GAYATHRI GIRISH LEC DEM CONCERT –PALLAVI DARBAR

[CRama]

On the second day of the Pallavi Darbar, Gayathri Girish presented the lec dem concert titled the Art of Pallavi Singing. Some of the points covered by her.

1. The caption "Art of Pallavi singing" is very apt. Every aspect of a RTP is an art by itself. Singing the raga alapana in various stages, tanam in different speeds, the Pallavi line being a meaningful one, neraval singing with the sahityam always being aligned to the talam- these are all different aspects which make Pallavi singing an art by itself.

2. It is very important that a Pallavi should be aesthetically pleasing.

3. Within the framework of the talam, a Pallavi gives scope for a lot of innovations, while singing the neraval or swara.

4. When we talk of kalai in a Pallavi, it should be in multiples of 2. Hence it is possible to have 2,4,8,16,32 kalai and so forth.We can sing 3 kalai Pallavi in tisra 4 kalai. To illustrate this, she took up the Pallavi line "un darisanam kidaikkumo Nataraja dayaanidhe" in Kalyani and first sang it in tisra jhampa 3 kalai. Then the same line was sung in tisra jhampa 4 kalai.

5. Nadai Pallavi- the usual method that is followed in concerts is to put the corresponding Chapu talam for a Nadai Pallavi. She took up the BrindAvana sArangA Pallavi line " naadhanai dhinam ninai maname BrindAvana sArangA ranga " in tisra jati Triputa talam and explained the subtle difference by alternatively singing both Khanta Nadai sung as Khanta Chapu for every beat and as Khanta 2 kalai.

6. Pallavi which has a combination of Nadai's- she took up the Pallavi line "Sabhapathikku veru deivam samaanamaagumaa Tillai " in Abhogi, set to Khanta jati Triputa talam. She sang elaborate raga alapana and tanam. The Poorvangam of the pallavi was in chatusra nadai and utharangam in tisra nadai. GG demonstrated how trikalam must be done with great care- that the sahityam in a particular Nadai has to be sung only in its corresponding keezh kaalam and mEl kaalam. And while singing swaras, she took up different places in the Pallavi line and sang swaras correspondingly. The korvai also should be a combination of both the nadais.

The demo concert was very educative and enjoyable. Ananthakrishnan and R.Sankaranrayanan accompanied on Violin and Mridangam. This year, I could see many young faces in the audience- probably music students. This lec dem must have been much beneficial for the students.

[mahavishnu]

Thanks CRama. It was a very scholarly presentation.
As I was browsing through the other thread on the pallavi darbar, I thought it was an interesting omission. But this lec-concert deserves a special thread of its own.

I have a question. Re: What is the logic against calling something 5 kalai (or any odd integer kalai for that matter)? Is it just an irrational fear of odd numbers in our system?

[vasanthakokilam]

sr_iyer wrote about that odd kaLai thing quite well a few years back.
Here is the link:
http://www.rasikas.org/forums/viewtopic. ... 27#p184470

[mahavishnu]

Thanks, VK. Very helpful. And thanks sr_iyer.

[Sivaramakrishnan]

Thanks CRama for the input.

Was there any discussion on the criteria of raga selection for Pallavi-s?

[CRama]

There was no discussion on which ragas should be taken for pallavi. But she said that in olden days when the concert duration extended to 5 hours or so, vidwans used to take big ragams like Thodi, Kambodi etc for pallavi and invest considerable time in exploring the ragam. With the duration getting shorter, vidwans use smaller ragams that have got potential to sing RTPs. Even she sang pallavis in Brindavanasaranga and Abhogi. Regarding innovative pallavis, she told that current day vidwans are presenting lot of innovative pallavis.