a little exercise using ragas and the alankaras

skyblue101 · Post by **skyblue101** » 11 Oct 2009, 19:30

can anyone think of 10 ragas, where each raga is played for each line of the alankara without confusion over raga and without repitition?

eg- taking chathurasra jati dhruva talam, PDNS ND PDND PDNS, if you play/sing in shankarabaranam, others can say it is kalyani swaras.

can anyone crack this puzzle (remember NO repition of ragas allowed)

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 12 Oct 2009, 02:16

May be I do not understand the puzzle properly.

The first line of the chathurasra jati dhruva talam alankarm

s r g m | g r | s r g r | s r g m ||

stays with in the purvangam involving S R G M. There are six ragas that share any combination of R and G, how can there be uniqueness no matter which R and G we choose?

arunk · Post by **arunk** » 12 Oct 2009, 04:03

So you would need a raga uniquely identified by 4 notes. The following pentatonics with the alankara starting with R with the presumption that sa is there) can do it:

(has to have ri and ni - for to be unique in this case)

You then can rmpn (madhyamavati, hamsanadam, revathi)
S R2 M1 P N2 (madhyamavati)
S R2 M1 P N3 (brindavani?)
S R2 M2 P N2
S R2 M2 P N3 (version of hamsanadham without D3)
S R1 M1 P N2 (revathi)
S R1 M1 P N3
S R1 M2 P N2
S R1 M2 P N3

That is 8.

One could do perhaps R3G3PN2 and R3G3PN3 and complete (there are other possibilities but probably as contrived as in rgmn etc.)

So if I sing rmpn pm rmpm rmpn in madhyamavathi, I think this combo can only be in madhyamavathi (assuming no skipping of swaras). Of course if I go srmp mr srmr srmp - it certainly isnt unique

If I am right - this is a good one

!

Note if one takes a s g2 m1 p n2 s (suddha-dhanyasi) with an alankara going like gmpn pm gmpm gmpn - it isnt unique as it would be shared by a raga with S (R1|R2) G2 M1 P N2 S. Thus the uniqueness needs a ri and ni.

Arun

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 12 Oct 2009, 06:03

Arun, if we go by such a scheme, then we can have these corresponding eight involving G and D, right? I have not thought through this fully but blindly substituted G and D for R and N.

S G2 M1 P D1
S G2 M1 P D2
S G2 M2 P D1
S G2 M2 P D2
S G3 M1 P D1
S G3 M1 P D2
S G3 M2 P D1
S G3 M2 P D2

arunk · Post by **arunk** » 12 Oct 2009, 06:21

no vk - an alankaram "iteration" using gmpd of that would also be the same for a raga with sgmpdn. If you have an alankara that has the lowest swara as ri, and highest as ni, AND the presumption is that no swaras are skipped in an alankara, then the ambiguity goes away

Arun

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 12 Oct 2009, 06:40

Ah.... Got it. Thanks. That is indeed a good one.