Murali’s friends were reluctant to take him along for taking up other jobs, considering his wide recognition.

Murali Narayanan working as a carpenter