Music maestro with an emotional connect with cricket

Music composer Thaman donates a special edition of sports magazine

He has an emotional connect with cricket and one of his most priceless possessions is “The Sportstar” issue featuring the victorious India team in the 1985 Benson Hedges World Series on the cover.

“I still have it. It happened to be the only sports magazine which was so good to read and look for,” famed music composer S.S. Thaman said during his interaction at The Hindu office on Thursday.

And, not surprising, Thaman is a huge fan of cricket and is also a regular out there in the middle under floodlights despite being a music maestro.

In a sporting gesture, Thaman decided to donate the special edition of “The Sportstar” issue featuring 1,000 best photographs selected from the coverage of the ODI matches featuring more than five decades.

Thaman, who plays for Madras All Stars team in the Chennai League, formally handed over the first copy of the collector’s issue to Sujatha Rani, principal of Kanya Gurukul High School in Ameerpet. He also donated copies of the same issue to 30 other government schools in the twin cities to let students get a feel of how the sport has evolved.

Interestingly, Thaman said that the construction of a flood-lit stadium near Guntur, to be named after his mother and which will also have a full-fledged recording studio, was nearing completion.

For someone who loves to open the innings every time he plays a cricket match during free time, Thaman is a huge fan of M.S. Dhoni and in fact, composed the tunes for the Chennai Super Kings and Sunrisers Hyderabad teams.