Scalar raga? Vector raga?

keerthi · Post by **keerthi** » 15 Oct 2014, 10:56

This post began as a knee-jerk indignant response to pAdi being labeled as ‘scalar’ in this discussion. But I have maybe meandered on to several related and some unrelated issues.

It is quite scalar and Dikshitar uses these steps to construct a beautiful edifice. There are other versions that are also wonderful available commercially; Prof. S. Ramanathan's is highly recommended.

TMK has long insisted that scalar ragas do not provide the same scope for expansion as more traditional pre-scale ragas like kambhoji, bhairavi/mukhari or todi. The fact that prayogams from simhendra madhyamam can be transposed to shanmukhapriya and vice versa is, in his opinion, the reason that they do not provide the same effect on the performer/listener complex. Not that they don't have any unique aesthetics or intellectual appeal.

He stuck to mostly non-scalar ragas. I guess that is his thing which suited my tastes. One exception may be pADi, it sounded scalar to me but that may be due to my lack of familiarity with the raga.

Interesting observations all..

1.Scaling the scalar

Doesn’t this beg the question of what makes a rAga scalar or the opposite [whatever that is?]. Is rAsali scalar? Is sarasvati scalar? What about bahudhAri and bindumAlini and ranjani?
If the answer is yes for all, or for any combination of these, then do well feel that they are all ‘scalar’ to the same degree?
I feel that scalarity or non scalarity isn’t an attribute of the rAga as much as it is a feature of one’s treatment of the rAga.

Isn’t the style of manOdharma music practiced by most musicians today, one wherein the mEla rAgas and rAgas like mohana and hindOLa are sung in a regimented way, without much thought to important vAdi samvAdi pairs, identification of important nyAsa swaras, or even in identifying and emphasizing particular sancAras which confer rakti – aesthetic and emotional character, which can help to formulate a definite swarUpa of the rAga?

I remember a saraswati I heard by the Hindustani Harmonium Ustad Ravindra Katoti, in the village of Harihar, Karnataka. His treatment of it was astounding, and surpasses all the sarasvatis I’ve ever heard. He expanded my perspective of the rAgas scope by an order of magnitude, by interpreting it in a very novel fashion, using sancAras like sn\rs , ssnsrsns, mpdn,nd and so on; which contemporary Carnatic artistes are unlikely to approve of.

2.Understanding the ‘other’

Are we treating the ‘more traditional pre-scale rAgas like kambhoji, bhairavi /mukhAri and thodi’ in a non-scalar way? Do our AlApa and swarakalpana treatments (and the notations/ pAThAntaras of the kRtis we sing) reflect this pre-scale nature of the rAgas?

I will use a different sample set – nAtakuranji, bEgaDa, pUrvakalyAni, anandabhairavi and sAranga. If we can label these too as ‘traditional pre-scale rAgas’; what is it that makes them so? What in the performative interpretation and treatment of these rAgas by current musicians warrants them being called non-scalar, or rakti rAgas or whatever other label we choose for them. If our interpretation of the ‘non-scalar’ rAga merely constitutes the set of all sancAras allowed by the scale plus a handful or ‘special’ or ‘archaic’ sancAras; this is a highly unsatisfactory way of defining scalar and non-scalar in my book.

In my understanding of the Indian music system, the very heart of the rAga lies in those particular vakras and varjyas and janTas and gamaka-intoned swara clusters, with various unique and sometimes shared/overlapping melodic sequences, all of which form a gestalt that is the rAga’s universe. However our modern education, with an emphasis on the positivist sciences, pressurizes us to form an idea of the rAga music system that is ‘logical’ or ‘scientific’.

Is it possible to revisit these views? Could they possibly be ill-formed? While it is somewhat true that the provisional scales of ragas help us to determine the ‘scope’ and the ‘scale of magnitude’ and ‘degree of scalarity’of a rAga, could there be something in our lenses and viewpoints that biases our response to this question?

3. Interrogating the question

The treatment of every single rAga – scalar or non-scalar, big rAga and small rAga, by S.Balachander and T.R.Mali and Voleti Venkateswarulu, has almost always been fresh, entirely consonant with (my understanding of) the raga lakSaNa; and has given an array of new sancAras, and shed light on contour and possibilities of the rAga. I choose to include Balachander since he performed the mElakarthas and the other 'traditional' ragas, with equal enthusiasm and frequencey and elaboration.

To a lesser extent, Balamuralikrishna, and Vasantakumari and Kalyanaraman have demsntrated original sancaras and scaled uncharted territories. The latter two were somewhat limited and restrained by their allegiance to the scale-dominated world-view of the rAgas.

The attitudes of artistes like Tiger Varadachariar, Smt. Brinda and Nagaswaram T.N.R. Pillai, which was yet another kind, needs a separate discussion. [and my limited understanding of Tiger’s attitude is entirely from a combination of hearsay and a study of his compositions and his pAThAntaras of certain songs]. Similarly, I have found SubbarAma diksitar's interpetation of every single rAga, barring none to be exceptionally sophisticated. Be it the sancAris or his own compositions, his elaborations always have embodied the complex, intricate treatment that carnatic music deserves - be it in HindoLa, hamsadhwani, amRtavarSini and mOhana, or be it Pharas,yamuna kalyAni and asAvEri. He again, deserves a dissertation length treatment.

So I return to the question, where does the scalarity abide? Is it inherent in the nature of the rAga – as it lives in the lakSaNa grantha and in the notations of songs, and in the shared intelligence of performers? Or it is a product of attitudes towards performance and interpretation of music?

Rsachi · Post by **Rsachi** » 15 Oct 2014, 12:16

Keerthi,
You have raised many points which go over my head.
Just sticking to a rudimentary understanding of ragas,
I think Hindola is scalar, whoever renders it whatever way.
Todi is non-scalar, whichever way it is presented.
In this context it is not that scalar lacks direction (=vector) but lacks a dimension of slides, curves, and colours. It is like the old 256 colour rendering like a GIF and the 16.7 million colours we now have everywhere.

I hope I am right here.

Thanks for starting this discussion. It is a pleasure to listen to you.

Rsachi · Post by **Rsachi** » 15 Oct 2014, 12:40

Scalar

Non-scalar

sureshvv · Post by **sureshvv** » 15 Oct 2014, 19:16

http://sanjaysub.blogspot.in/2009/06/sc ... i.html?m=1

mahavishnu · Post by **mahavishnu** » 16 Oct 2014, 10:15

Suresh, Did we discuss that article in the context of bEgaDA bigotry? Thanks for the Sanjay blog reference. I remember having read it a while ago and liking it as much then as I do now.

Doesn’t this beg the question of what makes a rAga scalar or the opposite [whatever that is?].

Keerthi: First of all, thank you for starting this interesting discussion.

While I agree with you that appropriate treatment of rAgas can change something that is considered "scalar" into a more non-scalar and perhaps livelier form, I think there are some basic principles at work when we do the categorization (either cognitively or through some text-based classifier).

To some extent, everything in CM is "non-scalar" in the sense that there are oscillations that preclude certain usages; and there are clear-cut rules that govern the grammar/syntactic order in which we approach the note frequencies. That said, if we strip all the ornamentation out of something like tOdi, you will get a rAga of different flavor; such as sindhubhairavi but not end up in the range of related neighbors like dhanyAsi or ghanTA. Likewise for sankarAbharaNam or kalyANi.

The point I was making about pADi and Krishna's treatment of it (from the other thread) has to do with some of his thoughts on equivalencies of phrases between certain scalar rAgas. And using the same examples of shanmukhapriyA and simhEndramadhyamam, there are phrases in existence in each rAga that can be instantiated on the other and vice versa. Thus there is no "special" syntax for these rAgas that is unique to them. Or if you prefer that I weren't being categorical, I could rephrase that to say that there is a less rigid syntax involved in bringing out the rAga swaroopam than say, darbAr or nAyaki.
Just for reference, I am providing the link to Krishna's original comments on this yet again: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15UnZMT ... C3&index=8

So, perhaps instead of classifying rAgas as scalar or non-scalar, perhaps a more useful way to categorize them would be along a continuum of rigidity of syntactic rules that govern their execution. My sense is that the so-called rakti rAgams will end up being on the opposite end of the category from the ones that are reducible to their scalar form.

Now, where does that leave mOhanam and ranjani? My feeling is that these rAgas have acquired some additional embellishments over the years, but they are closer to the scalar end of the continuum than not.

Again, this is not to say that one can't do wonderful things with the rAgas. I think the skill of composers and the manOdharma of performers is to bring what they can out of these syntactic arrangements. I think what Lalgudi did with Mohanam or Ranjani is spectacular!

So I return to the question, where does the scalarity abide? Is it inherent in the nature of the rAga – as it lives in the lakSaNa grantha and in the notations of songs, and in the shared intelligence of performers? Or it is a product of attitudes towards performance and interpretation of music?

In many ways, I think scalarity (and everything on this continuum) perhaps resides in inter-subjective agreement like the way public language, culture and the semantic spaces they create, tend to dwell in.

Systems that do not see syntax the way we do in CM (like W. Classical music) see scalarity quite differently. Even very well trained ears in those traditions see kiravANi and naTabhairavi and being much more similar than we do.

Which makes me think that a lot of it is culturally specified and has much less to do with the acoustics of the tonal structural sequences, but on rules arrived at by intersecting phenomenal experience of the performer/composer with existing grammatical rules arising from the corpus of lakSaNA grantha.

Rsachi · Post by **Rsachi** » 16 Oct 2014, 10:26

A bit tangential, but the all-knowing Google asked me to watch a Ravikiran talk on raktitvam (ARTery). He said many things that play into this discussion. He also showed how there are these ragas which have an instantly recognisable face through a typical phrase of just two/three notes. Their raktitvam is of such a high order that the scale is neither necessary nor sufficient to recognise them.

sureshvv · Post by **sureshvv** » 16 Oct 2014, 12:48

IMHO, this is the latest attempt to create a caste system among ragas, much in the manner that vivadhi ragas were stigmatized by the previous generation which we now know is hogwash, thanks to various anti-establishment vidwans

@RSachi: When the Hyderabad Bros. sing Kalyani, I can recognize it with a single note. I am not sure it has anything to do with "raktitvam". Either that or it has to do with much more than "raktitvam".

Rsachi · Post by **Rsachi** » 16 Oct 2014, 15:14

@sureshvv,
It's surely your raga identifying prowess.
I too have a similar success with recognising the raga and song when the neighbourhood "beedi basava" pied piper appears! It's going to be that song from movie Sankarabharanam

sureshvv · Post by **sureshvv** » 16 Oct 2014, 16:59

As long as you don't attribute it to the rakthitvam of beedi basava we will be fine

arunk · Post by **arunk** » 16 Oct 2014, 18:38

sureshvv wrote:IMHO, this is the latest attempt to create a caste system among ragas, much in the manner that vivadhi ragas were stigmatized by the previous generation which we now know is hogwash, thanks to various anti-establishment vidwans

+1

I also think "scalar" seems as nebulous as mothers of nebulousness - "Bhava" and "Rakthi"

- Also perhaps the whole thing has a dose of a bias towards anything complex or not simple (and thus implies sophistication as well as mystique).

Arun

VK RAMAN · Post by **VK RAMAN** » 16 Oct 2014, 18:47

Caste, Subcaste, gothram, vegetarian and no vegetarian - are there any other scalar system available for pundits to explain for strict conformance.

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 17 Oct 2014, 10:49

If we set aside the subjective value judgement that one group of ragas is more authentic or genuine than the other, then we can look at this strictly as a classification exercise. ( The word scalar itself brings with it so much baggage, especially to those who still have not quite recovered from the trauma of the Linear Algebra course!! )

At the top most level there are three different classifications that need consideration. Perhaps there are more, but let us look at these three.

Axis 1:
1.1 Ragas whose major essence can be captured by Scale + other things(*)
1.2 Ragas whose major essence can be captured by Scale
( this is about their musical nature )

Axis 2:
2.1 Ragas whose major essence was reverse engineered into a scale + other things(*)
2.2 Ragas whose major essence was reverse engineered into predominantly a scale
( this is not about their musical nature but it is about what musicologists did to them)

Axis 3
3.1 Ragas that existed as melodic motif and were fitted into a close enough scale
3.2 Ragas that evolved from a scale
( so this is about which came first, the melodic motif or the scale )

(* other things : Characteristic Prayogas, gamakas, specific modulation of swarasthanas, nyasa swaras etc )

Each one of these classifications has an aspect related to scale alright, but that does not say anything about how ancient the raga is, how classical it is, whether there is scope for exploration or not etc. Those can be overlaid on top of any of these 6 categories. For example, a raga in 1.2 can be an ancient raga, a raga in 3.1 may have limited scope for exploration and some ragas of 3.2 can belong to 1.1 etc.

That is one aspect of the issue. Our ancestors were Taxonomists, being masters at classification in every sphere of human activity, they even classified things that are normally thought of as not classifiable. So the above exercise is in that tradition.

Second aspect is not about classification but about qualitative description. It is almost universally stated that Ragas are not just scales. If that is a fundamental axiom of the entire musical system and practice, it is the responsibility of the system to describe as clearly as possible and without too much handwaving what is that delta that makes a scale a raga. Stated in another way, still qualitatively speaking, if X = Raga - Scale, what is this X? Can X be 0 in some cases and still be called a raga?

sureshvv · Post by **sureshvv** » 17 Oct 2014, 12:19

The problem is Swara = Note + Y

harimau · Post by **harimau** » 22 Oct 2014, 11:21

Let us take a look at some of the pre-melakartha ragas that were in use in Tamil thevarams.

Mohanam stands out. With just 5 notes, is it scalar or - because of its antiquity and evolution over centuries - is it a rakthi raga?

Now let us compare it to Hamsadhwani. We know that this has been in use only since Ramaswamy Deekshithar's time, making it less than 250 years old. it differs from Mohanam in that the dhaivatham of Mohanam has been replaced by nishadham. Is this a scalar raga?

Let us take the pair Keeravani and Simhendramadhyamam. Musicologists hold that both are recent ragas not having been mentioned in ancient texts. Do they admit of elaborate treatments? Are they scalar? They differ from each other in just the madhyamam. Can most listeners tell them apart even if they cannot name the ragas?

How about Sankarabharanam and Kalyani? Again, they differ only in the madhyamam. Can even an uninitiated listener tell the two apart from the alapanas?

Sankarabharanam is an ancient raga in use in tevarams. Kalyani is a recent import. In fact, it was dismissed by Mudduvenkatamakhi as the music of Turks, unfit for use in Carnatic music. Is Kalyani a scalar raga because of its lack of antiquity or is it a rakthi raga? If it is a rakthi raga, what made it so?

One could go through all the melakartha ragas and ask the question whether some of them are mere scales.

I remember a discussion or a review in this forum a couple of years ago where someone who can only be called a jaalra of the tup-tup artist claimed that Dharmavathi was merely a scale because the tup-tup artist didn't/couldn't treat it elaborately and that was conclusive proof to him that Dharmavathi still needs to evolve, perhaps at the hands of the tup-tup artist.

I also remember reading about how the late Dr Pinakapani elaborated Sarasangi for 30 minutes which led Musiri Subramania Iyer to exclaim, "What could this man do with Sankarabharanam if he could elaborate Sarasangi for 30 minutes?" Is Sarasangi merely a scale?

Thus, trying to classify a raga as scalar because our current-day musicians can't sing it elaborately is like buying a plastic scale (ruler to you guys in North America) for Rs 2 in a stationery shop in Mylapore, measuring the international standard for metre (a platinum cylinder in Paris) and declaring the international standard to be faulty. It may be faulty due to recent more accurate measurements but not because your plastic ruler with the ends broken off doesn't agree with it.

That goes for measuring the rakthi of a raga as sung by TMK or the tup-tup artist too.

PS. As to Padi, hardly six years ago, the artist in question neither knew "Sri Guruna Palitosmi" nor the name of its raga. That should disqualify him from making any statement as to the scaliness of Padi.

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 22 Oct 2014, 20:39

PS. As to Padi, hardly six years ago, the artist in question neither knew "Sri Guruna Palitosmi" nor the name of its raga. That should disqualify him from making any statement as to the scaliness of Padi.

That is interesting. Any public evidence of that? Not to settle any discussions of this thread but just for general info.

Just so we do not mis-attribute, TMK did not make any statement as to the scaliness of Padi. It was I the ignoramus who floated the idea based on how it sounded to me. That was based on my own mental conception of how a scalar raga sounds and in that mental model 'scaliness' does not have anything to do with any sort of value judgement or its lack of ancientness. We can have scalar ragas from ancient times too. There is a related but different thread of thought on what a raga is and in what way it is different from a scale. Here we are talking about scalar ragas and not scales. May be lack of that distinction is causing some confusion. I made an attempt to bring this point explicit in my post above about various forms of classifying ragas.

I did not write about this earlier, but when I heard Sri Guruna Palitosmi in the TMK concert, the song that it reminded me of then was 'EkambreshaNaayike' in Karnataka Suddha Saveri. I have not looked up as to why that is so, I intend to do that.
And Karnataka Suddha Saveri to me sounded scalar mainly because I can play that raga based on its aro/ava on my iPad and it sounds somewhat like KSS. Here is that example

https://soundcloud.com/dabbler125/japan ... _karnataka

I know nothing about KSS's raga lakshaNA but when I listened later to the brief kalpanaswara passages I felt there was some similarity to KSS

Talking of scalar ragas in general beyond pADi, Sivaranjani sounds scalar to me. I love this raga a lot. Here also its essence is reflected in playing aro/ava. See if you agree based on this recording
https://soundcloud.com/dabbler125/major ... ivaranjani .

And another one that is somewhat like this is udaya ravi chandrika.
https://soundcloud.com/dabbler125/minor ... scalebased

There is probably more to URC than this. But it sounded like one of the ragas in that complex (URC, Abheri, Suddha Danyasi etc. )

The problem is Swara = Note + Y

Suresh, that is indeed true. Of course, there are swaras where the Y component is zero depending on context.

harimau · Post by **harimau** » 22 Oct 2014, 21:29

vasanthakokilam wrote:
That is interesting. Any public evidence of that? Not to settle any discussions of this thread but just for general info.

Just so we do not misattribute, TMK did not make any statement as to the scaliness of Padi.

When the first CD in the Audio Archive of the SSP was released, the function was held at the Kasturi Srinivasan Hall of the Music Academy. Sri R K Srikantan was invited to present a concert and he sang "Sri Guruna Palitosmi". I was within earshot when TMK asked Sri Srikantan what the raga was.

If TMK didn't make any remark about Padi, he should refrain from doing so at least for a few more years.

harimau · Post by **harimau** » 22 Oct 2014, 21:38

vasanthakokilam wrote:
I did not write about this earlier, but when I heard Sri Guruna Palitosmi in the TMK concert, the song that it reminded me of then was 'EkambreshaNaayike' in Karnataka Suddha Saveri. I have not looked up as to why that is so, I intend to do that.
And Karnataka Suddha Saveri to me sounded scalar mainly because I can play that raga based on its aro/ava on my iPad and it sounds somewhat like KSS. I played this with the scale in mind but almost zero knowledge of what KSS is except for an occasional hearing of EkambreshaNaayike. Here is a recording of that. It does indeed show I know nothing about KSS but when I listened later to the brief kalpanaswara passages I felt there was some similarity to KSS .......

Karnataka Suddha Saveri is a janya raga of Kanakangi, the first melakartha.

Padi is a janya of Mayamalavagowlai, the 15th melakartha.

If you look up the arohana/avarohana of both ragas, you may discover the reason for similarities. However, the parent scales do not have identical swaras for gandharam and nishadham.

sureshvv · Post by **sureshvv** » 23 Oct 2014, 14:48

harimau wrote: I remember a discussion or a review in this forum a couple of years ago where someone who can only be called a jaalra of the tup-tup artist claimed that Dharmavathi was merely a scale because the tup-tup artist didn't/couldn't treat it elaborately and that was conclusive proof to him that Dharmavathi still needs to evolve, perhaps at the hands of the tup-tup artist.

Hope this is not an oblique reference to "Subbudu" because he is reputed to have said something equally braindead

As someone who has his initiation into CM more than a couple of decades ago thru' a dharmavathi RTP of TNS where he had wrung every last essence out of the raga out, I think its evolution was near complete at the end of the cassette tape

arunk · Post by **arunk** » 23 Oct 2014, 19:02

To be fair of TMK, the one time I heard him say about "scalar" ragas vs others is that (excellent) lec-dem/class he did at IIT (you can view this on YouTube I think) where he qualifies it more than once that this is strictly his opinion/preference (and thus not prescriptive). He says ragas e.g. like begada (not sure he mentions this one in particular) are as he says "an idea" and thus to him as a musician more challenging to elaborate. We may not agree with him (I don't but then that is my preference

), but he is certainly voice his opinion, and it is certainly understandable for it to reflect in his music. One is also certainly entitled to evolve/change their opinions over time.

I did not warm up to the pADi song performed by TMK/RKS/AP at Chicago. But there were other reasons all entirely my own: my preconceived expectations, the downright sombre/quietness of the song as the very first song (I wasnt in the mood

), and the very low volume of his singing at that point (my expectations werent right at that point

).

IIRC, he used long slides (neraval) and perhaps that is what vk felt as "scalar". And I also felt there were similarities to karnataka suddha-saveri (KSS). Perhaps ni isnt a strong swara in pADi (?) - and the rest atleast in terms of swarasthana tee up to karnataka suddhasaveri (pAdi's scale is not a straight up/down - has vakra as per SSP and I am fairly sure as per how it was rendered that day). Perhaps that is why we could sense traces of KSS.

Arun

arunk · Post by **arunk** » 23 Oct 2014, 19:35

The other thing I wanted to mention is that when we come across an unfamiliar raga, we subconsciously try to map it to any of familiar ragas we know and thus we say 'dont know, but it sounded like this other". It certainly is fraught with over-extrapolation and hence need not have any correlation to the truth of the matter!

Arun

harimau · Post by **harimau** » 27 Oct 2014, 08:42

Let us take two ragas that existed from before the 72-melakartha scheme was devised and that go back to the beginnings of Carnatic music.

There are musicians who can and do bring out Bhairavi in Kharaharapriya and vice versa.

Whom do we blame for this -- the melakartha scheme or poor musicianship?

Nobody sings Harikambodhi extensively nowadays. Persons like Alathur Brothers could easily do a 30-minute alapana.

Today, if the alapana lasts 3 minutes, you are lucky. On the other hand, a nothing raga like Khamas is elaborated for 20 minutes. Is Harikambodhi losing its stature and becoming a mere scale? Is Khamas a rakthi raga?

tiruppugazh · Post by **tiruppugazh** » 30 Oct 2014, 08:31

The Bore-adi brothers, who are of the same lineage as the manavaadu pitamaha, can do a brilliant scalar Shankarabharanam for more than 30 minutes with elaborate sangathis on a static kaakali nishaada

sureshvv · Post by **sureshvv** » 30 Oct 2014, 11:24

tiruppugazh: I can never tell when your remarks are tongue-in-cheek, so I shall refrain from defending the brothers. Not that they need it. Looks like you are catching the harimavu disease

harimau · Post by **harimau** » 30 Oct 2014, 14:14

harimau wrote:
Sankarabharanam is an ancient raga in use in tevarams. Kalyani is a recent import. In fact, it was dismissed by Mudduvenkatamakhi as the music of Turks, unfit for use in Carnatic music. Is Kalyani a scalar raga because of its lack of antiquity or is it a rakthi raga? If it is a rakthi raga, what made it so?

This morning I was watching the program Pann Isai Vitthakargal on Makkal-TV .

Prof. Kotilingam sang a stanza from Silappathikaram in the Pann Merchempalai. It sounded like Kalyani to me and Dr Sundar too identified it as Kalyani.

Does that mean Kalyani existed as a Pann before it came from the Turks through Hindusthani music? If so, were Carnatic musicians and musicologists in Tamil Nadu unaware of its existence? Or is Merchempalai a 16th century or later invention in Pann Isai?

Prof Vaithilingam and his brother Prof Kotilingam are gold mines as far as Pann Isai is concerned. I hope they give a lec-dem somewhere this December Season so I can ask them about Kalyani/Merchempalai.

harimau · Post by **harimau** » 30 Oct 2014, 14:18

sureshvv wrote:tiruppugazh: ......Looks like you are catching the harimavu disease

Do not accept imitations or substitutes.

I have plenty to say and will say them.

arasi · Post by **arasi** » 31 Oct 2014, 05:12

Harimau uvAcha

ganeshkarthik · Post by **ganeshkarthik** » 14 Mar 2015, 20:52

Hello all, an intresting discussion. I would request you to compare suddhasaveri- a vector raga and pasupathipriya- as a scalar raga as per my understanding of the above definition . can we say ragas whose roopam can be achieved plain notes as scalors.physics also says scalar as only magnitude (in music- swarams), but vector as both magnitude and direction ( swarams with gamakams as per manodharma rules- otherwise we will land up in some other raga)

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 14 Mar 2015, 22:52

GeneshKarthik, that is a neat twist in the interpretation of scalar vs vector.

Very nice.

In fact, that popular distinction ( Magnitude ) vs (Magnitude + Direction ) is actually a very special case of the general mathematical definition of Vectors. Vectors are built using scalars by using certain well defined rules ( called axioms ). Those rules are deceptively simple but a whole gigantic universe of mathematics has resulted from it (Linear Algebra). That pretty much dominates the world of science and engineering (as many of you know, Quantum Physics is all about Linear Algebra).

What you state works with this general picture as well. Even more so I suppose. Ragas are indeed built out of scales using some well defined aesthetic rules. Rules give you guidance on do's and don'ts. They provide boundaries which give rise to shapes and behaviors - form and function. The 'raga rules' are not precise rules as in mathematical rules but they are rules nonetheless in terms of defining boundaries with a lot of artistic freedom. I would even venture to say that those rules are fairly simple, And out of scales and those rules a whole gigantic universe of musical aesthetics have been derived. That is Indian music, raga music, the musical vector space.

(Note : in the interest of rigor, the above is just a conceptual comparison and just for fun. Ragas are not really vectors made out of scales as per mathematical definition of a vector)

SrinathK · Post by **SrinathK** » 19 Mar 2015, 20:16

Allow me to barge in to a most fascinating subject on ragas. I am drawing upon whatever little I have listened to, read, thought about and experimented with myself to examine. If you really want to determine what a raga is really capable of, we need to look at all the following. As usual, this will have to involve several posts.

It's gamaka capabilities : And I'm not just refering to kampitas, there are several types of gamakas involved, but ok, I'll start here :

1) Kampita : E.g. How many ways can you phrase that G2 in Thodi ? I'm still finding out more -- yesterday while listening to an ARI thodi (Kangalidyaathako), I noticed in the swara section a rapid kampita on a G,, which was new to my ears. The gamakas of a note are not only taken in isolation, they also change slightly depending on the combination of swaras present in the raga phrase.

This level of gamaka also depends on the overall tempo of the krithi or alapana. How many new gamakas can you discover singing that krithi slower or faster? Even some plain note brighas would qualify. So how many gamaka colours DOES that raga phrase have?

And yes, vibrato is a gamaka too even if the label is Italian. Some scalar ragas really have a limited gamaka palette than others, partially because their scales are too knotted in vakra phrases, or some notes are too far apart, and this can stop some swaras from using the kampita.

2) The dhaTTu : You have a raga. How many swaras can be linked with how many other swaras and create recognizable raga phrases. Again more evolved ragas shine here. In particular the pentatonic ragas seem to have a flair for this sort of gamaka, as their scales are not so dense nor so sparse as to allow quite a few combinations.

This is where the distinction can get tricky. How far can you take this gamaka without treading on another raga's territory? For this reason, there shouldn't actually be too many vakra scales posing as ragas, it can limit the scope of this gamaka in many other ragas. However, CM so far seems to have this problem very well on the whole, but some ragas like Harikambhoji and the lesser sung melakartha ragas do suffer from the "Janya effect" -- the phenomenon where a melakartha becomes limited by the very ragas put under it.

More on Part 2

SrinathK · Post by **SrinathK** » 19 Mar 2015, 21:26

3) Arohanam and Avarohanam : Is only one of the gamakas, YES! A really limited idea is to assume that the arohanam and avarohanam creates the raga. While this is true in many scalar ragas, vector ragas have a much greater potential outside the "skeleton" if I may put it. Their evolution is driven more by experimentation with phrases and the arohanam avarohanam is hardly indicative of their true capabilities. Some ragas can violate their skeletons to the point where it has to be heard to be believed. Look at Atana : M P N2 S ; P D N2 S ; M P S ; P D N DSNDN P (notice the subtle dhatus that come in those short brigha phrases) ; M P N3 S ; M P S N3 S ; S N3 D N2 P ; S N3 P : S N2 P (there is a jharu here) ; S P ; S D P ; D N D S ; S N3 D2 - P (This is not so straightforward, you need a long slide from N3 to D2 and then one more slide to P, so it can be done in slow speeds, but would sound odd in faster tempos, but crucially it indicates the ability of gamakas to carve out combinations that would otherwise not be possible or sound meaningful from swara derived phrasings).

By aro avaro definitions, aTaaNa would be at least 6 different ragas! I'm not even talking about ragas like Nattakurinji which has 2 very distinct avarohanams with no common ground. Ataana is a case of fuzzy logic in comparison to the binary logic of Nattakurinji.

There is a particular gamaka that allows you to skip the Panchamam or the Shadjamam or some other note without losing the flavour of the raga and not every raga can handle it. Thodi can use it at will

, Shankarabharanam, Madhyamavati to a lesser extent. Thodi is unique among all the 72 ragas for this one. I have not heard other notes skipped at will like that. Madhyamavati is a tricky line on the other hand -- overdo it and Madhyamavati is gone and a mere scale remains.

4) Unique phrases : Go beyond swara. Just how hard is it to make a unique phrase which you are sure can be a totally new raga? E.g. Look at Amrita Behag. The story is that GNB got the idea for a new raga by listening to TNR experimenting with some really vakra phrases in Kalyani -- phrases which came from the "walking lab works" that was TNR. After some thought, it would have become clear to him that these could really not be recognized as Kalyani and would indeed be a new raga's. This requires a lot of thought, a lot of evolution and a vast knowledge on the capabilities of known ragas and a deeper intuition that can actually recognize a raga's identity the way we recognize people despite a change of clothes, age or hairstyles or a new style of dressing. Clearly there is more to a person's identity than just defining him by parts of clothes or fashion sense -- the whole is more than just a sum of parts. So is your musical sense as developed as your visual cortex?

Which brings us to some questions. How can you sing Sarasangi without it looking like a fusion of Lathangi and Charukesi? Clearly new phrases have to be discovered, sometimes imported. Do you think that Sarasangi's N3 can be sung plain like KalyaNi ? (maybe it has, my recordings of Sarasangi are limited) As a matter of fact, Kalyani's plain N3 is a more recent discovery -- so it's still evolving. But will Sarasangi or other scalar ragas evolve even further? Despite sharing 6 out of 7 notes, Kambhoji and Shankarabharanam have found their own ways to distinguish their notes -- do you think the vivadis in one chakra with the same S R G & M can evolve their own spectra? As an example a plain N3 is king of kaarvai in Kalyani, not so much in Shankarabharanam (I've heard ARI use it a lot, but now-a-days it seems to have adjusted in response to the evolution of N3 Kalyani). G3 in Shankarabharanam is a plain note while G3 in Kalyani has oscillations. Will the vivadis do something similar to acquire their own identity?

More questions. Do ragas have an overpopulation problem where the presence of too many ragas with common notes starts to limit each one's scope? E.g. I am afraid that Keeravani will hesitate to use a S-P jharu (unlike BegaDa or Thodi) because it has been stolen by it's little sister, Kiranavali. Harikambhoji in particular has been hit quite badly and is forced to stick to more scalar phrases (and avoid many others that would be possible) out of fear of Khamas and Kambhoji, limiting it's scope.

The evolution of ragas means that we can encounter surprisingly different variations of these ragas depending upon the "gamaka spectrum" -- this is just a vast ground that it can create many versions of a raga that are totally unique and when taken to it's extreme can even carve a musical system into 2 or more (Yes, HM Yaman vs CM KalyaNi) -- so it is not something that can be answered right away, it needs time and lots of research. It will take even longer for these ragas to standardize into versions with sufficient common ground that a Kambhoji is always going to be a Kambhoji regardless of musician and won't sound like a graft experiement of ragas spliced together.

(Then again, there is Basant Bahar, which is one such splice experiment, which finds an identity by turning it's 2nd arohanam into a special effect)

More on PART 2

kvchellappa · Post by **kvchellappa** » 20 Mar 2015, 08:17

A layman's question: why can't we have different ragas ones without gamakas (simply scalar?), and ones with them? For example, Thodi is unrecognisable without gamakas. Can't we have a basic thodi without gamakas?

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 20 Mar 2015, 22:16

why can't we have different ragas ones without gamakas (simply scalar?), and ones with them?

We have cases where raga A and B are same in syntax ( Aro/Ava ) and are differnt in their gamakas. One extreme case of that is B is without any gamakas. I think HM will be more amenable to such a thing than CM since HM strongly identifies ragas with such aesthetic considerations ( prototypical example being Bhoopali and Deskhar ). Of course that does not mean they will necessarily consider a 100% straight note usage as a raga.

One strange way to answer the question is 'There can be ragas that are same as scales but not all scales can be ragas'. The reason is, ragas are organic and arise out of musical aesthetics. They are not conceived in a day by putting together a sequence of notes. It has to have a characteristic swaroopa that is aesthetically interesting and can be codified as a melodic motif. If it so happens it is all straight notes usage and hence same as scale, so be it. But obviously that does not mean all scales can be considered as ragas, even the ones that are derived from well known ragas sans gamakas. The necessary test it has to pass is whether it has appeal from a melodic perspective.

(Also as a practical matter, ragas need time to settle into the consciousness of people, but that is different given that is a sociological phenomenon)

There are web sites that provide mappings between film songs and ragas. Quite a few such mappings do not make any sense because it is based on notes used and looking up a raga with that note usage. Another misconception which is more subtle is to claim that they can produce totally different emotions for ragas. Even Ilayaraja was susceptible to that at times when he claimed that his song in Subhapantuvarali is all joyous. All he is saying there is that he used subhapantuvarali notes but without any subhapantuvarali gammakas or characteristic phrases. It is subtle because ragas can indeed produce different emotions ( like Mukhari having a wide range of such emotions ) but the bottomline is it should sound like that raga even when different emotions are brought out.

For example, Thodi is unrecognisable without gamakas. Can't we have a basic thodi without gamakas?

That will sound like Sindhu Bhairavi. There is more to SB but people will most probably think you are playing SB. ( e.g. P D1 P.. M1 G2 R1 R1 R1,,,, R1 G1 M1 P.. M1 G2 R1... S.... played without gamma's would sound like the starting line of Venkatachala nilayam.. more or less )

But it turns out that it is OK to sing thodi without gamakas occasionally. MLV in her excellent thodi Lec Dem says so and also you can sense that clearly in some portions of a few Papanasam Sivan songs as well.

kvchellappa · Post by **kvchellappa** » 21 Mar 2015, 10:35

Thank you Vasanthakokilam. It has been lucid.

ganeshkarthik · Post by **ganeshkarthik** » 22 Mar 2015, 13:45

Mr. srinath and mr. kv chellapa, it was amazing to see your depth of analysis

. I would like to mention one view which i have heared from many stalwarts."Ragas (especially vectors) cannot be got with swaras''. Each and every raga has its own roopam like you and me. In my understanding these shapes can only be felt but not written. One of the important aspect of CM is the term '' manodharma '' which i understand as a dharma common for all our manas (unwritten rules, as it not possible. Simply can we write how is thodi's G2? But we all know what is thodi's G2

). I use to compare this with rangoli ( In fact i dont know it). There we can see, first they will plot the matrix with many dots.(this is our melakartha or the framework). Then they will connect the dots to get a picture ( which is the final raga roopam). I think the way we connect the dots matters(manodharma) whether it is a kuthuvilakku or an elephant rangoli ( Final raga roopam) . So before we proceed to perform a raga we should keep the picture in our mind.

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 22 Mar 2015, 22:00

Ganeshkarthick. I like your Rangoli metaphor. And those shapes are indeed motifs/templates and are not static. Different people can use similar connections to produce the same recognizable shapes but they all can/will look different. Just as it happens with alapanas and various songs in the same raga.

SrinathK · Post by **SrinathK** » 29 Mar 2015, 21:33

Although I wanted to write quite a bit more here, I've been buried underground in work for a while and have just found my way to the surface. So I'll just mention one more very important point :

How many compositions are around to explore the full gamut of this raga? Essentially, how big is this raga's data bank?

Like my example in ATaana, I know those phrases exist because of all the Thyagaraja krithis out there. And we know that there are ragas with literally hundreds of compositions of all types and tempos and talas and phrases in them whereas at the other end there are ragas which have "tried to venture into compositions" and all in between. The last category definitely needs a compositional genius like Thyagaraja or an OVS and a vast array of musical geniuses who will increasingly expand the interpretation of both the krithi and the raga -- I must point out here that as ragas and gamakas evolved, krithis and sangathis too have evolved and the impact is mutual. Then these lesser ragas would standardize -- i.e. their "data bank" has become large enough to sufficiently build their unique "body". A raga is a person, an entity, only that it is made up of sound and musical phrases and is recognizable to the ear as a person is to the eye. And "raga genetics" is a very real thing. No wonder those old descriptions of "raga devatas" or the artistic descriptions of ragas as characters can be found.

Next time someone asks what a raga is, say "A musical individual, made of musical phrases and features".

Now I should note that ragas can still be elaborated extensively even without a large data bank of krithis -- but still, that has been the base that differentiates ragas that share a lot of common swaras and establishes common standards. How else could you differentiate between a G3 of Shankarabharanam and a G3 of Kalyani or the R2 of Shankarabharanam and the plain R2 of Lathangi? Or even define how Shakarabharanam can have a plain G3 or Lathangi has a plain R2 or that the G2 of Thodi despite its huge spectrum is still different from the G2 of Dhanyasi or Bhavapriya? I dare say, make the D2 of Shankarabharanam as plain and you will suddenly have a different raga. Maybe some other melakartha could try it, and use it as a jeeva svara.

Oh yes, that reminds me -- Garudadhwani. Same D N S - D, P and G M P - (G) R, S are possible in both ragas (Shankarabharanam can do this despite being a sampoorna raaga), but they are so TOTALLY different. Fact is, Garudadhwani sounds like an orchestral C-major composition in comparison to the mighty Shankarabharanam. Their M1s are both completely different too, with Garudadhwani taking great care not to use the kampita gamaka as Shankarabharanam does, instead treating it virtually as a plain note.

The other day I was seeing a completely different version of Manavati (HM flavour) which didn't sound like anything I've heard before. That means the scope of this raga is still so unexplored it probably hasn't fully standardized, yet -- or it may be interpreted completely differently in another system of music, which is also a clear example that defining a raga by label and aro-avaro is by no means enough. At least in the CM system, this is one major purpose of having compositions in a raga.

Considering that Thyagaraja (for e.g.) alone has 81 unique ragas to his credit, I'd say he was definitely trying to explore the world of ragas and would have found even more had he had a much longer time on earth.

The scope of this subject is staggering. Even after hundreds of years of musical evolution, we are finding ourselves thoroughly tiny in front of what is still possible.

Sindhuja · Post by **Sindhuja** » 15 Jan 2016, 22:45

http://srutimag.blogspot.com/2016/01/ra ... l?spref=fb

- A fun (ish) article by me on the topic. Comments welcome.

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 16 Jan 2016, 01:46

Great work, Sindhuja!! Loved it. I was waiting for Begada to make an appearance and sure it did.

"Bahudhāri got quite offended and said, “On top of being gamak-ist and phras-ist, now you’re being ageist!”

Nice!

that Nalinakanthi and Hamsadhwani give pure visceral joy to a lot of people, whereas Shubhapantuvarali can make them deeply melancholic. Hamsanādam often evokes passion and is deeply moving, while Shankarābharanam can stir up a sense of blissful contentment.Nīlambari is reassuringly soothing while Thōdi and Bhairavi evoke a sense of grandeur and loftiness.

All good stuff and well written. This is something we all relate to in pretty much along those lines. When I read the above, I wondered about if any other community/culture/society outside of CM and HM circles would associate such highly specific emotions with melodic motifs. I can see them associating individual songs and compositions giving them such experiences but it will be interesting to see if there are higher level melodic abstractions( like the raga ) that people associate with emotions. Closest one I can think of is, western ear does consider minor scale to be a bit darker or sombre than the major scale.

Sindhuja · Post by **Sindhuja** » 16 Jan 2016, 08:50

Thank you, @vasanthakokilam!
And yes, that's an interesting question - I think for starters no other genre has such rigid, codified musical forms as ragas. But having said that, it's true that the major scale is generally considered "happy" and the minor scale not so much.

As an aside I in fact think that even individual notes/ swaras (even the plain ones in Carnatic) can create strong moods.

mahavishnu · Post by **mahavishnu** » 16 Jan 2016, 12:02

Very nice, Sindhuja. Thanks for sharing

rajeshnat · Post by **rajeshnat** » 16 Jan 2016, 14:19

Sindhuja
Very nicely written and quite educative as well. I especially like the entry of chitta who resolved the stalemate- ofcourse chitta himself/herself can have a radically different opinion the very next day . Great write up.

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 17 Jan 2016, 01:15

Sindhuja, it is interesting you classified Mohanam more on the scale side. It is true that simple execution of the scale reveals its identify. A part of it. But one needs to bring in gamakas and pidis/prayogas to bring out the rest of it, right? So it that dialog Mohanam could have played on both sides, chiding both sides and come out smelling great!!

kvchellappa · Post by **kvchellappa** » 17 Jan 2016, 07:18

In one Q&A, TMK said that ga of mohanam goes close to ma.

narayan · Post by **narayan** » 17 Jan 2016, 07:37

Nice to see this topic rolling along over the years! Enjoyed reading Sindhuja's article and SrinathK's posts among others.

sureshvv · Post by **sureshvv** » 18 Jan 2016, 11:20

Nice post Sindhuja. How come Jayantasena stayed out of the fracas?

Sindhuja · Post by **Sindhuja** » 19 Jan 2016, 05:30

Thanks, all!

vasanthakokilam: that ambiguity in classifying Mohanam is exactly what I intended to convey there, perhaps I wasn't very successful. I don't believe Mohanam belongs to the likes of Reethigowlai/ Begada/ Sahana - it is not characterized by typical phraseologies and I think it is one of those ragas where "anything goes". But of course, it has come to acquire strong raktitvam in the form of gamakams and pids as you say - and that's the point that I intended Nattakurinji to be making in that monologue but guess I was too quick there and could have added more details.

sureshvv: I guess Jayanthasena wanted to stay of the fracas - you see, he's not very confrontational...
On a serious note, excuse me but I'm not sure why you ask - I think it's going back to an earlier discussion here but not sure

sureshvv · Post by **sureshvv** » 19 Jan 2016, 09:33

Sindhuja wrote: sureshvv: I guess Jayanthasena wanted to stay of the fracas - you see, he's not very confrontational...
On a serious note, excuse me but I'm not sure why you ask - I think it's going back to an earlier discussion here but not sure

My memory is rather poor and I don't recall the earlier discussion, may be you can provide the context. Reason is a couple days back I heard Abhishek sing Jayantasena with alapana, and was wondering where in the spectrum it would fall.

Sindhuja · Post by **Sindhuja** » 19 Jan 2016, 23:48

Ah I see, ok - that way tons and tons of ragas are missing from the scene. I had to pick and choose from the 1000s of ragas in existence...

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 20 Jan 2016, 00:25

The rakthis and ghanas raise their hand and say 'we are a countably small group. Let me prove it. Roll Call please'

SrinathK · Post by **SrinathK** » 23 Jan 2016, 18:18

Wow Sindhuja, fantastic article.