Of taals and taans

[Sivaraman]

While surfing the web,I came across this very illuminating "Hindu" article,by Ramadas Menon,intricately analyzing the various facets of both Carnatic and Hindustani systems of Indian Classical Music,highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of both the systems.

http://www.hinduonnet.com/folio/fo0012/00120060.htm

I thought this article is worth sharing and also thought that we could throw open for discussion this subject in an enlightened and objective way with so many musicologists like Dr.Shrikanth and Coolkarniji who have given us all so much delightful insights into the carnatic system over the years.
I,as an ordinary rasika, have always considered that one needs to have an open mind, and musicians in both systems would only enhance their skills by imbibing the plus points of each system and this would help them to evolve as complete musicians in the truest sense of the word.Unfortunately, I find that while both the carnatic musicians,dating right back to the "Great Trinity" to the present generation of dynamic musicians are not averse to imbibing the good aspects of hindustani system, I find that the typical hindustani musician as well as their rasikas have more of a closed mind, and really think that their system is superior to ours,by virtue of their voice culture and emphasis on shruti and melody.
No doubt the jugalbandhi experiments between carnatic and hindutani musicians likeBMK/Bhimsen/Jasraj, and the Dr.Ramani/Chaurasia have helped to bridge the gap in both systems coming closer and complementing each other with their plus points.But much,yet, remains to be done to popularise carnatic music and make the hindustani audiences realise our precious heritage with it's own unique grammar,the treasure house of krithis,the intricacies of swara prastharams,pallavi singing,etc.
In this endeavour to spread the horizons of carnatic music,both the present carnatic musicians,rasikas,musicologists and music critics have a vital role to play.
I still hope to see the day when hindustani audiences would flock to carnatic concerts like our rasikas flock to concerts of top notch hindustani musicians during our music season.

[gobilalitha]

whilst on the subject, I would like to express my agony on the indecent habit of many of the rasikas( iam sorry ,it should be crowd) rushing out of the hall , as soon as the thani avardhanam starts.whereas the hindustani music lovers are with rapt attention when the sawal jawab starts. but it is a very sorry state of affair that the hindustani musicians are paid an astronomical amount, when compared to carnatic musicians. . they are accommodate in 5 star hotels. in what way our music is inferior ? gobilalitha

[Sivaraman]

GL,you are absolutely right on both counts.It's a very bad habit on the part of our carnatic audiences to rush out of the auditorium in search of canteens, as soon as the thani starts.This needs to be corrected very much, as it is an insult to the percussionists to leave the concert when they start exhibiting their skills.It is sad that our audiences have yet to imbibe the lesson,"Shruti mata,layam pita"!Without the great skills of the percussionists, no concert could be soul-filling and complete.When will our audiences realise their prejudiced attitude towards the percussionists?Probably it is because so few of them are able to understand and appreciate the nuances of thala as an integral part of music.It is for this very reason that BMK introduced in his concerts a short interval in his concert to enable the percussionists to start his thani after the interval, so that the audiences will, at least after the interval, have the decency to sit through the thani,honour the percussionist.
As to your second point, it is also totally unjust that hindustani musicians should be paid astronomical sums, whereas our musicians have to be content with far less sums offered for their concerts.This again validates my point that it is due to the patrons and sponsors of music putting hindustani music on a much higher pedestal than carnatic music.This should be totally unaccepatable to our own musicians who should protest at such unjust treatment, when our music system is in no way inferior to theirs.
Btw,my write-up was to focuss on analyzing and comparing the two systems of indian music, and I would appreciate more discussions on this subject, as expounded by shri Ramadas Menon in his illuminating article.

[Nick H]

I think the economic issues and the audience behavior issues have been very well covered in this forum.

Not that there is any reason not to discuss them again, while the situation remains unchanged --- but I'd echo the inclination to concentrate on the article.

Not that the Northern and Southern musical divide is not something also well covered here

[vasanthakokilam]

Quite a nice summary. It is a refreshing article in the sense the author states his opinions openly without couching it in veiled criticisms or equivocal expressions.

As with any such short articles comparing such wide oceans, he had to be quite broad. I am wondering if I should just accept his characterization of HM at face value or if there is scope for multiple opinions on that. I also would have liked him to cover the percussionists' approach and the treatment of rhythm in general in the two music systems. He sold me on the 'taan' to the extent I was going to check it out myself and see if I can relate to it and experience the joy he talks about. The reference to BMK in that context gave me the necessary idea to relate to it. I should not let that slow me down

One thing on the voice culture and sruthi instability he mentions about CM. Definitely, point well taken. How do instrumentalists fare? Are CM instrumentalists for the most part on par in terms of sruthi suddham with their HM counterparts?

[vijay]

I suppose taans refer to the drut section (latter half) of a khayal where the vocalist cuts loose. I wonder whether this is not equivalent to brighas in CM? Other than BMK, GNB, MLV, Ramnad Krishnan and TNS also come to mind.

Another possible CM analogy is to be found in taanam (the names obviously come from the same root). While most taanam renditions are perfunctory and not really comparable to hindustani taans, those who do take taanam singing seriously (TNS, Sanjay, TMK to name a few) come close to taans in HM...

In response to VK's Q - on the whole, instrumentalists are a lot better in sruthi since it is a less abstract concept when it comes to an instrument. However violinists do slip up quite often - partly because, like vocal music, the swara sthana is somewhat hazy and partly because of the challenge of accompaniment especailly at high speeds...for instruments like the flute I suppose it is hard to slip on sruthi although some giants appear to have managed even that! (without, IMHO , their music being any the worse for it...)

[gobilalitha]

as against the instrument, the human voice gets disturbed due to various factors frequent travel in different weather conditions especially in USA where the weather takes dramatic turn from one state to another state, in addition to storms building up at a very short notce, daily programmes , sometimes even 2 everyday, food habits(not avoiding oily stuff), too much of departure from main raaga for sruthi bedhams,disturbing the natural voice, attempting higher octaves, though the voice refuses to cooperate gobilalitha

[vasanthakokilam]

Vijay: Regarding the nature of instruments and the 'haziness or non-fixed nature' of where the swarasthanas are, flute has more 'fixed' swarasthanas than Violin in that sense but 5 of the 12 notes require partial opening of the hole. Also the correct orientation of the blowing hole, the placement of the lip against that blowing hole, is critical to keep in sruthi. This especially comes into picture when they take the flute off the playing position and then it need to be put back exactly right. Of course, these are not excuses for sruthi slippage but just as a comparison of the degree of 'haziness of the swarasthanas' as you put it regarding the construction of the instrument.

I am thinking of the instrumentalists vs vocalists in this context to get at the root of the sruthi issues. Since, oscillatory gamakas are given as a possible excuse for the occasional CM sruthi slippages, one way to get better data on that is to compare instrumentalists and vocalists.

If on the average, CM instrumentalists are much better in sruthi alignment and produce the full CM gamaka richness, then atleast we can take out the gamakas as an 'inherent' reason for the perception of sruthi slippages. Veena artists are probably a good statistically valid test case for this. Then to apply this to the vocalists, we have to assume that over the course of the duration of the concert it is indeed physically possible for the average CM professional vocalists to have great and proper gamaka skills and still be in perfect sruthi alignment to the extent of the average HM professional musicians. Citing MMI as an example to show that it can be done is not sufficient since in any population there are always a few data points at the edges of the normal curve and they should not be used when comparing averages. We need to consider the improvement of the meaty middle ( 95% ) so the overall average goes up significantly to achieve what Ramadoss Menon refers to.

[vijay]

Thanks for that clarification VK - I have no idea about the flute and did not quite realize the intricacies of producing gamakas on it...veena artistes as far as I can tell are pretty much on the ball...nagaswaram vidwans OTOH are very iffy when it comes to sruthi...

[ramdasmenon]

I know it's a bit too late in the day to comment, but I'm glad to see that you folks liked my writing. Actually The Hindu had asked me to write this way back in Sep 2000 for their Music Special issue in Dec 2000. I was given a word limit of 1200 words, and therefore had to restrict myself.
Will send out a Note on Season 2010 in Facebook; there are a couple of Ramdas Menon-s in FB, so you can track me down using my e-mail ID [email protected].
I had also written a "tribute" to Jyoti Basu; this was published as an Op-Ed piece in The New Indian Express on 27 Jan 2010, and is also available in my Notes section in FB. Of course, I had sent it to the Ram The Red Blooded Hindu, but I didn't even get an acknowledgement.
Thanks once again for your encouragement.

[srikant1987]

To me, taans seem to be just swaras sung in the akara instead of naming them. I think MMI and TVS sometimes sing that in between the swaras, and then swarapaduthify the akara. Creates a nice effect. Makes a subtle point that music comes first, then swaras. |(

Taanams correspond to jod-jhalap in Hindustani Music, I believe.

One of my friends who learnt CM, is a listener to both CM & HM, and later learnt HM and now learns dhrupad, says that CM, he can listen to vocalists and instrumentalists, but feels instrumentalists in HM often water down the music. I haven't listened to lot of HM, but it indeed string-instrumental HM seems to almost always contain fast-bowing or fast-plucking, often with cross-string, swaras / taans. It goes on for several minutes normally. That friend calls it "ding dong stuff" -- I think it's' a cute name!

[ramdasmenon]

Thanks Mr. Sivaraman for your comments. I apologize for being so tardy in my reply