Major ragas not handled by Tyagaraja

[shibi]

What are the main ragas ( both melakarta and janya) in which Tyagaraja has NOT composed.

Thanks,

Shibi

[srikant1987]

In a way rAgas become "major" when Thyagaraja handles them, so we could say that by definition this is an absurd question.

However, mAnji is a strange ommission -- but my guess is, a/some mAnji song/s of his would have been converted to bhairavi. lalitA would have been another, but the Vedavalli mami school sings sItamma mAyamma in that.

[keerthi]

It is slightly presumptuous to try and make a list of things which tyAgarAja 'hasn't' composed in. It may be wiser to say, raga-s in which compositions aren't prevalent, or haven't been found.

My friends who had once seen the codices at the madurai saurAshtra sabhA claim to have seen songs in the rAga-s saindhavi and mAnjI.

[Those were the only two I asked about]

Since our very skewed sense of major and minor rAga-s comes from the unfortunate choices of the artistes of the last three generations, latangi and shanmukhapriya and devamanohari and markatamanohari and whatnot are major rAgas.
tyAgaraja has two digit number of songs in darbAr and yadukulakambhOji and probably asAvEri and balahamsa. I don't see them graduating to the 'major league'.

given that many of his contemporaries and predecessors have used dvijAvanti, it is sad that no song of his is available; and in paraZ we only find one song from the prahlAda-bhaktivijayam, which only survives in the mangled notation of sAmbamoorthy.

[srikant1987]

Come on, dEvamanOhari is a major raga, and in fact it isn't treated elaborately anywhere near as often as latAngi and Shanmukhapriya. What is marakatamanOhari?

Darbar, YK and maybe asAvEri get better treatment than dEvamanOhari!

[keerthi]

markaTamanohari - 'delighter of the monkey' is still being gestated in the prefrontal cortex of some contemporary vaggeyakAra.

dEvamanOhari has very little to offer in terms of content and is a lightweight. I have said this elsewhere on rasikas, the mrmr- rmr srmrs phrases grate on the ear. Most singers seem to be incapable of handling non-ndn phrases in it. They won't sing Ahata-pratyAhata phrases while singing janTa prayOgams, and add further to the lack-lustre quality of the rAga.

You are welcome to all the devamanOhari I have heard. I wish I could 'unhear' it and transfer it to you. It is unfit for any protracted swarakalpana or tanam.

If you have heard elaborate, major raga approaches to darbAr, YKK and asAvEri, in the fashion they deserve, without hearing a rehash of the same old-chestnut phrases, good for you. Especially for such rAga-s, I feel we could learn from the north Indian musicians, who develop the atmosphere of the rAga, with well deliberated mErukhaND AlAp.

This is a digression form the original topic.

[arunk]

yes. Please transfer it my way too - Major or not it doesn't matter to me.

Arun

[mahavishnu]

markaTamanohari - 'delighter of the monkey' is still being gestated in the prefrontal cortex of some contemporary vaggeyakAra.

This is why we need a "like" button!

[cmlover]

Of course markaTa tAnam is gestated and used by some competent veterans
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tanam
and hence devamanohar elaborated in that tAnam is sure to please the monkeys

[arunk]

- good catch.

Arun

BTW, it always gives me a warm, cozy "things are normal" feel when we cm rasikas use personal tastes as a basis to pass objective judgments on a largely perceptive and personal domain which is music. Be it deeming something to major ragas, or (more often) trashing a raga and whoever may feel otherwise. Live and let die - that be the motto we will take to our grave.

[narayan]

shibi, the well known ragas of today that do not have well-authenticated songs of Tyagaraja are probably a few of the popular pratimadhyama mela ragas (Shanmukhapriya, Simhendramadhyamam, Latangi, Ramapriya etc.). There are some songs listed in a few of these, but it does not seem to be watertight. For example, the two "commonly sung" Simhemdramadhyamam songs - Natajana and Needucarana - with the Tyagaraja mudra are not his, I think.

Off hand, I cannot recall if any songs are listed under either Navaroj or Kuranji, for tyagaraja, although I'm sure there must be some. Some 'major' ragas are under-represented in tyagaraja (Paras has been mentioned, and one that strikes me is Gaula, where other than the Pancaratna song, no other tyagaraja song seems popular).

Of course some popular ragas of today are very clearly post-Trinity creations (e.g. sung by Muttaiah bhagavatar or so), so we can perhaps not discuss those.

keerthi, I am surprised that you have heard so much Devamanohari that you are saturated. The raga has something going for it - at least three Tyagaraja songs including Evarikai, and although I have not checked the Diksitar lists, there seems to be the ragam there as well. There is at least one varnam, it has post trinity compositions, it appears in ragamalikas, ... so I would call your assessment a bit harsh. But feel free not to listen to it, of course. Also, keerthi, I don't even know what saindhavi is, so perhaps you could elaborate when you can or provide a pointer? Thanks.

[srikant1987]

narayan,

MD's composed (or commonly believed to have composed) the following in dEvamanOhari. I'm sure keerthi also knows this, which is why I'm surprised that he dislikes the rAga so much!

# tripura sundarI namOstutE - dEvamanOhari/Adi
# bhAratI maddhiSaNAjADyApahE tvad - dEvamanOhari/rUpakaM
# mahAdEvEna pAlitOsmyahaM - dEvamanOhari/Adi

[keerthi]

1. In response to shibi's original question, I have always wondered why there isn't a song of tyAgaraja in malahari, given the story that he heard purandaradAsa's songs from his mother [and the obvious sahitya semblances].

2. there is also a story about tyAgarAja singing jyOtiswarUpini, in SoNTi VENkaTasubbayya's home. It is unlikely that he only sang rAgam, there must have been a kRti.

3. I have always wondered why there are no songs of the divyanAma or utsavasampradAya genre in kAmbhOji. All the available kAmbhOji songs of tyAgarAja are biggish ones, and we haven't seen any in say, rUpaka tAla or khaNDa chApu.

4. narayan, I concur w.r.t gauLa. I am surprised and disappointed that we have access to no other songs of his in gauLa. what we have is the ultimate lakshya prabandha for the rAga, and embarrasses superlatives.

4.5. the utsava sampradAya song 'gaurI/ sItA- kalyAna vaibhOgamE' aka 'pavanaja-stuti-pAtra' is definitely in kurinji. Similarly, 'nA pAli shrIrAma bhUpAlaka-stOma' is in navrOj.

[keerthi]

The devamanoharI-trasher-murdAbAd! comments I gladly accept. I will be the first to concede that I am a bit of a nazi when it comes to notions of what is and isn't a fertile rAga. My only arguments in my defense -

Yes, I've heard/ seen the good compositions and the decent varnam.

I agree there is some small scope for an interesting account of the rAga.

All the elaborate renditions I've heard have been exactly that - renditions, they rent apart the songs and my aesthetic apparatus. [The gandharva-s play a cruel joke on me by prompting that girl on radio to sing one of those forgettable dEvamanohari-s as I type this post]

If anyone comes across a non-hackneyed devamanohari, that they feel will reform me from the heretic I am, please do send me your versions.

narayan, regarding saindhavi; there is pitifully little we know. Clearly a dEshya rAga, the name having a place reference - 'saindhavi - = that of the sindhu, could either refer to ocean/coast or to the Indus'. It is describes as a niSAdAntya janya of kharaharapriya. There are songs by annamayya, ksEtragna, upaniSad brahmEndra yOgin, shahaji, the merattur composers, swati tirunAL and the usual laksana gita-s by Venkatamakhin and GOvinda.

The jAvaLi iTu sAhasamulu is in this rAga. the jAvaLi Emandune muddu bAlamaNi was supposed to have been in this rAga, and later metamorphosed into mukhAri or kApi or something.

These are somewhat in prevalence. The pallaki-sEva-prabandham daru-s have used saindhavi, and Smt. vEdavalli's students must have sung the one, in their recent felicitation programme.

There is a song Ascribed to MD, and SubbarAma dIksitar has given the rAgalakSanam, but no song, and at the end of the SSP, at the very end, the last song of the appendix is a ksEtrayya padam dondara videmutO.

It is one of those rAga-s on the endangered 'Red list'.

[narayan]

Trying to stick to the spirit of shibi's question, I hesitantly put forth Rudrapriya (the Amba paradevate one) which seems to have been prevalent at the time and in which I cannot recall a Tyagaraja song?

srikant1987, thanks for the devamanohari pointers.

keerthi, thanks for the info and opinions. I think your comments on ragas you you dislike are perhaps worth more than my comments when I like one! I would say you are certainly entitled to your opinion twice over, since you have seen what there is to see. I don't know if I can point you to anything striking, but I recall the following from my experience - a sprightly one by S.Ramanathan that I heard live, a KVN recording somewhere preceding Evarikai (perhaps with neraval in the caranam as I hazily recall), and a Ramnad alapana preceding Kannatandri napai.

From my side, shibi, you have to say whether your question is answered to any extent. I am done for now.

[arunk]

Apologies if this seems like a philosophy lesson (but it is, one which I also have not learned).

Instead of battling out which raga is major/fertile based on objective merits (which can be interesting but is ultimately futile as it would rarely overcome internal biases/preferences), IMHO consider the following.

Consider the possibility that it is OK for there to be ragas which people handle expansively and other like, which we personally don't think is great. Consider the possibility that "I need not have to appreciate everything in CM that everyone considers valuable". In short, consider tackling the subconscious notion that "If it is good, I like like it. So if I dont like it, it isnt really good, worthy" etc. etc..

Consider that the music is much bigger than us - I would dare say the carnatic music is much, much, much bigger than the trinity. They themselves have said it, and lived it.

So just because they didn't handle certain ragas and "new ragas" are being handled by later folks, dont mean that the later folks are "misguided", etc.

Live and let live. Understand your biases but don't extrapolate too much based on them

Arun

[cmlover]

Dear Keerthi
You seem to have moved too far to left since you wrote in
http://rasikas.org/forums/viewtopic.php? ... 8&p=176542
No problem! The grating mr-mr and ndn-pndn is actually capitalized by Narasimhan and his Quartet Team.
Perhaps that is what endears this raga to the westerners (the devas
Though my repertoire is very limited I fell in love with it after hearing Dr. S Ramanathan whose favourite this was.
One of these days I hope Sanjay or Sowmya will do a magnificent rendering of this raga which will make you change your mind and open the doors of the 'Heaven' for you to join the company of the devas

[arunk]

cml,

FYI: sanjay (and many others e.g. I have heard malladi also recently) has done evarikai. He also has done an RTP. Tanjore SKR has done ninnuneranammi (? I think - HMB)

BTW, I (again IMO and only MO) dont think it is that major a raga (but certainly underutilized) - I find it about the same as durbAr. But that is just me

Arun

[PUNARVASU]

In South Indian marriages, soon after the 'mAngalya dhAraNam' the song 'Anandam Anandam AnandamE' is played. I think it is in the rAgam 'saindhavi'.

[vidya]

I'd say Dharmavati, Jyotisvarupini and Rupavati (based off the line of the Melaragamalika this raga seems underexplored) - Three ragas I'd liked to have hear a composition of Tyagaraja. But Mysore Vasudevachar, Walajahpet Venkataramana Bhagavatar have compensated for the first two.

[vgovindan]

This may or may not be pertinent to present discussion. However, in response to a query by a viewer in my blog, I find that Sri tyAgarAja has not composed in any kRtis in Melas 6,7,10,18,31,32,37,38,42,43,47,49,50,54,55 and 66-72.
Most prolific is Melas 22(122), 28(121) and 29(123), followed by Mela 8 (72), 15 (41), 20(34), 65(30), 17(23), 51(15), 39(12), 16(7).
The remaining Melas have 1 to 3 kRtis each.
These figures are based on the Melas given in the book 'Compositions of Tyagaraja' by Sri TK Govinda Rao.
(PS : This list includes 24 kRtis listed as 'doubtful' in the book)

Edited

[vasanthakokilam]

Very interesting, Govindan. Thyagaraja's high runners map to 8 of the 10 thAts of HM. That common cluster account for 558 of his krithis. That says something about the tonal characteristics that are attractive to the Indian melodic aesthetic.

Code: Select all

1   Kalyan	 65 	Mecha Kalyani (30)
2	Bilawal	29 	Dheera Shankarabharanam (123)
3	Kamaj	  28 	Hari Kambhoji (121)
4	Bhairav	15 	Mayamalava Gaula (41)
5	Bhairavi	8 	Hanumathodi (72)
6	Asaveri	20 	Nata Bhairavi (34)
8	Purvi	  51 	Kamavardani (15)
10  Kapi	   22 	Karaharapriya ( 122 )

A few more interesting tidbits about the 4 of these high runner melas.

1) 4 of these 8 clusters are separated by seven: 8, 15, 22, 29 ( 51 and 65 being the pratimadhyama counter part of the two in this series of seven is also interesting ).

2) In each of these 4 melas ( 8, 15, 22 and 29 ) the pUrvAngA and uttarAngA are symmetrical to each other.

3) If such symmetry is pleasing to the Indian ears, it will be an interesting analysis to see how many of the janya ragas of these melas also exhibit this symmetry and get a histogram of Thyagaraja's krithis among such symmetrical ragas.

[cmlover]

It is nice to try to read the mind of Thyagaraja. Apparently he had astute perception of the asthetics of the mela and janyaraga systems. His shishya Manambuchavadi Venkatasubbier wailed (according to Sambamoorthy) that Thyagaraja had extracted the juice (rasa) of the CM raga sytem and left only the chaff ('chakkai') for the future explorations. VGV's list proves it without a doubt. But I wonder why he did not stray into the HM arena since he would have had ample oppotunities to listen from the court musicians. Ragas like sindhubhairavi, dvijavanti, hamsanandi would not have escaped his ken but then perhaps he wanted to remain a purist and an innovator strictly in the classical constraints....

[Enna_Solven]

Threads like these are why I am here in rasikas - to learn.

[cmlover]

Lakshman
Since you had tallied before, could you tell us the number of T's compositions in the vivadi melas?

[Lakshman]

cmlover: Pardon my ignorance but please explain the vivAdi mELa for me. Thanks.

[cmlover]

Melas which contain any of R3,G1, D3 or N1. They are totally 40 in number.

[cmlover]

I found the following interesting article on Thyagaraja's use of the ragas (in case you have not seen it..)
http://www.ipnatlanta.net/camaga/vidyar ... logist.htm

[kartik]

Tyagaraja composed one in Shatvidhamargini that is rendered in Purvikalyani these days.