Nedunuri Krishnamurthy is among the few who have attained the highest level of spiritual communion with God through their ‘sadhana’ of music, Sadguru Sivananda Murthy said in his tribute to the doyen of Carnatic music Nedunuri Krishnamurti who passed away on December 8.

In a message that was read out at the memorial meeting organised here on Tuesday, Sadguru said Nedunuri would always be remembered as long as Carnatic Classical music was performed. “We are blessed to be born in the same country and state,” he added.

Later, exponents of Carnatic classical music, many of them disciples of Nedunuri, came together to perform at the Kalabharati Auditorium here to pay a musical tribute to the departed Nadayogi. Paying rich tributes to Nedunuri many recalled his singular contribution to Carnatic music especially in setting the tunes for Annammayya, Bhakta Ramdas kirtanas and also for some Tyagaraja kritis.

The three-hour programme began with Garimella Balakrishna Prasad, who has become synonymous with Annammacharya kirtanas, termed it his good fortune to have been a disciple of Nedunuri and performed a concert of Annamayya kirtanas. Shobha Raju said she was blessed to be able to pick up a few pebbles from the ocean of knowledge that late Nedunuri was.

Malladi Brothers got emotional while paying their tributes and recalled their Guru’s instructions to promote the three great Telugu composers Annamayya, Ramdas and Tyagaraja.

It was unfortunate that neither the people nor the Government of Andhra Pradesh gave him due recognition, founder trustee of Visakha Music and Dance Academy C.S.N. Raju lamented. Chairman of Visakha Music Academy R Prabhakar Rao recalled his long association with the maestro.

Thespian Gollapudi Maruthi Rao, musicologist Perala Balamurali Krishna, patron of performing arts S. Vijaykumar and others spoke.