Which Raga is Raa Raa?

[dianicdreams]

Since I saw this little disagreement on the raga of Chandramukhi's Raa Raa... between two yahoo group members:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/arrahmanf ... sage/71562

Karthikeya was saying it is Shuddha Dhanyasi, and Pankaj was saying it is a transition between Sooryaa and Hindolam...

So, I looked up what others may perhaps be offering as the diagnosed raga for this song:

Ramesh does a detailed breakdown:
http://rameshonmusic.blogspot.com/2005/12/raa-raa.html

Quoting, "This song, from Chandramukhi, is set in F minor (4 kattai). Sudhadhanyasi in F minor is F G# A# C D# F (or) Sa Ga2 Ma1 Pa Ni2 Sa, whereas the scale of this song is F G# A# C E F (or) Sa Ga2 Ma1 Pa Ni3 Sa - Just a half note difference. This scale is the same as "Sindhiya venmani" song in a Vijayakanth film. I read somewhere that this scale is the Srothaswini raga."

Then in the second charanam, the scale is said to shift to Hindolam...

Which means that Pankaj noticed the Hindolam aspect of the song, while Karthikeya noticed the Shuddha Dhanyasi aspect...

But where is the "Sooryaa" Raga coming from? Pankaj, can you clarify?

This sort of thing, I am finding is quite common... that two people would insist that a song is two different ragas, when infact, the song has both ragas within it. "Kannodu Kanbethelam" from Jeans is a great example. It is both Shuddha Dhanyasi and Abheri. Not one, or the other, but both.

In the end, from what Ramesh is saying Raa Raa from Chandramukhi, as far as the pallavi is concerned, is more Srothaswini Raga than it is anything else.

However, we cannot stop here. We must investigate thoroughly...

If you check the forumhub:
http://forumhub.mayyam.com/hub/viewtopic.php?t=5536

Someone lists Raa Raa as "Beautiful song in Surya/sallaapam (with Hindolam for happy parts)"...

But hang on... someone named Subu interjects and explains:

"This raga is NOT surya. I think the confusion is in the interpretation of where you think the "Sa" is.

The starting of the song is actually "Ni Sa Ga", while you seem to interpret it as "Ga Ma Dha". I would classify this raga into the pentatonic scale "sa ga ma pa ni sa" notes of gowrimanohari as the parent scale. I am not sure if there is a known classical raga for
this scale, but this raga has been used by film musicians. For instance, Ilayaraja's "vellai nilaa irandum vellai nilaa" follows the same raga."

So.. anyone know the Raga for IRR's "Vellai Nila Irandum"?

Ok, but don't stop there... keep investigating... make sure...

Looking up a review of the Chandramukhi film's music:
http://www.mouthshut.com/review/Chandra ... 019-1.html

The reviewer states about Raa Raa: "Raa -- Raa’’- The song is in telugu and is probably the climax song- Don’t ask me why it is in telugu- I don’t want to spoil your fun if you haven’t seen the original. In malayalam, this song was ’’oru murai vanthu’’ based on the beautiful kuntalavarali ragam. Vidyasagar has used the rare raaga Surya."

So, it seems that looking at the song at face value, without indepth analysis, to assume it is Surya raga may be an obvious error that can be made.

So, after all that... what raga is Raa Raa? A difficult one, definetely.

Oh, and while we are at it... so far I have come across two sources that say that "Porkalam" from film Thenali, is Raga Kedar. However, Pankaj insists it's Shuddha Dhanyasi...

What's going on?

[ganeshkant]

If the ni is kakali (i.e) GM scale as mentioned this raga is called Udaya Ravichandrika.BTW THE SONG starts as "Pillai Nila Erandum Vellai Nila."If U add Ri(chathushruti) in the avarohanam that becomes Patdeep,I believe.

[dianicdreams]

hmm? What's Neengal Ketavai's "Pillai Nila" got to do with Chandramukhi's Raa Raa?

[ganeshkant]

Dear Dd,

Go thro ur post;U have only asked for it.

[dianicdreams]

yes true - hmm so you are saying the raga is Udaya Ravichandrika

[VK RAMAN]

I like to hear from CMLover, VK and Cienu their observations on "dianicdreams" post

[dianicdreams]

Alright.. the mystery is unravelling... refined my search this time...

http://philramble.wordpress.com/2009/02/13/srothaswini/

Wrote: "I was entranced by one of the nice numbers in the movie’s soundtrack - Ra Ra Sarasakku Ra Ra (not surprisingly, a thinly veiled invitation to have sex, as is common in many Indian film songs) when I first heard it, in part because the name of the song became the name of a memorably bad movie quiz. Anyway, I decided to try the song out today, since I hadn’t really given it a shot since December ‘07, when I made an earnest effort to try the song out, with my limited skills at the time. I was under the impression that it was set in Hindolam with a few anyaswaras, which are common in film music. Although this impression that it was Hindolam never left me, I began to doubt myself on it. After all, the Hindolam idea was thrust on me through a discussion forum, so someone had perhaps got the better of me because of my ignorance.

What I noticed when I played the song this time around, is that the song’s notes fit neatly into a scale I had never before explored! Courtesy Ilaiyagaram and Karnatik.com, I discovered that this scale is called Srothaswini (an audava-audava scale), and it seems to be a derivative of Gowrimanohari, at first glance. Lacking a Dhaivatam and a Rishabam, it comes close to the scheme of Shuddha Dhanyasi."

So, what I gather from all this information is this...

The charanam of Raa Raa seems to be Hindolam - that hasn't been disputed. We'll leave the charanam asside for now.

The pallavi and beginning of Raa Raa, when people first listen to it, can easily mistake it for Soorya raga.

However, what it seems to come down to now, is that it is infact a toss-up between Srothaswini and Shuddha Dhanyasi..

Issue is though, if I understand correctly... it is not quite Shuddha Dhanyasi...

But then comes a light at the end of the tunnel... one of the replies I recieved in solving this puzzle is that the Pillai Nila Erandum Vellai Nila (an Ilaiyaraja song from film Neengal Ketavai), is raga Udaya Ravichandrika.

If you remember Subu's interjection:

"The starting of the song is actually "Ni Sa Ga", while you seem to interpret it as "Ga Ma Dha". I would classify this raga into the pentatonic scale "sa ga ma pa ni sa" notes of gowrimanohari as the parent scale. I am not sure if there is a known classical raga for this scale, but this raga has been used by film musicians. For instance, Ilayaraja's "vellai nilaa irandum vellai nilaa" follows the same raga."

Then suddenly on the Philramble website, I notice a response that clears everything up (or creates a bigger hole):

"It is interesting to note that Udayaravichandrika (which I have known to be another name for Shuddha Dhanyasi) was another name for Srothaswini in the Dikshitar system."

Hmm. So Udayaravichandrika - allegedly Raa Raa's raga, is actually another name for Shuddha Dhanyasi... which is also another name for Srothaswini...

http://www.backtype.com/site/philramble.wordpress.com

philramble says: "I guess this is another instance of the dissonance that various schools of carnatic music have sometimes exhibited"¦ a little like the debate between what are Karnataka Devagandhari and Abheri."

Which makes me curious... what exactly can they debate about where it was meant to be impeccable mathematics?

Arun replied to Phil, "This raga (S G2 M1 P N3 S/S N3 P M1 G2 S ) is actually called udayaravichandrika per the dikshitar school and as you note, he has a composition in it. It also occurs in historical carnatic texts. Of course that name "udayaravichandrika"

[dianicdreams]

In the end, the clearest answer came from Arun here:
http://rasikas.org/forums/viewtopic.php? ... swini.html

"I think this has been discussed (more than once) elsewhere. This raga is actually called udayaravichandrika per diskhitar scheme (and early books). He has a composition in it (SrI guruguha mUrtE) - it has the raga mudra in it. Both the raga and this composition are rare in cm circles.

Of course you add on top that udayaravichandrika is also used for suddhadhanyasi per tyagaraja school and thus perhaps contributing to the eclipse of it. Although as Dr. V.V. Srivatsa ( see http://www.carnatica.net/newsletter/dha "¦ letter.htm towards the end), apparently govindacharya whose scheme tyagaraja followed treated udayaravichandrika and suddhadhanyasi as distinct and separate. Thus the confusion about the name w.r.t tyagaraja compositions probably rose later.

This raga obviously was renamed as srotaswini by someone who wasnt aware of the original name, its documentation in history, and the dikshitar composition.

Ilayaraja likes this raga a lot. Besides the above one, the more famous song is O vasantha raja from nIngaL kETTavai. I think he also uses a shade of it in the song pADum vAnambADi (nAn pADum pADal) - albeit for part of the song, and possibly with ri thrown on descent . There is another vani jayaram song which I cant recall now.

You even have people calling now that Ilayaraja discovered this raga smile - but to be honest this raga is almost never heard in carnatic circles. It is a forgotten one in cm that has more exposure on the film side."

[vijay]

Dianic dreams - it is a Sisyphean quest to find a raga in film melodies, except when they are spefically founded on raga lakshana. This is increasingly rare...with an ear for notes, once can map out the scale in terms of the tonic distance between notes. However the concept of a fixed tonic does not necessarily hold in film music - therefore, Mohanam, Hindolam, Suddha Dhanyasi, Madhyamavathi may all be valid to a greater or lesser for a given pentatonic scale, depending on what is assumed as the tonic - whether it is NSG or GMD is a moot point unless a fixed tonic can be established by means of a Tambura. Also, in many cases, the song does not strictly adhere even to a single scale.

Even if we do manage to allocate a song to a raga from a strictly technical point os view, we must keep in mind that the notes are only the building blocks of a raga and not the raga itself.

Thus it can be futile to assign ragas to film music (especially modern film music which is more rooted in western musical concepts) which is not constrained by grammar in the way classical music is.

[dianicdreams]

Vijay,

As correct as you may be regarding the ragamalika of film music... the issue actually comes down to carnatic music in general...

Infact, the actual issue of Udaya Ravichandra being another name for Shuddha Dhanyasi and another name for Srothaswini... has little to do with film music, and is actualy a dilema of the carnatic medium.

However, it has been widely accepted that each film song use a single raga as base (despite the fluctuations), and several books have been released on this advent... it is not a futile attempt at all, infact, it has been extremely rewarding for the carnatic composers/musicians/vocalists to make it a life goal to identify film music ragas for the better understanding of the ragas themselves. Tiruchi S. Gurunathan and Charulatha Mani are the few that I know of.

The natural fact is, being able to identify ragas, and the practice of identifying ragas from film music is actually an excellent sharpening of skill in th brain, because of the very difficulty, however, such tasks are never in vain... because in the end there is certainly a mathematics to it.

If there are issues and disagreements on which raga a song is - that is more from the carnatic source than it is anything else.

Vijay, as in all fields, there is the danger of regarding oneself consciously or unconsciously as too elitist... elitism is the true sisyphean quest.

As in the words of Rudyard Kipling,

"If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!"

I never believe in elitism.

[vasanthakokilam]

dianicdreams, I think you misunderstood Vijay. You are on this passionate journey to map out ragas of film songs, he has given you a good summary of the lay of the land, it is upto you to properly understand it and use it, I do not think he meant to discourage you from your hobby. There are of course film songs with raga lakshana and that is not what Vijay is talking about. He is referring to those film songs that share the scale of the raga and he is cautioning you not to confuse that with the raga itself. Go on in your journey keeping in mind what Vijay wrote. This is not about Carnatic vs Film.

>infact, it has been extremely rewarding for the carnatic composers/musicians/vocalists to make it a life goal to identify film music ragas for the better understanding of the ragas themselves

That is way overstating it, but then anyone can learn from any source. We can take it in that spirit.

>However, it has been widely accepted that each film song use a single raga as base (despite the fluctuations), and several books have been released on this advent

If you consider Charulatha Mani's programs, she carefully selects film songs that are closer to carnatic ragas in raga bhAva as well as scale sameness. Internet is full of lists that confuse scales with ragas. Here are the basics, summarizing what Vijay wrote.

1. Film music is based on notes. You can cast them into ascending and descending structures and find a closest raga whose scale is similar or same. That is not a sufficinet condition to term it a raga. This category includes those songs that even the internet lists do not map to a raga.
2. There is film music that are truly raga based.
3. There is film music that recasts ragas in different packages. Gamakas are less, beat is western, there may be chords, rhythms may be non standard, but nonetheless it is still raga based.
4. There is film music that cleanly maps to the scale used by raga but does not intentionally adhere to the raga bhAva as known in Carnatic. There is a claim that Ilayaraja once said that he has created a song in Subhapantuvarali with a very happy mood. That may be so, but it ceases to be SPV as we know it. I say, call it by a different name. It is not unheard of for the same scale to be used by different ragas.
5. There is film music that is based on a scale and does not give out any raga bhava. The internet lists are the place where you will find the scale mappings. This is a great talent no doubt and I have great admiration for them in identifying notes that clearly. But it can confuse passionate people like you to think that they are indeed ragas. Here is where you will have to be careful. If you are doing this as an exercise in note identification, go for it but not necessarily for raga identification in the hope that it will help you appreciate carnatic music better. Like, somehow use some of these songs as a template for a raga and pattern match the melodic similarity to carnatic songs as a way of relating to the carnatic songs. Use categories 2, 3 and 6 for that and not category 5.
6. There are ragas that are characterized as 'scalar' which are defined purely by the scales.
7. Add to this the occasional confusion about the perception of tonic. But this may be very good if the confusion is with songs in category 2, 3 or 6.

I have a friend who is a big film music buff. He has picked up considerable raga knowledge by just listening to the film songs using these internet lists. His ability to spot similarities in melody and hence raga identiication is quite amazing. He sometimes surprises/baffles me with identifying some really obscure ones. He admits his note identification knowledge is zero, he goes strictly by melodic similarities.
So I know the usefulness of these lists. These lists are his gateway into carnatic music and now he is passionalte about carnatic music. On the other hand, he relies on these lists a bit too much calling out ragas for songs that are in the category 5 above by referring to those lists and not through melodic similarities to the corresponding raga.

[vijay]

VK, thanks for the defence. DD, I did not meean to sound elitist and apologize if that is the way I came across. Perhaps futile was a strong word - it is possible to argue that music itself is a waste of time - I know some people who actually hold this view! I realize that you are passionate about your hobby and as hobbies go, yours is an interesting and challenging quest. VK's categorization makes a lot of sense in this context.

However, the thrust of my argument was that while songs can be broadly mapped to ragas, it would be a mistake to confuse any resultant resemblance with the raga itself. There are of course exceptions - Papanasivan Sivan composed for several films - but in 99% of the cases, a serious CM musician looking for ideas from film songs is heading the wrong way...in some cases, the result is painfully evident. This has nothing to do about which is superior - more a recognition that there are aesthetic differences between the genres that need to be respected.

However, I do agree that deciphering tunes and assigning them to scales is an intellectually stimulating activity and can lead to a keen sense of notes. This is much harder to do for film songs/western music than for CM/Hm. In fact, I have recommended this myself in a thread on swara gnanam!

[dianicdreams]

Yes I understand what both of you are driving at now. Infact, the issue you pointed out namely with

"He is referring to those film songs that share the scale of the raga and he is cautioning you not to confuse that with the raga itself."

This I find to be pivotal in the kind of research I am doing... coming from my own experience of recognising ragas by sound, which I have heard some people say is a boon only in the context of not overcomplication (as is often done), however perhaps you have realised already that I do try to do a thorough investigation, and will try to verify several several times... which is perhaps why I misunderstood Vijay.. as this entire thread demonstrated that I was not so quick to jump to conclusion about Ragas, so no caution was really necessary.

That being said, what you listed as the common mistakes made by those who indulge in film music recognition was quite an interesting revelation. I am grateful for it.

"Strictly speaking, no hypothesis or theory can ever be proven. It can only be disproven. When we say we believe in a theory, what we really mean is that we are unable to show that the theory is wrong - not that we are able to show, beyond doubt, that the theory is right." - Gerhard Robbins, Physicist.

Referring to an interesting comment:
"I have a friend who is a big film music buff. He has picked up considerable raga knowledge by just listening to the film songs using these internet lists. His ability to spot similarities in melody and hence raga identiication is quite amazing. He sometimes surprises/baffles me with identifying some really obscure ones. He admits his note identification knowledge is zero, he goes strictly by melodic similarities.
So I know the usefulness of these lists. These lists are his gateway into carnatic music and now he is passionalte about carnatic music. On the other hand, he relies on these lists a bit too much calling out ragas for songs that are in the category 5 above by referring to those lists and not through melodic similarities to the corresponding raga."

I am also having the same experience, and again, I am starting to see the benefits as well as disadvantages of it... although the stream - an avenue into carnatic music is not available to someone who has zero note identification knowledge... in employing simply sound to identifying ragas, there are definetely advantages that have come to my attention... it bids one to question and decipher for themselves without taking anything for granted, or going by anyone elses conclusions.

However, anyone who wishes to identify by sound, and not by note identification must always bear caution on how careful he must be not to oversimplify - that being understood, there are merits, definetely.

One thing to point out is, in the early part of my research into finding out the raga for Chandramukhi's Raa Raa, going by sound alone, I would have said the pallavi was definetely Srothaswini... and going by sound, I did not mistake it at all to be Shuddha Dhanyasi. Yet, going by notes, it is easier to make such mistakes, easier even to mistake the raga to be Soorya. It then occurred to me that for a devoted, and necessarily sober person who recognises by sound, quite a few traps can be avoided... I am going at this with the full understanding that I have only touched the drop of the ocean, will try to keep this awareness throughout the journey.

As for film music where as you said, and I paraphrase, a sad raga is made to sound happy by Illaiyaraja.. and your question of if it stops being that raga at all... excellent point, as I myself have wondered the same.

Rationally speaking, I would say that when ragas are recast with multiple variation of film music rhythms and beats, and especially with your mention of it using same notes, but different raga... it would be easier to identify by sound rather than by notes... not sure, it will take much more investigation before I can clarify this point.