Dear Rasikas,
Hope every body are doing well. am having lots of doubts regarding talam. am very well understood by 35 thalams. but how is 35*5 = 175 could you help me to identify how is this in detail. then the next doubt is regarding 108 thalams what is 108 thalam & what are they please help very urgent.
>but how is 35*5 = 175
Each beat of a thala can be further sub-divided into sub-beat counts. There are 5 such sub-beat counts : 3, 4, 5, 7 and 9 ( tisram, chathusram, kandam, misram and sankeernam respectively )
vasanthakokilam wrote:There are 5 such sub-beat counts : 3, 4, 5, 7 and 9 ( tisram, chathusram, kandam, misram and sankeernam respectively )...
...for each of the seven talas.
(I just finished you sentence for you, VK; I'm sure that's what you meant to say!).
I don't think that the 108 talas follows any pattern or logic: just that there are 108 of them! It wouldn't surprise me, though, if one of our scholars can say that I'm wrong!
Thank You so much to all. But one more thing i wanted to know whether there is any name for each of 175 thalas. if so please clarify. Also about 108 Thalams & their names.
There is 35 (7*5 as mentioned above) and 108 tala systems. Not, I don't think, 175.
Yes, each of the 108 talas has a name, and a structure of varying complexity. You can find it in any carnatic music text book --- probably even on the net too. Yep. Google will answer you question. Here is one list -->http://www.angelfire.com/mb/mridhangam/108talas.html. It is pretty academic and archaic.
The names of the 175 thalas are just expansions of the jAthi and gathi names.
That is, the common Adi thala is formally Chathusra Jathi Triputa Thala Chathusra gathi.
So, the 175 names can be generated using this concatenation format: <jAthi name> jAthi <thala type name> thala <gathi name> gathi
jAthi names are: Thisra, chathusra, khanda, misra and Sankeerna
thala type names are: Dhruva, Matya, Rupaka, Jhampa, Triputa, Ata, Eka
gathi names are: Thisra, chathusra, khanda, misra and Sankeerna
Examples:
sankeerna jAthi Dhruva thala kanda gathi
sankeerna jAthi Dhruva thala thisra gathi
thisra jAthi Dhruva thala misra gathi
misra jAthi Ata thala thisra gathi
chathusra jAthi Ata thala sankeerna gathi
etc.
As Nick said, there are no other common names in use for the 175 thalas ( Adi thala is the well known exception )
Another thing to note is, if you do not specify the jAthi and gathi, certain defaults are assumed.
Gathi, if not specified, the default is Chathsura gathi
For Jathi, different thala types have different defaults.
For Ata thalam, the default is the khanda jAthi. So if someone says Ata thala they mean Khanda jAthi Ata thala chathusra gathi.
Similarly,
Jampa thala refers to Misra jAthi jampa thala chathusra gathi
Dhruva, Matya, Rupaka and Eka: The default jAthi is Chathusra jAthi
Triputa: The default jAthi is thisra jAthi
I think even the 35 Talas have separate names as i vaguely remember having seen it in South Indian Music Vol III of Sambamoorthy ... will chek up again .. in the meanwhile anyone finds it also can clarify ...
Yes, all the 35 Talas are named and the list of them is also available in the South Indian Music Vol.III of Prof. P.Sambamurthy. But, I do not know why these 175 Talas have missed to have conveniently been named by the persons who have brought out the 72-Mela-talas.
In the same manner, not only 108 Talas but also there are hundreds of Talas which have already been named and long ago furnished in the old treatises. But, there are only two treatises 1.Sangita Samayasaara of Parshvadeva written just before Sangita Ratnakara in 12-13 century and later, only in 1902, the 2nd book, Gayakalochanam written by Tacchoor Singaracharya Bros., was brought out in which the Talas, along with their constituent Talangas and respective names, specific-serial-numbers are also furnished. But, due to lack of the knowledge of Talaprastara by which the serial-number of each and every rhythmical form could very easily be obtained, people do not know that they are serial-numbers as they are not in serial order. In the annals of our music literature itself, these serial-numbers of these Talas furnished in these two books obviously prove that their authors are aware of this technique of getting the serial-numbers of Talaprastara. But, unfortunately, the authors of these books did not reveal the secret of this technique as the conservatives are always used to keep their mouth shut in respect of such secret techniques. But, begining right from Sangita Ratnakara, many of the authors have very conveniently skipped off these serial-numbers but furnished lists of umpteen Talas coining their names with their own names and titles of their own fancy like Nisshanka-tala and Sharngadeva-tala of Sharngadeva in his Sangita Ratnakara and Lakshminarayana-tala of Bhandaru Lakshminarayana in his Sangita Suryodaya. By all this, much duplicacy took place in respect of many of the Talas. Mathematically there will never be two numbers of the same value i.e., there will never be two 2s or two 3s and so on and in the same manner no two Talas should be there of the same rhythmical structure. This knowledge should be obtained only from Talaprastara. Even though this topic of Talaprastara has been dealt with in 15 or 16 books, unfortunately, these technical-secrets have never been brought our by any author of any century in any language. Only by the grace of the Almighty, now this knowledge has been brought out and furnished in the sub-thread, Talaprastara of the main thread, Tala & Laya of this forum for the benefit of the aspirants. amsharma
