Adjoining
the porch of Bhashyakara Sannidhi on its western side,
is a small room called Talapakamara or Sankeertana Bhandara.
It was constructed to preserve the collection of sankeertanas
composed by the Talapaka poets (Talapaka Annamacharya,
his son Pedda Tirumalacharya and grandson Chinna Tirumalacharya),
who were minstrels attached to the hill shrine.
Annamacharya, the greatest of the
three poets, came to the hill shrine in 1424 AD and
served the Lord by rendering songs that he had composed,
during some sequences of worship. He was a senior contemporary
of Purandara Dasa, and his songs mark a significant
stage in the evolution of South Indian music.
His songs can be classified into
three groups - Adhyatama Sankeertanam, Sringara Sankeertanam
and Srungara Manjari.
The songs were preserved in the
Talapakamara for more than four hundred years, before
they were transferred to the TTD office in Tirupati
for the preparation of transcripts for publication during
the days of the last Mahant, Prayaga Das, at the instance
of the TTD epigraphist, Sri Sadhu Subramania Sastry.
