Rāga: Rasamañjarī

Tāḻa: Tiśra Eka

Composer: Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita (1775-1835)

This kīrtana, and the rāga rasamañjarī as a whole, can best be described as ‘weird’. 
The opening words are a nod to the ‘Rasamañjarī’, a 17th Century treatise by Bhānudatta on eroticism in poetry.

As regards the rāga rasamañjarī, it is the final or 72nd rāgāṅga in the system followed by the Dīkṣita tradition, and corresponds to - but is by no means the same as - Rasikapriya in currently dominant 72 Meḻakarta system. Dīkṣita makes a sly reference to the competing system in the madhyamakāla section of the anupallavi, which goes

रागाङ्ग राग मोदिनीं

मतङ्ग भरत वेदिनीं मङ्गळ दायिनीं

रसिक पुङ्गव गुरुगुह जननीम्

The topic of ‘vivādi’ or dissonant rāgas - of which Rasamañjarī is one - was the subject of an erudite lecture at the Madras Music Academy: https://youtu.be/B8xmLfHTTCo?si=IE5HnQWMpLFsRvjs.

It is important to note that these rāgas are uniquely South Indian. Hindustani music knows nothing of them; the closest it has is Jōg, which features komal and tivar Gandhara (G2 and G3) rather than any vivādi svaras. In the South however, 40 out of the 72 rāgāṅgas/meḻakartas are vivādi, and while these were artificially derived, there are ancient, 'organic' vivādi rāgas like Nāṭṭai and Varāḻi. Other than these precedents, these rāgas were broadly anathematised; their dissonance would bring bad luck: the ‘vivādi doṣa’.

Perhaps that is why the Dīkṣita weaves lines about Kāmākṣī - the deity praised in the song - removing the doṣa of the nine planets, and bringing maṅgaḻa or good fortune. But, as the President of this year’s Committee remarked, ‘சங்கராபரணத்தை தண்டமா பாடினா அதுவும் தொஷம் தானே?’

#vivadi #dikshita #veena #rasamanjari

Rāga: Śahāna

Tāḻa: Tiśra Eka

Composer: Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita (1775-1835)

Like Navaratnavilāsa from last week, this kīrtana is another mystical jewel. I have often recalled David Shulman’s characterization of Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita as a ‘modernist shaman’ whose Śakti compositions are musical enactments, indeed revelations, of secret Śrīvidya ritual, as well as formulae for re-creating the goddess Lalitā through sound. Dīkṣita starts with the arresting image, drawn from Śakta Puranic and Tantric literature, of Lalitā as Kāmeśvari sitting on Śiva as if he were a couch (‘mañce’). Other texts go further: they depict her sitting on his bleached white corpse.

As for the rāga, many will note that Dīkṣita’s ‘Śahāna’ sounds very different from the Sahāna we are used to, which features only the antara gandhara (g3). For the Śahāna of the SSP, while the antara gandhara appears as an occasional anyasvara, it is the sādharaṇa gandhara (g2) that predominates. This gives it shades of Kānada, Nāyaki, and even Jujāvanti. For a typically meticulous history and morphology of Sahāna, you can, as usual, do no better than Ravi Rajagopalan: https://rb.gy/7jtutl.

I emphasise just one thing: even though modern Sahāna is a most quintessentially Karnatic ‘rakti’ rāga, it is actually a Northern import, and a relatively recent one at that. The very name ‘Śahāna’ - which the Dīkṣita cleverly sneaks into the title ‘Īśānādi’ - is Persian. Nor is it unusual in this respect: think of Darbār or Huseni, each of which are Persian and Arabic.

As is the vīṇa itself: despite being thought of as the helpmeet of Sarasvati, the goddess of learning, its origins are almost certainly Persian. Early Indian musicians took a Persian Tānpūr and added frets to it. In the first half of the 17th century, musicians at the court of Raghunāta Nāyak in Tañjāvūr made those fixed rather than movable. And that is how we ended up with the Sarasvati vīṇa, originally known as the 'Raghunāta' vīṇa.

#sahana #dikshitar #veena #srividya

Rāga: Navaratnavilāsam

Tāḻa: Ādi

Composer: Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita (1775-1835)

This kīrtana, set in the rare rāga Navaratnavilāsam and brought to my attention by the indefatigable Ravi Rajagopalan, represents everything I love about the compositions of Dīkṣitar: the non-repetitive if not completely unpredictable melody, the unfamiliarity that comes from not being in the vernacular but in an ancient and learned Sanskrit, and the ‘mystical’ rather than devotional affect. In short, the sense of mystery.

Navaratnavilāsam is listed in the Saṅgīta Sampradāya Pradarśinī (SSP) as a janya (derived scale) of Nārīrītigauḷa, the rāgāṅga rāga that corresponds to (but is emphatically not the same as) Naṭabhairavi in the 72 mēḷakarta scheme. This is of immediate interest, because the only other interpretation I have found anywhere, a YouTube video by the stalwart violinist VV Ravi, renders it with a catuśruti dhaivata. The SSP, by contrast, indicates it as having a śuddha dhaivata. Other YouTube videos of the only other (known) song in Navaratnavilāsam, ‘Navaratna bhūṣita vilāsinī’ by the contemporary composer Alathur Vijayakumar, give it with śuddha dhaivata.

The rāga, whose name means ‘sport/splendour of nine gems’, serves as the natural launchpad for a riddle of nines, a magic number in the tantric tradition of Śrī Vidyā that is organised around the goddess Mahā Tripurasundarī (the ‘Great Beauty of the Three Worlds’) or Lalitā. There are nine enclosures (nava-āvaraṇa) of the Śrī Cakra, nine manifestations of the Goddess, and so forth.

Instead of addressing the Beauty of the Three Worlds directly, the kīrtana focuses upon the fearsome Durgā. The anupallavi (the SSP nowhere uses the term ‘samaṣṭi caraṇam’) begins by describing her as ‘bhavarōga parihāriṇī’, remover of the disease of worldly existence. The madhyamakāla phrase ‘navacakra bindu pīṭhavāsinī’ leads to the kīrtana’s esoteric climax in the word ‘Nārāyaṇī’, which is Durgā’s primary form of address in the Devī Māhātmya. As mentioned already, the Śrī Cakra at the heart of Śrī Vidyā worship comprises nine enclosures or āvaraṇas, progressing from the outermost square (bhūpura) through successive layers of lotus petals and interlocking triangles to the innermost sanctum. The bindu is the dimensionless point at the centre of this sacred geometry, and it represents the Goddess in her most transcendent aspect. As I said, it becomes quite mystical. Dīkṣitar concludes with his characteristic mudra, ‘guruguha viśvāsinī’ (trusted by Guruguha), integrating (if not ingratiating) himself into this theological framework.

Unlike his more famous and complex Kamalāmbā Navavarṇa kīrtanas that systematically explore each of the nine āvaraṇas across nine separate compositions, ‘Navaratnavilāsa vibhava’ distils the entire Śrī Cakra cosmology into a single, simple, concentrated hymn. The Goddess of the three worlds is both ineffably transcendent and readily accessible. She who delights in the sport of nine gems resides at a throne (pīṭha) on this bindu at the centre of nine (primary) triangles, and is the ultimate reality from which all manifestation emanates. Yet, for all that, she readily fulfils her devotees’ wishes (‘natajana śubhaprade’) through a short, two-part song in Ādi tāla (easy) and set to the well-defined, even ‘sassy’* rāga Navaratnavilāsam.

*Rajagopalan’s words.  

Rāga: Bṛndāvani/Bṛndāvana Sāraṅga

 Tāḻa: Rūpaka - 

Composer: Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita (1775-1835)

This kīrtana is fascinating both for its beautiful but heterodox Sanskrit, and for the record it presents of the history of the rāga Bṛndāvani/Bṛndāvana Sāraṅga.

The rāga: Rather than ‘s r2 m1 p n3 s / s n2 p m1 r2 s’, the Saṅgīta Saṁpradāya Pradarṣiṇi gives its mūrcchana as ‘r2 m1 p nN2 S / n2 p m1 R2 S’, and remarks that ‘This rāga is called bṛndāvana sāraṅga by those who know the tradition. It is the view of pūrvācāryas that ṛṣabha and niṣāda are the jīva and nyāsa svaras that provide rañjana…’ Crucially, Subbarāma Dīkṣita adds that those ‘who are well-versed in the saṁpradāya hold the opinion that there is svalpa gāndhāra present for this rāga.’ In short, Dīkṣita’s Bṛndāvani/Bṛndāvana Sāraṅga sounds nothing like contemporary Bṛndāvani, meaning that the versions performed by TM Krishna, DK Pattammal and DK Jayaraman (slightly less so) are authentic, whilst TN Sheshagopalan’s can only be described as completely ‘Hindustani-fied’.

The sāhitya cleverly interpolates the story of Gajendra from the Bhāgavata Purāṇa: Gajendra, king of the elephants, leads his herd through his enchanted garden to bathe at a lake, where a crocodile seizes his leg. Unable to extricate himself, he calls on Mahāviṣṇu, who kills the crocodile with his sudarśana cakra (‘discus’). Hence the pallavi: ‘bṛndāvana sāraṅga varada rājam’ (he who gave a boon to the elephant in a beautiful garden).

The anupallavi deploys dvitīyākṣaraprāsa (second-syllabic rhyme) and provides a thesaurus of the word ‘rāja’ in its multiple meanings of lord, giver, husband, etc. The caraṇaṁ uses antimākṣaraprāsa (final syllabic rhyme), and contains the unusual designation of Kāma, the god of love, as ‘Śambaravairi’. However, the line ‘sannuta śuka śaunakam’ is puzzling to classical Sanskritists who would most naturally translate it as ‘he who worships (the sages) Śuka and Śaunaka’, when it should be the other way round.

Naresh Keerthi (Ashoka University) has speculated on two possible reasons why Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita departs from the rules of classical Sanskrit with which he must have been extremely familiar. The first is that the correct Sanskrit might not have sounded quite as good. The second is the influence of Dīkṣita’s natural language (Tamil or Telugu) upon his Sanskrit. In Tamil, the phrase ‘Nāykkaṭitta muṭṭāḻ’ could equally mean ‘the idiot who was bitten by the dog’ and ‘the idiot who bit the dog.’ The ambiguity is not just tolerated, but celebrated. Perhaps something similar is happening here. 

Disclaimer: I have no Sanksrit. It was simply not taught in the kind of schools I went to.

Rāga: Haṁsadvani

Tāḻa: Ādi

Composer: Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita (1775-1835)

Following yesterday’s cauka varṇam of Rāmasvāmi Dīkṣita, it was only natural to continue with something in the rāga that he invented: the legendary ‘Vātāpi gaṇapatiṁ’ composed by his son, Muttusvāmi, in ‘Haṁsadvani’ – the cry of the swan.

The version you are listening to is my attempt to follow closely the notation provided in the Saṅgīta Sampradāya Pradarṣiṇi (SSP). It will not sound familiar. The idea most people have of the kīrtana comes to us from Mahā Vaidyanātha Śivan (1844-1893); arguably the first real rockstar of Karnatic music, and a grand-student of Kākarla Tyāgabraḥmaṁ, much better known by his colophon ‘Tyāgarāja.’ (Note: my own musical lineage traces back to Tyāgarāja through Mahā Vaidyanātha Śivan)

The story goes that Vaidyanātha Śivan visited the Eṭṭayāpuram court where he got to hear the compositions of Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita being performed by the court musician Subbarāma Dīkṣita, who was Muttusvāmi’s nephew by adoption, as well as the compiler of the SSP. Unbeknownst to Subbarāma, Vaidyanātha Śivan made a study of the songs, and performed them before him, of course completely re-interpreted in the Tyāgarāja style. Subbarāma was not pleased, but kept his thoughts to himself.

Vātāpi gaṇapatiṁ is perhaps the best example of the ‘Tyāgarāja-ification’ of Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita: faster speeds, loads of ‘saṅgati’ variations, linearity, etc. From the brief time I have spent looking at the SSP, it seems to me that an authentic Dīkṣita kīrtana will have the following: a slow and majestic pace, at most just two saṅgatis, tightly-fitted sāhitya leaving very little or no scope for ‘neraval’ improvisation, and lots and lots of ‘vakra’ or curvatures. Finally, Tyāgarāja drew heavily from the Bhakti tradition. It is impossible, however, to imagine Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita wandering from street to street singing bhajans; his inspirations were tantric. Trikōṇa madhyagatam: he who sits in the middle of the triangle. Mūlādhāra kṣētrasthitam: he who dwells in the Mūlādhāra cakra. Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita was, as David Shulman has put it, the ‘radical tantric modernist’ of Karnatic music. 

Rāga: Śrīrañjanī

Tāḻa: Ādi

Composers: Rāmasvāmi Dīkṣita (1735-1817), Śyāmā Śāstri (1762-1827), Cinnasvāmi Dīkṣita (c. 1778-1823), Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita (1775-1835)

After exploring Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita’s composition in the Mādhavamanohari rāga, I wanted to compare it with a piece composed by his father, Rāmasvāmi, in the arguably coeval Śrīrañjanī rāga. This is the famous - though rarely performed - ‘Sāmi ninne kōri’, described in the Saṅgīta Sampradāya Pradarṣiṇi (SSP) as a ‘cauka varṇam’.

I haven’t been able to find a clear distinction between a ‘cauka varṇam’ and a ‘pada varṇam’ (two types of compositions), so hopefully someone will enlighten me. What I do know, however, is that there is a common misconception that pada/cauka varṇams have lyrics throughout while tāna varṇams don’t. The real difference is stylistic: tāna varṇams move quickly with an energetic texture of ‘tānam’, while cauka/pada varṇams - being essentially dance compositions - are sung slowly with meaningful pauses, designed to express love, passion, and longing.

The opening lines translate to: ‘My Lord, she is hopelessly enamoured of you.’ The ‘lord’ here is Tyāgarāja (called ‘Aiyyārappan’ in Tamil), the form of Śiva worshipped at the monumental Coḻa temple in Tiruvārūr. Rāmasvāmi Dīkṣita had been appointed by the Nāyak rulers of Tañjāvūr to organise and standardise the temple’s musical rituals. Tyāgarāja is admittedly a most unlikely object of romantic devotion for two reasons: First, he is depicted as ‘Somaskanda’ - seated with his consort Kamalāmba and their son Skanda between them. Second, no one has actually seen these idols in centuries because they are permanently covered in cloth up to the neck. On special occasions either the left foot or the right foot are revealed - never both. Skanda is completely hidden and has never been visible.

While Rāmasvāmi typically signed his works with the colophon ‘Veṅkaṭakṛṣṇa’, he seems to have used 'Tyāgarāja' or ‘Tyāgeśa’ for compositions on Tyāgarāja. The most remarkable feature of this piece, however, is that it was left unfinished when Rāmasvāmi died. Only the first half and one section of the second half - the first caraṇasvara - had been completed. Not wanting such a beautiful composition to be lost, his neighbour Śyāmā Śāstri - who along with Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita and Tyāgarāja (the composer, not the deity) forms the ‘trinity’ of Carnatic music’s greatest composers - suggested that he and Rāmasvāmi’s sons complete the work. The second caraṇasvara was composed by Śyāmā Śāstri, the third by Cinnasvāmi Dīkṣita, and the fourth and final one by Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita.

The result is extraordinarily rare in the Carnatic tradition: a piece created by multiple composers. Even more remarkable is that two of the four collaborators - Śyāmā Śāstri and Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita - are widely (and deservedly) considered the greatest musical geniuses in the tradition. 

Rāga: Mādhavamanohari

Tāḻa: Ādi

Composer: Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita (1776-1835)

The other day I decided to take a break from ‘un-learning’ the Dīkṣita compositions I had been taught and then and re-learning them, but instead to try work out something new from scratch. So I went through the contents page of the Saṅgīta Sampradāya Pradarṣiṇi (SSP) – I have it as a pdf on my iPad – to pick something at random, and my finger came down on Mahālakṣmi karuṇārasa lahari – ‘great Lakṣmi, flood (great wave) of compassion!’ – in the rare rāga Mādhavamanohari, a janya or derivative of Śrī, the 22nd meḻa in the rāgāṅga rāgā system propounded by Veṅkaṭamakhin (17th century).

The kīrtana is often described as one of a set of seven composed on the goddess Lakṣmi, but no mention is made of this in the SSP. One interesting lyrical question is about the use of the words ‘manonmaṇi’ and ‘śiva sahite’, both of which seem to refer to the goddess Pārvati rather than Lakṣmi: manonmaṇi is the utsava mūrti (processional idol) of the goddess Kamalāmba at the Tiruvārūr temple, and ‘śiva sahite’ is ‘companion of Śiva.’ This misprision of goddesses, however, would be of a piece with ‘Kāmākṣi varalakṣmi’ in Bilahari, where you’re not sure whether it is about Kāmākṣi or Lakṣmi.

As usual, Ravi Rajagopalan provides us a meticulous and exhaustive run-down of the kīrtana and Mādhavamanohari in general. After tracing its first mention to Tulajā’s Saṅgīta Sarāmṛta (1735), Rajagopalan surmises interestingly that Dīkṣita, far from adhering closely to established tradition, must have chosen to introduce a subtle change to Mādhavamanohari by adding a śuddha dhaivata in the phrase ‘p/ d1 m1’ (1) to differentiate it from the melodically similar Śrīrañjanī, and (2) to bring it into conformity with the newer understanding of a ‘bhāṣāṅga’ rāgā as one that intoduces an ‘anyasvara’ or note foreign to the parent meḻa. Before this, Rajagopalan explains, a bhāṣāṅga rāgā was simply a ‘regional’ rāgā. It is interesting to note that Śrīrañjanī is also described in the SSP as a bhāṣāṅga even though it does not contain any notes foreign to Śrī.

In interpreting this kīrtana, I chose to sing it in a flightly faster kālapramāṇa (‘tempo’) than Semmangudi, MS Subbulakshmi, and Shobhana Rangachari have done on the strength of DK Pattammal and R Vedavalli having done the same. I also emphasised the śuddha dhaivata (d1) more prominently than Semmangudi, MS Subbulakshmi, and Shobhana Rangachari have done, also because DK Pattammal and R Vedavalli seem to do so, and because I think Rajagopalan is correct to think contend, from the evidence of the notation in the SSP, that Dīkṣita must have wanted this. 

Rāga: Kannaḍa baṅgāḻa

Tāḻa: Miṣra jhampa

Composer: Muttusvāmi Dīkṣitar (1776-1835)

Yet another kīrtana I've had to un- and re-learn. ‘Reṇukā devi samrakṣitoham’ – a short, long-neglected kīrtana by Muttusvāmi Dīkṣitar – was the piece that first drew me to Subbarāma Dīkṣitar’s magisterial, monumental Sangīta Sampradāya Pradarṣiṇi (SSP). 

A friend visited Brighton and played it on my vīṇa the other day. Having lived with it for months since then, it now strikes me as the musical equivalent of David Lynch’s 'Lost Highway' (1997) – murder, psychosexual terror, and even a fugue state encoded in the svaram-graham passage.

My visitor performed it in the arrangement  popularized by DK Jayaraman that I had myself been taught: set to khanda cāpu tāḻa and sung more or less in the rāga Malahari. Yet the composition’s text identifies its actual rāga as 'Kannaḍa baṅgāḻa.' As a student trained overwhelmingly through practical instruction, with minimal exposure to historical or theoretical dimensions of Karnatic music, I had assumed Kannaḍa bangāḻa was simply the Dīkṣitar school’s name for Malahari – that they were identical. A few Google searches - and this blog by Ravi Rajagopalan in particular - completely demolished my assumptions.

The SSP contains separate entries for both rāgas. Though both are classified as janyas (derivatives) of Maḻavagauḻa (roughly equivalent to Māyāmaḻavagauḻa), sharing identical ārohaṇa and avarohaṇa, their mūrcchana – their phraseological DNA – differs subtly. Subbarāma notes that both use Ga as the grahasvara (tonic note) and suit early morning performance. But Kannaḍa baṅgāḻa, he specifies, requires the phrase (m g m) and resembles sāveri, a likeness he illustrates with gamaka symbols I cannot reproduce here.

Incidentally, Subbarāma seethes at contemporary pedagogical trends. While tradition as established by Bharata and Mataṅga prescribes beginning students’ training in Maḻavagauḻa, “modern musicologists, following European traditions” had shifted to Śaṅkarābharaṇam (the Major scale). Subbarāma's contempt is palpable: “It seems that this practice is meant either to undermine the traditions of our pūrvācāryas, or to curry the favor of the Europeans, or for some other reasons.”

The SSP provides a gīta by Veṅkaṭamakhi (17th century) in the extinct Dhruva rūpaka tāḻa, followed by notation for ‘Reṇukā devi’ – which sounds very little like what I was taught. The tāḻa is Miṣra jhampa, not khanda cāpu, creating a languid 10-beat cycle rather than crisp 5-beat phrases. Neither pallavi nor anupallavi (often misidentified as samaṣṭi caraṇam) contains saṅgati variations. Most remarkably, there is both a svaram passage and a graham passage, where the solfeggio syllables (Sa Ri Ga…) are transposed to reflect Ga as tonic. The actual Sa is sung as Ga, Ri as Ma, and so forth. The effect is profoundly disorienting, requiring singers to abandon the foundational habits ingrained from their very first lessons.

Which brings us to the lyrical content – itself deeply unsettling. Unlike most Dīkṣitar compositions praising Vedic deities at major temples, this kīrtana honors a non-Brahmanical village goddess worshipped at a small temple in Vijayapuram, near Tiruvārūr. Convention nevertheless dictates assimilating such deities into Vedic-Brahmanic tradition, so she is identified with Reṇukā, wife of the sage Jamadāgni and mother of Paraśurāma, the 6th incarnation of Viṣṇu.

Reṇukā embodies feminine virtue – so pure that the unfired clay pot she used for fetching water held together through her chastity alone. One day at the river, she glimpses a king in intimate congress with his wives. The pot shatters instantly. Enraged by this thought-crime, Jamadāgni commands his sons to behead their mother.

What positivist legal philosophers call a 'norm conflict' ensues - a collision between the iron law of patriarchal command and the unforgivable crime of matricide. One by one, the sons refuse. Jamadāgni reduces them to ash. (Another version has him cursing them to live as women, giving rise to the Jogappa tradition of wandering transgender musicians.) Only the youngest, Paraśurāma, agrees to carry out the sentence, with his axe.

The pleased Jamadāgni grants Paraśurāma a wish. He asks for his mother and brothers’ resurrection. Yet even this cannot expiate his matṛhatyadoṣa.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Rāga: Nāsāmaṇi

Tāḻa: Ādi

Composer: Muttusvāmi Dīkṣitar (1776-1835)

This is another kīrtana I've had to un- and re-learn. I was taught it in the style of Maharajapuram Santhanam, who sang it in Nāsikābhūṣaṇi, the 70th Meḻakarta in the scheme devised by Govindācārya (18th century), which most people generally think is the same thing as the 'Nāsāmaṇi' (meaning 'nose-ring') of the older Asampūrṇa rāgāṅga rāgā system of Veṅkaṭamakhin (c. 1630), which Dīkṣitar followed. 

The Saṁgīta Sampradāya Pradarṣiṇī (SSP), however, reveals significant differences. Nāsikābhūṣaṇi is scale-based and was 'invented' mathematically, or, to be honest, mechanically. In contrast, Nāsāmaṇi is phrase-based, and had an organic existence long before Nāsikābhūṣaṇi. Subbarāma Dīkṣita cites the Anubandham of the Caturdaṇdi Prakāśikā for its lakṣaṇa śloka:

अवरोहे रिवक्रा स्यात् गेया नासामणि सदा

In other words, for Nāsāmaṇi, the riṣabha must always be sung 'vakra', or 'curved', in the descending order. In other words, while 'm g r' is permitted for Nāsikābhūṣaṇi, for Nāsāmaṇi, it has got to be 'm r g.' Subbarāma Dīkṣita lists the further distinctive phrases of Nāsāmaṇi as 'p n d S', 'p n d n S', and 'p m p s r g S', indicating that ri is not the only curvature. Essentially, Nāsāmaṇi is nothing like the direct, linear creature known as Nāsikābhūṣaṇi.

This leads to a major gripe. Dīkṣitar composed ciṭṭasvara passages for many of his pieces, particularly the shorter ones, those in rare rāgas like Taraṅgiṇi, obsolete rāgas like Kannaḍabaṅgāḻa, or 'Vivādi' (discordant) and therefore, unlucky rāgas such as Nāsāmaṇi. The contemporary practice of omitting them is unfortunate because (1) it mutilates the original composition, and (2) we lose a record of how a rāga originally sounded like. As Ravi Rajagopalan says, 'one shudders to think what would have been the case if we did not have the SSP... and the cittasvaras as well! Notwithstanding the documentation in the SSP, it’s indeed sad that we do have versions of Dikshitar’s compositions which have been normalized to the krama sampurna equivalent scales and so rendered.'

Rāga: Yamunākalyāṇi

Tāḻa: Tiśra jāti Eka

Composer: Muttusvāmi Dīkṣitar (1776-1835)

Yet again, this is a Dīkṣitar composition, composed in praise of Jambukēśvara of Tiruvaṇaikkāval, the temple where Śiva is worshipped as water. Water is a running theme of the song, most famously in the invocation of the rivers Ambudhi (Sindhu), Gangā and Kāverī. The kīrtana – for that is what the authoritative Saṁgīta Sampradāya Pradarṣiṇī (SSP) calls it – is one of a set of 5 pieces describing different temples where Śiva takes the form of the elements. 

The motivation to learn this piece came from Ravi Rajagopalan, who mentioned he had never heard it played on the vīṇa. Also very fortuitous was meeting @sufianararah last week in Berlin, where he played rāg Yaman - not the same thing as Yamunākalyāṇi - on the Oud.

I have tried to be faithful to the authentic SSP notation and kept my own flourishes to a minimum. As you can see, it sounds very little like the Yamunākalyāṇi of the ‘tukkaḍā’ or lighter pieces performed towards the end of concerts, typically in the madhyama śruti. The śuddha madhyama (M1, or the perfect fourth) obtains very sparingly, primarily in the caraṇam (third section).

That said, there seem to be several differences between my interpretation and those of experts like Prof SR Janakiraman and Seetha Rajan. Chamber recordings of both of these are to be found in this three part essay by Rajagopalan:

1) https://guruguha.org/yamuna-kalyani-a-journey-back-in-time-part-i-2/

2) https://guruguha.org/yamuna-kalyani-a-journey-back-in-time-part-ii/

3) https://guruguha.org/yamuna-kalyani-a-journey-back-in-time-part-iii/

These essays provide a typically extensive analysis of the piece, as well as a fascinating and comprehensive history of the evolution of Yamunākalyāṇi, alongside the rāga we now call Mecakalyāṇi, out of the much older Śuddha Kalyāṇa. This rāga is still performed in North India but went extinct in the South, perhaps because Venkaṭamakhin (c. 1630) reviles it as तुरुष्काणामतिप्रियः - 'greatly beloved by the Turks', and so, absolutely inappropriate for gīta, prabandha, and ṭhaya. (Caturdaṇḍiprakāśikā, Rāgaprakaraṇa, śloka 107). 

But evolution is a funny thing. Most of the time you get metamorphosis, or change into a different, improved form. Occasionally, however, you get 'palingenesis': some bird, usually on an island some distance from the continental mainland, evolves into a distinct species, which then goes extinct, but then another bird arrives from the mainland, which then evolves into the exact same species that died out before, and the process can repeat several times. This is what seems to have happened to Śuddha Kalyāṇa in the South: it was 're-invented' as Mohanakalyāṇi in the early 20th Century by Harikesanallur Muthiah Bhagavatar, the flamboyant composer and Mysore court musician.

PS: There are several mistakes, particularly in the anupallavi. Hopefully I will iron them out with practice. 

PPS: Here's a link to Seetha Rajan’s rendition, which is truly beautiful: https://guruguha.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/jambupate-yamunakalyani-seetharajan.mp3

Rāga: Taraṅgiṇi

Tāḻa: Ādi

Composer: Muttusvāmi Dīkṣitar (1776-1835)

We return to usual programming.

‘Māye tvam yāhi’ is perhaps one of Dīkṣitar’s most personal, and haunting compositions. The pallavi – the first line repeated as a chorus – says ‘O illusion (māya)! Go away! Who are you to trouble me?’ The anupallavi – the second line –says, among other things ‘come back, bless me, protect me!’

It is also one of the compositions most severely mutilated by 20th century performers. I grew up listening to a completely different song in a rāga descibed variously as ‘Śuddha Taraṅgiṇi’ or ‘Sudhā Taraṅgiṇi’, which had an chatśruti dhaivata and sounded indistinguishable from Cencuruṭṭi.

The authentic composition, as recorded in the Sangīta Sampradāya Pradarṣiṇi of Subbarāma Dīkṣitar, is in ‘Taraṅgiṇi’, designated as the rāgāṅga rāga of the 26th meḻa in system outlined in the Anubandha (c 1750) to the Caturdanḍiprakāśikā (c 1630).

For an intimidatingly thorough analysis and exploration of the song Māye, the rāga Taraṅgiṇi, and the history of its misuse, see Ravi Rajagopalan’s excellent essay: https://guruguha.org/tarangini-story-of-a-quaint-beauty/.

Rāga: Śāraṅga

Tāḻa: Ādi

Composer: Tiruvoṟṟiyūr Tyāgayyar (1845-1917)

For a change, I thought I’d play something not by Dīkṣitar or any member of the Trinity. This piece is a tāna varṇam composed by Tiruvoṟṟiyūr Tyāgayyar, son of Vīṇai Kuppayyar (1798-1860), widely acclaimed as the most accomplished disciple of Tyāgarāja (1767-1847). I am performing this composition in both speeds, rather than in just madhyamakāla as is customary for tāna varṇas.

Tyāgayyar was an accomplished vaiṇika (veena player) like his father, as well as among the first Karnatic musician-composers to publish notations for both his own compositions and those of his father. Consequently, his works serve as valuable guides for understanding how rāgas have evolved over time.

My rendition deviates from the original composition—there is an additional eṭṭugaḍai svara passage in the original that, for unclear reasons, is generally omitted nowadays. Nevertheless, one can discern something of how Śāraṅga must have sounded in the past from the sparing use of the śuddha madhyama, particularly in the caraṇam. He also composed in Kannadabaṅgāḻa and other rare rāgas only Dīkṣitar is known to have used, though “the scales adopted by Tyagayyar for these ragas differ to varying extents from those adopted by Dikshitar” (Kuppuswami and Hariharan, 136).

Besides this, Tyāgayyar accomplished the monumental task of composing a series of 108 (aṣtottara) kṛtīs in praise of his family deity, the Veṇugopālasvāmi—a form of Kṛṣṇa—of Tiruvoṟṟiyūr, now a suburb of Chennai. Kuppuswami and Hariharan observe that “Tyagayyar was the first composer in the annals of the history of Carnatic music to have composed Ashtottara group kritis and only one other composer has so far emulated Tyagayyar in this regard viz., Sangita Kalanidhi Harikesanallur Muthiah Bhagavatar, who was Tyagayyar’s junior by a generation” (1987, 134).

This assessment requires correction. Eṇṇappadam Veṅkaṭrāma Bhāgavatar (1880-1961) - my great-grand-uncle - also composed a series of 108 kṛtīs, coincidentally also in praise of Kṛṣṇa. According to an autobiographical preface to a compilation of his songs, he began composing at age 51 while bedridden with smallpox. His first compositions were five songs in praise of his village goddess, Parukkāñcēri Bhagavati. Astrologers had predicted his death at this age, and propitiating the indigenous, non-Vedic deity was considered the best chance for survival. The same astrologers had also warned of two attempts to poison him, which provided the impetus for composing his set of aṣtottara kṛtīs (Venkata Ramaneeyam, 1964, i-iii). This appears to have done the trick. He lived to 81.

Kuppuswami, G., and M. Hariharan. “Tiruvottiyur Tyagayyar.” Journal of the Madras Music Academy 58 (1987): 130-140.

Kerala Sangeetha Nataka Akademi. Venkata Ramaneeyam: 146 Musical Compositions of Late Sri Ennappadam Venkata Rama Bhagavathar. Trichur: Geetha Press, 1964.

Rāga: Bhairavi

Tāḻa: Aṭa (Khanḍa jāti)

Composer: Pacchimīriam Ādiyappayyā

This is a piece I found absolutely tedious as a child and dreaded practicing—but have come to deeply appreciate with age and experience.

This is arguably the original tāna varṇam in the challenging Aṭa tāḻa, composed by the legendary Pacchimīriam Ādiyappayyā, an 18th-century musician in the Tanjore Maratha court. Ādiyappayyā was guru to both Śyāmā Sāstri (1782-1827) and Ghanam Kṛṣṇayyar (1790–1854). Subbarāma Dīkṣitar (1839-1906) honored him with the title Mārgadarṣi for inventing the tāna varṇam form itself.

Ādiyappayyā was also an ancestor of the renowned Veene Sheshanna (1852—1926), the Mysore court musician who revolutionized vīṇā technique by popularizing the horizontal playing style we know today—before him, it was typically played vertically like the sitār.

The musicologist and performer Mudicondan Venkatrama Iyer (1897-1975) credits this single composition with establishing Bhairavi as the Carnatic mainstay it is today, effectively eclipsing the very similar rāga Māñji.

What you hear here—and what is typically performed—is an extremely abbreviated version of the much longer original. The complete composition includes an additional eṭṭugaḍai svara (between the second and third sections) and an ‘Anubandham’ following the caraṇam that connects back to the muktāyi svara and returns to the pallavi. Mudicondan Venkatrama Iyer's student, the incomparable Sangīta Kalānidhi R. Vedavalli has recorded this extended version, though even she omits the sāhitya (lyrics) for the muktāyi and eṭṭugaḍai svaras. Without these lyrics, the caraṇam’s opening line remains incomplete and puzzling: “Cirunavvu mōmu” (small smiling face…).

I have notation for the Anubandham and access to P. Sambamoorthy’s book containing the missing sāhitya. However, I’m still searching for the lyrics to the eṭṭugaḍai svara that I’ve only heard Smt. Vedavalli perform. If anyone knows where to find this text, I'd be immensely grateful.

Further Reading: For an extremely informative analysis with a rare recording of another recently discovered varṇam possibly by Ādiyappayyā, visit: https://guruguha.org/tana-varna-margadarshi-adiyappayya

A North Indian rāga, the first known mention of it in the South is in Veṅkaṭamakhin's 'Caturdaṇḍiprakāśika' (c 1750), which encapsulates it in the 'śloka' (formula) as

जुजावान्ताख्यरागश्चसंपूर्णःसग्रहानवितः |

लक्ष्यमार्गानुसारेणगीयतेगानवेदिभिहि ||

In other words, 'Jujāvanti' is a sampūrṇa rāga with the full complement of seven notes, and is to be comprehended through practice (as opposed to theory).

Another blogger claims it was first adopted in the South in Kathakaḻi dramas. He provides no references though.

In Volume 1 of the Sangīta Sampradāya Pradarśini of Subbarāma Dīkṣita, it is listed as a janya ('child') - that is, derivative - of Harikedāragauḻa, or what we now call Harikāmbhōjī. Subbarāma Dīkṣita maintains that it suitable for singing at all times, that its jīva svarās are Ri and Ma, and that 'Besides its own shadow, this jujāvanti shines with the additional shadows mixed from erukalakāmbhōji [incorrectly called yadukulakāmbhōji], darbār, sahānā, and bhairavi.'

You may have noticed some very Sahānā stylings by me. On this, Ravi Rajagopalan writes that "Subbarama Dikshita’s cryptic foot note on this is rooted to a very subtle point... Modern Sahana has practically only G3/antara gandhara. However for Subbarama Dikshita,... Sahana is a raga under Mela 22 – with sadharana gandhara dominating and antara gandhara occurring sparsely. Thus this older Sahana and the Jujavanti of Ceta Sri Balakrishnam documented in the SSP has much melodic overlap... And so the raga Dvijavanthi can at best be treated as a sibling of modern Sahana..."

#karnaticmusic #veena #dvijavanti

Rāga: Jujāvanti (also called Dvijāvanti)

Tāḻa: Rūpakam (2 kaḻai)

Composer: Muttusvāmi Dīkṣitar (1776-1835)

My new favourite song by the 'modernist Shaman.' When I was learning music, this piece tended to be overshadowed by 'Akhilāṇḍeśvari rakṣamām' in the same rāga. A consensus has since emerged that Akhilāṇḍeśvari is not an authentic Dīkṣitar composition.

There is no question at all about 'Cetaḥ śrī bālakṛṣnam' - it is listed in Volume 2 of Subbarāma Dīkṣitar's monumental Sangīta Sampradāya Pradarśini as the prime examplar of Jujāvanti (the secondary exemplar being a Maṭya tāḻa sañcāri of Subbarāma's composition). Subbarāma Dīkṣitar was the biological nephew, and adopted son of Muttusvāmi.

It is mentioned several times in Justice TL Venkataramana Iyer's biography of Muttusvāmi Dīkṣitar, where he states that 'In Dwijavanthi the piece Ceta Sri of Dikshitar stands out in solitary splendour…' He makes no mention of Akhilāṇḍeśvari.

Venkataramana Iyer wasn't just a distinguished jurist - he served as Chief Justice of the Madras High Court and also for 4 years on the Indian Supreme Court, where he apparently had a penchant for referring to US Supreme Court cases - but a student of Ambi Dīkṣitar, the son of Subbarāma, and so, a descendant of the composer.

Alongside Ambi, Venkataramana Iyer also taught DK Pattammal, generally considered the foremost authority on Dīkṣitar compositions. According to a lecture given by V Sriram, Venkataramana Iyer once asked Pattammal to sing Cetaḥ śrī bālakṛṣnam when the President Rajendra Prasad was visiting him, and from then on Rajendra Prasad would always ask Pattammal to sing this song whenever he happened to be in Madras.

Rāga: Nāṭṭakurañjī

Tāḻa: Miśra Jhampa

Composer: Muttusvāmi Dīkṣitar (1776-1835)

Following on from the last piece, 'Cetaḥ śrī bālakṛṣṇaṁ' in Jujāvanti, I felt compelled, for reasons unknown to me, to re-learn this piece, widely considered the finest in the rāga Nāṭakurañjī.

In praise of Mercury, it is often described as a 'Navagrahakṛti' - that is, of the series in praise of the nine planets. This is wrong. The best evidence is that Dīkṣitar only composed seven kṛtis on the Sun and the other six planets of the Indian system. The additional two pieces on Rāhu and Ketu are inauthentic; likely composed by his brother, Bālusvāmi or his descendants Subbarāma or Ambi. In fact, in his monumental 'Saṅgīta Samprdāya Pradarṣiṇī' ('SSP'), Subbarāma describes Budhamāșrayāmi as a 'vāra' kṛti. In other words, the series is not organised around the planetary system, but on the days of the week. In yet other words still, this is the song for Wednesday / Mercredi.

The kṛti relates the story of Mercury - 'Budha'. According to Hindu myth, Budha is born of an extramarital affair between the Moon (Candra) and Tāra - the wife of Jupiter (Bṛhaspati). The cuckolded Jupiter takes his rage out on the unusually intelligent child by condemning him to have no gender (nāpumsaka). Budha expiates the curse through austere devotion to Śiva.

Subbarāma Dīkṣitar introduces Nāṭakurañjī with the following śloka:

परिवर्ज्यावरोहे तु रागो नाटकुरञ्जिका ।

षड्जग्रहसमायुक्ता गीयते लक्ष्यवेदिभिः ॥

This is taken from the 14th verse of the Anubandha of the 'Caturdaṇḍiprakāśikā', a musicological treatise composed around 1650 by his and Muttusvāmi's ancestor, Venkaṭamakhin.

In the Caturdaṇḍiprakāśikā, this verse comes immediately before the one describing Jujāvanti. It comes immediately after the verses describing Sūraṭi, Erukulakāmbhojī, and Aṭhānā. It is the same in the SSP.

Given its structure and name, I had thought Nāṭakurañjī was an ancient rāga derived from Tamil music. This is not so: A minority thinks it is the Paṇ Naṭṭapāḍai. The majority thinks it just 300 years old, and still developing.

Rāga: Kumudakriyā

Tāḻa: Rūpakam (2 kaḻai)

Composer: Muttusvāmi Dīkṣitar (1776-1835)

I've always felt this to be one of Dīkṣitar's more intriguing compositions, and one illustrating why David Shulman calls him 'a modernist shaman who detached Carnatic music from its earlier ritual contexts and transposed it into a new, highly personal, universalist-secular mode.' 

That, of course, is assuming it is a genuine Dīkṣitar composition. In the monumental and authoritative Sangīta Sampradāya Pradarśiṇi ('SSP') of Subbarāma Dīkṣita (1839-1906) - Subbarāma was the composer's younger brother's biological grandson and adopted son - there is a section on the rāga Kumudakriyā, where it is listed as a derivative or janya ('child') of the 51st Meḻa of Kāśirāmakriyā, which we would identify as Pantuvarāḻi. No one, as far as I know, has doubted the authenticity of this piece, but it is strange that Subbarāma Dīkṣita does not include it in the SSP. The ārohaṇa (ascending order) is S R G M D D S, while the avarohaṇa (descending order) is S N D M G R S. 

The SSP normally introduces each rāga with a lakṣaṇa śloka taken from the Caturdaṇḍiprakāśikā, a foundational 17th musicological text composed by his and Muttusvāmi's ancestor, Veñkaṭamakhin. No lakṣaṇa śloka is provided for Kumudakriyā, and the only mention of it I can find in my OCR copy of the Caturdaṇḍiprakāśikā is in verse 39 of the Anubandham ('appendix'):

अथ रामक्रियामेले कुमुदक्रियदीपकौ । 

शान्तकल्याणिमेले तु यम्नाकल्याणिमोहने ॥

I can't make sense of this passage - google translate is not very helpful - other than that Kumudakriyā is a janya of Rāmakriyā, alongside 'Dīpakam'. The SSP mentions the existence of Dīpakam, but says it has been lost. One wonders if this was the Dīpak that Tansen is supposed to have sung to light the lamps in the palace of Akbar.

I cannot find any earlier mention of Kumudakriyā.

The SSP remarks that it is suitable for singing at all times, but there is a tradition - again I don't know from where - that Kumudakriyā evokes the 'bhāva' (emotion) of 'adbhuta,' commonly described as 'awe', but in my opinion better translated as the 'sublime'; that is to say, the combination of beauty and terror. I have always found this rāga profoundly unsettling.

The last line of the madhyamakāla passage in the caraṅam goes 'āraktavarṅam ṣobitam' - 'him who glows in red' - which is interesting because most depictions of Ardhanārīśwara display only his left, female side as red in colour, while the masculine right portion is pure white. It would be interesting to know where he got this.

One suggestion is that it is a reference to the 92nd verse of the Saundaryalahari, which reads 'Brahmā, Viṣṇu, Rudra and Īśvara form four legs of your throne and Śiva who is like pure crystal form the seat for You to sit and He reflects Your deep red complexion.' The Saundaryalahari is of course a central text of the esoteric tradition of Śrīvidya, of which Dīkśitar was an adept, and whose teachings he was expounding through his music. Hence his signature 'Guruguha', which can plausibly be translated as 'teacher of the secret.' A modernist shaman indeed.