Kerala's First All-Women Panchavadyam Ensemble, 75 Strong, Debuts on Women's Day

Panchavadyam has thundered through Kerala's temple grounds for centuries, and in all that time it has been almost exclusively a men's art form. On March 8, 2026, that tradition cracked open in Edappal, Malappuram district, where 75 women trained by the Sopanam School of Panchavadyam took the stage together for what is believed to be Kerala's first all-women panchavadyam ensemble.

The group is a cross-section of everyday life in the region: housewives, teachers, doctors, and students standing side by side on stage, holding instruments that have historically never been in their hands. The ensemble's age range tells its own story, spanning from 10 to 74 years old, according to reporting by the New Indian Express, with social media accounts from the event placing the range even wider, at 8 to 75.

Getting there was not easy. The maddalam and the kombu, two of the core instruments in a panchavadyam ensemble, demand serious physical strength and sustained stamina. For the middle-aged and elderly members in the group, the learning curve was steep. Deepa, one of the performers, described what practice looked like for many of them: "Many of us had health issues and handling these instruments was difficult at first. But during practice, we slowly forgot those challenges. In fact, many of us felt our health improving as we continued training."

That health improvement is the kind of detail that gets lost when people talk about panchavadyam purely as cultural heritage. The physical demands of this art form are real, and these women met them on their own terms, under the guidance of the Sopanam School of Panchavadyam.

The debut performance drew encouragement from prominent figures in Kerala's percussion world, most notably Mattannur Shankarankutty Marar, whose endorsement the New Indian Express noted "boosted the confidence of the performers." That kind of validation from a respected figure in the tradition matters enormously in a classical art form where lineage and credibility carry weight.

Since the March 8 performance, the ensemble has been fielding invitations to perform across Kerala, a sign that the debut landed as more than a symbolic gesture. An all-women panchavadyam group that can actually perform, that trained hard enough to earn a nod from one of the tradition's respected names and then go on the road, is a different proposition than a one-day event.