Veteran Music Activist Dr Suresh Chandrashekar Passes Away

We are very saddened to hear about the passing of Dr. Suresh Chandvankar. He was a music archivist and the honorary secretary of the Society of Indian Record Collectors.

He was one of the main guests at TRC’s first Record Store Day in 2017 at Title Waves (Bandra). He led a panel discussion and a presentation about the history of Indian music.

Dr. Chandankar was fascinated by records since his childhood. His father, who managed a small waste paper shop in Pune, began purchasing discarded records.

The challenge was, that there needed to be a gramophone to play these records. So, young Chandvankar improvised, driving a nail into a wall, spinning the record around the nail with one hand, while holding a pin in the other, tracing the grooves to catch whatever faint sound he could.

Eventually, his father bought him a gramophone.

Having finished his Masters in Physics and relocating to Bombay in 1976 for his position at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Chanvankar had already collected over 1,000 records.

“Even during my early years as a paying guest, I brought along those records,” he mentioned. The collection expanded further during his stays in rented accommodations in Dombivli and later in the TIFR staff quarters in Colaba.

Like many collectors, he acknowledged being self-absorbed until the day he “realized that I am not the only guy doing this.” — thanks to Michael S. Kinnear, of Australia, an Australian researcher who was then compiling a discography of the earliest Indian recordings.

“When he first said why don’t you guys come together, I was like, ‘why should we come together, we are enemies’,” said Chandvankar. “Because that’s how we thought then.”

Shortly after, The Society of Indian Record Collectors was founded after a meeting at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research staff quarters in June 1990.

Initially, they arranged listening sessions, occasionally, they also brought in a guest singer or musician. But their focus was always on conversations.

The Society also began publishing a newsletter called “The Record News,” with Chandvankar as the editor.

The Indian Vinylheads community mourns the loss of Dr. Suresh Chandvankar.

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