His father Narayan Govind Ratanjankar was born in Mumbai. Shrikrishna's grand father, Govindrao came to Mumbai in the middle of 19th century. After graduation Shrikrishna's father, Narayanrao became a police officer in the then British regime. At the age of 7, S.N.Ratanjankar was trained under the guidance of Krishnam Bhatt of Karwar. He also received instruction from Anant Manohar Joshi and later under Faiyaz Khan of Agra gharana. In 1911, he started training with musicologist Vishnu Narayan Bhatkhande and is today his most well known disciple. He graduated from Bombay University in 1926.
Career
In the year 1925, Ratanjankar graduated from the Wilson College, Mumbai. He was the Principal of Bhatkhande Music University, at Lucknow for several years, and later was appointed Vice-Chancellor at Indira Sangeet Kala Vishva Vidyalaya, Khairagarh, Madhya Pradesh. Later he was once again called to head the Bhatkhande Sangeet Vidyapeeth on a two-year contract. His students include K. G. Ginde, SCR Bhatt, Chidanand Nagarkar, V.G. Jog, Dinkar Kaikini, Shanno Khurana, Sumati Mutatkar, Prabhakar Chinchore, C R Vyas, Chinmoy Lahiri, and Roshan Lal Nagrath. As a vocalist he sang Dhrupad and Khayal styles of Agra gharana. A known musicologist like his mentor Bhatkhande, Ratanjankar has more than 800 compositions under his pen name "Sujan", notated and documented diligently by his disciple K. G. Ginde. He also published books including Geet Manjari, Taan Sangrah, Sangeet Shiksha, and Abhinava Raga Manjari. He also composed some new ragas such as Marga Bihag, Gopika Basant, Kedar Bahar, Sawani Kedar, Ranjani Kalyan, Hansaranjani, and Salagvarali. He was appointed Chairman of the Jury of Auditions of AIR in the mid-1950s, during which time he was involved in a re-auditioning controversy, which involved re-auditioning of Indian musicians performing on AIR, who considered it an insult and opposed it and were upset about Ratanjankar's rude and angry comments, and this greatly diminished his reputation among Indian classical musicians. In 1957 he was awarded the Padma Bhushan by the Government of India, and in 1963 the Sangeet Natak Akademi, India's National Academy for Music, Dance and Drama, awarded him its highest honour for lifetime achievement, the Sangeet Natak Akademi Fellowship.
