Arthavan Selvanathan started learning the mridangam at the age of nine from Sri Ananthakrishnan Kailash, affectionately called Madhu. He also received intensive training from Madhu’s Guru, Sri Sriranga Rajapuram Jayaraman, and his son, Sri J Ganesan, in Chennai, India, during his visits to India over the summer holidays for over 6 years.

In April 2007, Arthavan performed his Arangetram (stage debut) accompanying the famous vocalist from India Sri Maharajapuram S Ramachandran, along with the violinist Sri Anayampatti G Venkata Subramanian. Since then Arthavan has been regularly performing in Chennai Music Festivals in India and in various concerts in Brisbane. He has accompanied accomplished and graded AIR artistes like Sikkil Gurucharan (vocal), M K Saraswathi (Veena), Maharajapuram Ramachandran (vocal), Rajyashree Josyer Shrikanth (vocal and Veena) and Yamini Ramesh (vocal), to name a few.