Musical Points to Ponder

[varsha]

THE CREATIVE process requires more than reason. Most original thinking is not even verbal. It creates a groping experimentation with idea ,governed by intuitive hunches and inspired by the unconscious. The majority of well educated men are incapable of original thinking because they are unable to escape from the tyranny of reason.
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BERNARD SHAW may have been the first notable ever to speak up against noise pollution. In the relatively quiet early 1920s, Shaw. entering a luxurious restaurant, was approached by a waiter who said deferentially, "While you are eating, the orchestra will play anything you like. What would you like them to play?"
"Dominoes," said Shaw.

[varsha]

SOMERSET MAUGHAM in A Writer' s Notebook: When I was young I was amazed at Plutarch's statement that the elder Cato began at the age of 8o to learn Greek. I am amazed no longer.
Old age has little time .And hence is ready to undertake tasks that youth shirked because they would take too long. —Heinemann, London .

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The MUSIC PUBLISHERS of Beethoven's time were so afraid of his dissonances that he inscribed one quartet with the ironically reassuring line: “Not too original—borrowed from many sources.”

[varsha]

IN 1948, William Faulkner scribbled a reply across the bottom of a letter from an old friend who wanted to do a New Yorker magazine profile on him: "Oh, hell no! Come down and visit whenever you can, but no piece in any paper about me as I am working tooth and nail at my lifetime ambition to be the last private individual on earth and expect every success since apparently there is no competition for the place." —Selected Letters of William Faulkner,
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BRITISH veterinarian James Herriot is the author of the popular All Creatures Great and Small and All Things Bright and Beautiful , books about his adventures as a country vet. "I kept telling my wife for 25 years that I was going to write a book." he says. "but she didn't think I would.
Then one day she said to me, We had our silver wedding anniversary last week, and you're 50 ; you'll never do it now.' So I thought, Ok, mate. I Will .Herriot began typing tentatively before the television set in the evenings- which his family preferred to previous efforts to teach him­ self to play the violin. And there he found his nome de plume made necessary because British veterinarian etiquette might interpret authorship as self-advertisement.
James Herriot is the name of a goalkeeper on an English football team that the country vet was watching one evening as he peeked at his typewriter.

[rshankar]

BRITISH veterinarian James Herriot

There is a lovely program (a cross between a documentary and a reality show) called The Yorkshire Vet - a show about the daily lives of Drs. Julian Norton and Peter Wright - who now run The Skeldale Veterinary Center in Thirsk, Yorkshire, the practice of Drs. Alfred Wright (James Herriot) and Donald Sinclair (Siegfried Farnon). Peter Wright was trained by Alf Wight. The series is narrated by Christopher Timothy, the actor who played James Herriot in the TV show for years.

[varsha]

Penultimate post in this series.Will close tomorrow
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HOKUSAI, nineteenth-century Japanese artist, : From the age of six I had a mania for drawing the forms of things. By the time I was 50 I had published an infinity of designs; but all I have produced before 70 is not worth taking into account. At 73 I learnt a little about the real structure of nature, of animals, plants, birds and fishes. In consequence, when I am 80, I shall have made still more progress; at 90 I shall penetrate the mystery of things; at 100 I shall certainly have reached a marvellous stage; and when I am 110 everything I do, be it but a dot, will be alive. I beg those who live as long as I do to see if! do not keep my word. Written at the age of 75 (October 31, 1760 – May 10, 1849)
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I AM not one of those who imagine that the modern world can get away from specialization. In this connection I always recall a Marx Brothers film in which Groucho played a shady lawyer. When a client commented on the dozens of flies buzzing round his shabby office, Groucho said, “We have a working agreement with them. They don’t practise law, and we don't climb Walls.“

[varsha]

To Conclude
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AN ARTIST can look at a pretty girl and see the old woman she will become. A better artist can look at an old woman and see the pretty girl she used to be. A great artist can look at an old woman, portray her exactly, as she is and force the viewer to see the pretty girl she used to be. More than that, he can make anyone with the sensitivity of an armadillo see that this lovely young girl is still alive, prisoned inside her ruined body.

He can make you feel the quiet, endless tragedy that there was never a girl born who ever grew older than 18 in her heart, no matter what the merciless hours have done. -R. Heinlein in Stranger in a Strange Land
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AUGUST is hardly the month when people plan great new things full of ginger and surprises. But in a curious way it is the month when we pause, consider and assess, in the light of reason. More decisions not to rush into this or that are perhaps made in August than in any other month. These decisions persist and control many actions in what have come to be considered the more aggressive months of the year.
People relaxing in the shade of a hot month cover more ground than they ever realize It is a time when they pick up this or that book and gradually realize what it is all about. It is a month when, on holiday, they visit new places with old histories and quietly get a better perspective of the past, the present, yes, and the future. Watch August ! It is a more decisive month than one may have thought.
cheers

[shankarank]

To Conclude
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AN ARTIST can look at a pretty girl and see the old woman she will become. A better artist can look at an old woman and see the pretty girl she used to be. A great artist can look at an old woman, portray her exactly, as she is and force the viewer to see the pretty girl she used to be. More than that, he can make anyone with the sensitivity of an armadillo see that this lovely young girl is still alive, prisoned inside her ruined body.

He can make you feel the quiet, endless tragedy that there was never a girl born who ever grew older than 18 in her heart, no matter what the merciless hours have done. -R. Heinlein in Stranger in a Strange Land
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cheers

Wow! that is some real analogy to traditional arts and Carnatic music especially!

[RSR]

Now that Varsha ji has ended the series, may I add one here...hoping that it is not too irrelevant. It is about the period of Macathyism in United Staes, Einstein, Paul Robeson.."
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"Two years earlier, in 1951, when his friend, W. E. B. Du Bois was indicted for his pro-peace activities on the trumped up charge of being a "Soviet agent," Einstein, along with Robeson and civil rights heroine Mary McLeod Bethune, sponsored a dinner and rally to raise funds for Du Bois’s defense. Du Bois’s lawyer, the fiery radical ex-Congressman Vito Marcantonio, managed to reduce the trial to shambles even before the prosecution had finished its case. But had the trial continued, Marcantonio planned to call Einstein as the first defense witness.
Perhaps no one had been more pilloried or isolated during the "red scare" than Einstein’s great ally from the struggle against lynching, PAUL ROBESON. atacked as much for his militant stands against white supremacy as for his radicalism and his call for pan-African independence, Robeson had become a virtual non-person in his own country, denied an income, venues for concerts, and the right to travel.
In 1952, in a very public act to break the curtain of silence around Robeson, Einstein invited him and his accompanist Lloyd Brown to lunch. The three spent a long afternoon discussing science, music, and politics, all subjects of mutual interest.
At one point, when Robeson left the room, Brown remarked about what an honor it was to be in the presence of such a great man. To which Einstein replied, "but it is you who have brought the great man."

[shankarank]

But the civil rights movement has suffered a great deal because of its association with the left. Just look at the plight of people in every inner city. I think a resistance movement should ground itself based on its own experiences and develop what I call a spirituality of itself! MLK did that. It has now been hijacked!

[RSR]

shankarank ji -> True. but the world power balance has changed and seems ready to change once again soon. The second problem is that unlike African movements, the colored are a minority in USA. Any minority movement in any part of the world, has to win over the progressive section of the majority and make them speak for them. ( much similar to Dalith movement in India). . May be a sweeping statement but it is the progressive section of the privileged that liberate the under-privileged. ..always..in all countries. Lincoln was an example. Gandhiji another. . Economic liberation is a common problem for the whites as well as non-whites. Formal democracy and civil rights has not made much change in the average life of the majority in South Africa.

Einstein loved Western Classical music. ( he was a refugee from Germany). Did not Soviet Union under the unjustly maligned Joseph Stalin take Classical music to the common people?

Varshaji , already a keen connoisseur of both Carnatic and Hindusthani music, can begin another long thread , not on too technical aspects of Western Classical music but a primer on the system, its famous composers of the pre-war Germany and of the composers from Soviet Union. for the benefit of laymen like me

[RSR]

Paul Robeson...."There is no richer store of human experience than the folk tales, folk poems and songs of a people. In many, the heroes are always fully recognizable humans - only larger and more embracing in dimension. So it is with the Russian, Chinese. and the African folk-lore.
In 1937, a highly expectant audience of Moscow citizens - workers, artists, youth, farmers from surrounding towns - crowded the Bolshoy Theater. They awaited a performance by the Uzbek National Theater, headed by the highly gifted Tamara Khanum. The orchestra was a large one with instruments ancient and modern. How exciting would be the blending of the music of the rich culture of Moussorgsky, Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Khrennikov, Gliere - with that of the beautiful music of the Uzbeks, stemming from an old and proud civilization. "

[RSR]

"The Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin was hostile toward "modernist" music, i.e., music that broke too radically with 19th-century style and harmonic technique. The Party preferred aggrandizement of itself and of the Russian people by means of music that was relatively simple and triumphant. ".......from
http://www.columbia.edu/itc/music/ito/history/

[shankarank]

Any minority movement in any part of the world, has to win over the progressive section of the majority and make them speak for them

Minorities in bed with the left are really only in two countries : India and the U.S. India is a refugee state of it's own people and U.S the country of migrants!. In Europe even the majority are enlightened! - so the French had to be saved twice last century! May be once more this century!

Lincoln! - what happened to the party of Lincoln? Polarized - when it was on the right side to the wrong side by the left. Gandhi! - what happened to party of Gandhi? Pulverized by the left!

Any country really implementing any Left ideas having any immigrants? And it is clever that you will use the word Dalit and also make them minority!

[RSR]

shankarank Sir-> The fact is that in India, it is the Left that is courting 'minorities'. ( religious, linguistic, regional, and tribal areas). with very little success. Fundamentally, it is a 'class' question though the minorities may not be aware of it. Atleast in the USA, the problem of 'coloured' people is definitely an economic problem. Be it the recent hurricane in Texas or the deluge of 30 cms rains in Mumbai, the worst sufferers are the 'poor' mostly. ..And the attitude of some West European Nations about the refugees from Syria recently, makes one wonder about the 'enlightened' majority. .. There are many types of minorities'. one among them is based on caste structure. and minorities may not always be at the receiving end economically yet insecure as the jews were in many West European countries for all their tremendous financial power ( or because of that power?)..I was mentioning about the great work done in erstwhile Soviet Union to take classical music to the working people without any racial or other prejudices. I feel that the great majority of people in Tamilnad of the present generation are not much interested in Carnatic music as such . In a separate thread, we can perhaps think loud on measures to make majority of people in rural areas , rasikas of the composers like the Trinity, Purandhara dasa and such. Regards.

[shankarank]

Let me ask you one thing! We often hear so much about Chennai rasikas being indifferent to various musicians from other states etc.? What is this so special about the Chennai or Mylapore rasika? Why is it that many Andhra musicians have to relocate to Chennai to sustain? Why is it that a Karnataka musician comes to Chennai to get recognition?

Why are rasikas in other states looking upto Chennai artistes only when they visit their places? In spite of the fact that many of these musicians don't pronounce their language correctly?

Even after 70 years ( or lets say 40 years even) after independence?

[SrinathK]

Let me ask you one thing! We often hear so much about Chennai rasikas indifferent to various musicians from other states etc.? What is this so special about the Chennai or Mylapore rasika? Why is it that many Andhra musicians have to relocate to Chennai to sustain? Why is it that a Karnataka musician comes to Chennai to get recognition?

Why are rasikas in other states looking upto Chennai artistes only when they visit their places? In spite of the fact that many of these musicians don't pronounce their language correctly?

Even after 70 years ( or lets say 40 years even) after independence?

To move one step out of the familiar comfort zone requires significant effort.

[MaheshS]

Let me ask you one thing! We often hear so much about Chennai rasikas being indifferent to various musicians from other states etc.? What is this so special about the Chennai or Mylapore rasika? Why is it that many Andhra musicians have to relocate to Chennai to sustain? Why is it that a Karnataka musician comes to Chennai to get recognition?

Why are rasikas in other states looking upto Chennai artistes only when they visit their places? In spite of the fact that many of these musicians don't pronounce their language correctly?

Even after 70 years ( or lets say 40 years even) after independence?

Music and musicians have always been in the mercy of patrons. Where the patrons / money there the musicians. It moved from Rajah's and Jamindars to Chennai, which was the capital of the Madras Presidency due to their downturn + was a metropolis and that's where the new rich came. The period also saw one of the biggest changes in classical music & dance, the Poochi / Ariyakudi bani took off and polished. The temple dancers becoming professionals and doing dance for dance sake. Both of them happened in Chennai. Notwithstanding Veena Dhanamal's comment about musicians *talking* about music, it also established a very good research ground, so you could still survive as an academic.

The situation is changing now with so much like air travel, mobile phones, Skype classes and what not. So while all other big cities like say Bangalore, Thiruvananthapuram, Cleveland have all set up a very good base, Chennai will always be Chennai for nostalgic reasons, for now. It will take another few decades before the hangover starts wearing down, and lets see where that takes us

[shankarank]

To move one step out of the familiar comfort zone requires significant effort.

Good post modern cliche! At least you didn't go the extent of saying - just the way the mylaporians are - it causes oppression!

It moved from Rajah's and Jamindars to Chennai, which was the capital of the Madras Presidency due to their downturn + was a metropolis and that's where the new rich came

Now credit goes to the British - they set it all up - rest of the stuff is all incidental. Just like we have so many good IT programmers because the British taught us English and Math! - as Narayana Murthy says! But somehow this extends to Cleveland and beyond. As narrated by many impresarios , the early touring CM musicians, especially instrumentalists like Lalgudi - hoped to see a lot of audience beyond the usual Mylapore crowd! In two trips they figured out that it is the same people https://youtu.be/8LY9MlGiYBE?t=379

The Mylapore people coming again and again and again to concerts whose language most do not understand!! All incidental - money flowed from patrons and things happened. If the patrons desired they could have made Brinda-Mukta so popular!! So should we blame the patrons? Oh the Ariyakudi bANi became popular! - lets blame the format!

You see in all this , things cultural are set aside. We don't talk about culture like we talk about sanitation or education : https://youtu.be/lQdkFRUzoTU?t=955 , or economics or people behavior or their motives!

He is part of so many clubs : https://youtu.be/lQdkFRUzoTU?t=804 - Culture is a club! Somebody like me who has never been part of this club in physical terms ( psychologically may be I am) - I just happened to have lot of cash once I worked abroad! I paid my way through and sat even in a front row - the one below the stage at MFAC - I paid good money - it is the highest priced ticket! About Rs 3000 or so for me and my brother ( 2002/2003 season). See all it takes is money to pierce through the club! This is much before the prices generally went up - blame the likes of me!

But I didn't pay through my nose to look at him wearing Dhoti and Angavastram! https://youtu.be/lQdkFRUzoTU?t=876 . My brother was already learning key board after years of some Pazhani style Mridangam training ( from a disciple of Madurai T . Srinivasan) and has never been in the habit of concert going even working in Chennai. Me the NRI in the discovery of my culture dragged him along supposedly. We were just sort of interested in hearing Trichy Sankaran that day - but yes we did enjoy that part.

But my brother was also not there because of dhoti , angavastram, antiquity and the Sastras and purANas! His impression as he expressed - "Man TMK sang like a sport star!! - like CM is the in thing these days!!"

I am sure there are so many fans of my generation and later that related to him that way! - way before his transformation. But yet the people he is dissing are all the elders who held on to this art - however corrupt may be the clubs!

In all this however, we sat through so many songs - we would not have understood a word. Were we some elite art lovers? I don't think so!

Only thing culturally I could reconstruct - why we did it, is something I found recently:

https://swarajyamag.com/culture/the-col ... ed-indians

Of the clerks or crannies as they were called, Williamson offered: “They are with very few exceptions, Hindoos, and obtain situations merely from an ability to write a clear hand with tolerable quickness. It may appear strange, but it is perfectly true that many crannies who can read and write English with fluency and correctness, do not understand one word in 10! Others affect great erudition, which they are desirous of displaying on all occasions

I think there is something about the sacredness of things that bestow knowledge eventually. Of course world over in all cultures children have recited rhymes! But for adults to do this as work - there is something more! Is this confined to just Brahmins? Don't think so - this was likely prevalent in all literate castes. But obviously this will not be there in people beyond that!

I think this would later lead us to our political independence - or at least sustain it even imperfectly!

My tamizh teacher used to mock the Sanskrit classes and the rote recitations we do there! Of course she forgot that Avvai said "OdAmal oru nALum irukka vEnDam" - and much of her tamizh treasures came via oral tradition as well for quite long time.

I cannot think of anything more than this, in explaining this cultural trait!

[shankarank]

To move one step out of the familiar comfort zone requires significant effort.

They moved out of vizhianagaram and vijayawada from their comfort zones of growing up and surroundings into well nigh uncomfortable political maze of oppressive clubs , all for just the comfort of 3 hours on stage! wah-re-wah!!

As the commentators pointed out to Al Gore - the sore loser of 2000 presidential election - if you had just won your state of Tennessee?!!

[RSR]

The series of quotes by varsha ji was like a garland. ( some thing like Palgrave's Golden Treasury). When I read the first few of the quotes , I was amazed that he was an expert in Western Classical too.. None the less valuable for being quotes. for what we choose to quote reveals the person behind....It was primarily about the spirit of music and arts. Some nice and a few very nice. As he said, nothing much to comment about.
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Now to the comments by Sri.Shankaran and Sri,Mahesh,
In the southern states, around 1850, all the areas had been brought under direct control of British government. and the then areas were known as Circar province which included a major part of today's seemandhra, a part of kerala and even mysore. And Madras emerged as a major center outshining the historical centers like Tanjore, Kumbakonam, Madurai and Kanchipuram. The British let the zamins continue as before but remained in the background wirh powerful administrators and advisors.
Establishment of Madras University in 1857 made Madras the intellectual center and many bright men took to legal profession and rose to great eminence besides becoming fabulously rich by their legal practice. In their relationship with the ruling British officials, a few had cordial relations but mostly the new English-educated intelligentsia, was either mild in opposition(liberals) or very radical . Mostly they were from tanjore and madurai districts. and for some reason best explained by social scientists, the trinity (1800)and prior to that Sadasiva Brammendral (1750)were all Telugu people. or smartha iyer, immigrants from andhra . Cauvery delta had nourished Carnatic music for centuries before them through temple patronage and festivals. The tradition was that of Oathuvaars and Nagaswaram players. Thus before and after the trinity , Carnatic music has been closely associated with Theistic spirit.During the Maratta rule in Tanjore, Harikatha spread the bakthi message and classical music tinged with hindusthani ragams. it is noteworthy that both Smt.MS and NCV were very much shaped by the spirit of Harikatha.
Due to great many temples all over the deltas, there were almost continuous festivals in one temple or another and free performance was the order of those years. Of course either the temple trustees or rich patrons rewarded the artistes suitably. ( Director K.Subranmanyam organized music festival in Kumbakonam 'Mahamaham' in which MS at very young age ( leass than 20) gave a concert and gained great fame. I am curious if that concert was not free for the people!
The common people did not have to pay anything..... When things moved to the new metropolitan power center, that continuity was lost. Artificial music sabas much like drama troupes of yore came into existence. Classical music became commercial then. and continues to be so except for some idealistic musicians like Mani iyer who gave many concerts in Mylapore temple, free for the people and Smt MS who gave concerts for raising funds for charity. A far cry from hunting for patrons. The only salvation is reverting back to temple festivals in interior towns and villages of tamilnad . Chennai is not tamilnad. Commercial cenema and the socalled rationalist movement have done their damage by branding classical music as brahminical. Even 60 years back, very common non-brahmin people were very well informed about classical music, partly through the films of pre-independence decade and mostly due to temple festival free concerts more importantly through affordable gramophone records and films some of which had as many as 30 classical-based songs. ( one such was of GNB),and there were great many artistes from NB communities. . We need more AIR concerts and less videoed sabha concerts. less importance should be given to visuals. and cinema.

[shankarank]

Notwithstanding Veena Dhanamal's comment about musicians *talking* about music, it also established a very good research ground, so you could still survive as an academic.

The first attempt to talk about music it seems is by Abraham Pandithar - then scoffed at by Konerirajapuram Vaidayanatha Iyer - if you go by the speech of Musiri in Shanmukananda hall - it was posted in Sangeethapriya around the same time when we were discussing the changes in Abheri!

I was listening to TKM speech at MMI 105th celebration - where he mentions about HMB coming to help Abraham Pandithar on a book or something!

[shankarank]

The only salvation is reverting back to temple festivals in interior towns and villages of tamilnad

This is somewhat related to the inspiration question I was asking in the other thread. Are we first inspired by the concept of Temple town and deities these days? Even in speeches we hear generic references ( ellAm valla iraivan - like almighty God) these days!

Every marriage invitation in the olden times will start with references to the deities including family deities. Dikshitar went around and never missed the references to "samEdam" the consort. Even Dharma SASta - conflated with a celibate deity - will have pURNA puShkalAmbA samEda added as reference.

If we lose the spirit of the temple town - they become pieces of art - the hard work of artisans not withstanding! Then it may even go the extent of: the artisans were oppressed!

Is this just a question of faith and theology? There is a cultural aspect to it as well!

[RSR]

ShankaranK Sir, Every word in your above post, is absolutely correct. However, in the month of Margazhi ( Dec 15 to Jan 15...what we call the december season! in Chennai), all the interior towns having either a Siva or Vishnu temple come alive with the spirit of religious fervour and Thiruppavai and Thiruvempaavai songs are broadcast in early morning hours. During the Navarathri days, all the Devi temples are attended by huge number of devotees. Who has not heard about Meeknakshi Kalyanam festival in Madurai ( which incidentally gave us Mani Iyer and MS) . The spirit is still preserved. No reason to lose heart. Do you think, if leading and orthodox musicians come forward to perform in cities like Nagerkoil, Tirunelveli, Madurai, Trichy, Salem, Kanchipuram etc, there will be any poor response? No Sir. Actually, the crowd of listeners will be more but only if associated with religious festivals. The reality as I observed is that theistic spirit has grown and not diminished. It is for the classical musicians to travel down south and win over the common people, especially the youngsters in colleges. I would like to share here a brilliant article on free feast on the occasion of Goddess Meenakshi in Madurai. ( in The Hindu tamil ) by K.K.Mahesh, who is a regular columnist and an Environmentalist. it is in tamil however. https://sites.google.com/site/rsrshares ... anam-feast. Certain articles cannot be translated retaining the same flavour of the original. This is one such. Common people are instinctively 'Advaithin's . We love Idol worship be it siva, vishnu, subramanya, or ganesa or parvathi. ( Saaktham) and all our classical kruthis are about them. So, what could be the problem? Not with the people, certainly. !