Pantula Rama @ The Siva Vishnu temple, Washington DC

[chandrajothi]

Dr. Pantula Rama
MSN Murthy
Payri Satish kumar

kAmAkshI nAtO vAdA dayalEdA– begada, SS
sadAchalESwaram - bhoopAlam, MD, R, S
bhAratI maddhishanA jAdyApahE – devamanohari, MD, S
jambUpathE – Yamuna kalyani, MD, R, N@ anirvacanIya nAda bindO, S
pAlincu kAmAkShI – madyamavathi, SS, R, S
RTP – Lalitha, adi, kanda gathi
Pallavi:
lAvaNya rAmA dheena sharaNya pAhimAm thrAhimAm lalitha
thani
Sri VEnkata GirishamAlOkayE – surati, MD
kanaka shaila vihAriNI– punnagavaraLi, SS
mAmava pattAbhirAma – maNirangu, MD
mangaLam kOsalEndrAya

The concert was a part of Dikshitar and Syama Sastri festival at the SV temple in DC. She gave a brief intro to the rhythmic and textural elements of the compositions. Neither the list nor my words can do justice to the concert as every one of them was a gem.
Nonetheless let me try my hand at Yamunakalyani -

Dr. Rama unravelled it in a grand expanse lingering over every note with a lilt in all its bountiful exuberance.
Then with her deep respect for the lyrics she embarked on the slow, languorous interpretation of MD’s staggering masterpiece Jambupathe delving into its layers with unruffled calm revelling in the text with a swing on every note awash in MD music idioms spiked with her own interpretation highlighting the composer’s poetry and pulling you into her tranquil sojourn through Ganga, Kaveri and Yamuna through streams of rippling notes keeping the rhythm fluid and letting the essence manifest itself. Then she wafted over ‘anirvacanIya nAda bindO’, (only she can make this phrase at this octave her comfort zone) for neraval relishing the rhythm flowing and ebbing in intensity that is engulfed in the melody and glided through the swarakalpana passageways with Murthy and Patri communing with their instruments in sharing her sensitivity with impeccable musicianship … time indeed appeared to hold its breath… their team work and the authenticity of it all… What a lovely tribute to the composer, the ragam and her guru…a concert to be preserved for posterity…

With a weakness for MD and SS, this is my all time fav concert of Rama...

[arasi]

Chandraj(y)othi,
A very good review on a classy concert. Thank you.

Your 'weakness for'? I would say it's your strength that you appreciate and admire MD and SS's krutis!

[rajeshnat]

Nonetheless let me try my hand at Yamunakalyani -

Dr. Rama unravelled it in a grand expanse lingering over every note with a lilt in all its bountiful exuberance.
Then with her deep respect for the lyrics she embarked on the slow, languorous interpretation of MD’s staggering masterpiece Jambupathe delving into its layers with unruffled calm revelling in the text with a swing on every note awash in MD music idioms spiked with her own interpretation highlighting the composer’s poetry and pulling you into her tranquil sojourn through Ganga, Kaveri and Yamuna through streams of rippling notes keeping the rhythm fluid and letting the essence manifest itself. Then she wafted over ‘anirvacanIya nAda bindO’, (only she can make this phrase at this octave her comfort zone) for neraval relishing the rhythm flowing and ebbing in intensity that is engulfed in the melody and glided through the swarakalpana passageways with Murthy and Patri communing with their instruments in sharing her sensitivity with impeccable musicianship … time indeed appeared to hold its breath… their team work and the authenticity of it all… What a lovely tribute to the composer, the ragam and her guru…a concert to be preserved for posterity…

In words ,Chandrajothi the raga handle sounds very much like kedharam raga handle . I would love to especially hear RTP in lalita, i see a bit of resurgence of lalita as rtp after this and another review few weeks back.Thank you chandrajothi for the review and wonderful to see the review of pantula and team.

[Sindhuja]

She sang Jambupathe a couple years ago in the bay area and it was exquisite - still etched in my memory.
I so wish I could've heard her Lalitha RTP

[Ranganayaki]

I entered to see her seated and ready, and I was struck by the tastefulness of her attire. She was in a simple off white silk saree that might have looked almost as austere on the stage as the men in Carnatic music are traditionally expected to look. But it was silk and she'd added a small splash of blue from a nice necklace.. The use of a very small amount of ornamentation to great effect which reflected her approach to the concert - smooth singing with barely any discernable effort to produce stunning beauty.

She began with a sloka on Kamakshi in Begada which I am completely unable to identify, try as I might. I loved it:

Omkarangana Deepikam
Upanishad ...??
Anaayaambudhi chandrikam
...?... hamsaprabham
kanchi pattana panjaraantara shukhi
karunya karunanidhim
kamakshim ... ??? ...
shivakamaraja mahishi
vande maheshapriyam...

Her voice is ready and does her bidding, and she does not seem to need any particular warm up on stage.. no varnam, she plunges directly in to this lovely kriti, Kamakshi Nato Vada - my words and thoughts seem completely insuficient to describe the aestheticism of her rendering. It was sensitive, smooth, sweet. The daya leda plea was so effective with the kind, supplicating tone she brought into the cadence of the kriti. At the end of the song, she drew attention to the interesting laya of the kriti, which makes it almost sound like a song in trisra gati. Indeed, the syllables of the sahitya mostly received 3-maatras.

Bhupalam had a mournful, sorrowful shade to it, none of the expected morning brightness of the raga that accompanies dawn scenes in the movies. I was a little surprised by the effect, and realized later that her alapana was consistent with the song, with many more downscale movements than upward ones, completely changing the outlook of the raga.. It had a strong Shubhapantuvarali tone, evocative of a tired return home in the evening rather, and probably reflecting the softer lamp-lit garbhagriha alluded to in the song, the aspect of the lord as the calm and the stillness of the meditative mind (shamadama).

Patri was wonderful, filling the silences with beautiful rhythms, and competently accompanying her with more than due attention to sahitya, especially bringing out the arrangement of the madhyamakala sahitya in his playing.

Bharati Maddhishana, like the two previous songs was beautifully rendered, the music chaste and subtly adorned, the sahitya perfectly pronounced - every word standing out and then fading in to let the next word be so beautifully articulated. This concert was turning out to be one of the finest I have heard and I knew that I would never forget it.

Patri was great, amazing actually. I confirmed what I noticed in the previous song, that he would play softly, in a cushiony way with a prominent left hand for her during kalpana swaras and then a predominant right hand for MSN Murthy's swara returns with an effect of masculine ruggedness. He anticipated their phraseology in the kalpana swaras both in the korvais and inexplicably in the body of the swara return. He was just a great team-mate, giving them the best of himself, and being still, attentive and mentally active while he did not have to play,

PR gave a detailed introduction to her next song, Jambupathe. She said that the style of the composition shows the influence on MD of the Dhrupad style of Hindustani music. I had recently looked up dhrupad music and was thankful to be familiar with the term at least, if not the music in its various forms. She said it was music that was committed to the feet of the Lord. There were two versions of dhrupad: in one a slow, long, grand raga alapana, beautifully structured and dedicated to the lord, and in other a whole song is composed to be very grand in its content. MD has composed this song in the second vein, making it an extremely grand piece, yet allowing for the raga to be very grandly expressed in the song too.

She says the contemporary version of yamuna kalyani was a janya of the old raga shudda kalyana that had a fixed arohana and avarohana (ma and ni varjya). But, she says, Jambupathe shows some variation from this older version, with the arohana-avarohana variants being given to us by subbarama shastri.. srgpds, srgpmpds, etc. with a very light and subtle use of madhyama and nishadha. But these notes are strongly dealt with in Jambupate which, at the time, gave the raga a very innovative view.

She said that there was also the distinctive use of Shuddha madhyamam in Yamuna Kalyani which especially demarcated it from Kalyani. I really wished she would demonstrate this use of the Shuddha Madhyama, but I didn't speak up. The raga can be sung without this madhyama, and still not sound like kalyani. She mentioned that there were said to be several other similar ragas with minor differences at the time, and said that in his travel to Kashi, D was probably inspired by several of these ragas and must have assimilated and synthesized them into this new and beautiful raga, Yamuna Kalyani.

She rendered the song in all its splendour, it felt like being on a langorous, luxurious river cruise. Swaras increasing in speed but mostly as sancharas, so it did not feel like an increase in rhythm. Patri was brilliant, playing as though he was on the tabla.

Pantula Rama was thoughtful in her planning, and included an RTP in Lalitha, honoring the two composers of the day, Muthuswamy Dikshitar and Shyama Shastri, the raga having been treated extensively by both composers, she said. MSN Murthy came into his own in the RTP, having played well, but not brilliantly that far. His playing had fluency, but was uniformly strong, and lacked modulation. But his violin returns for alapana and neraval and swaram portions of the pallavi were imaginative, strong and interesting and sensitive.

She performed brief and straightforward Anuloma (is that the right term?): slowing down the sahitya to half the pace over two avartanas then and speeding it up to double the place also over two avartanas.

Ragamalika swarams; Ananda Bhairavi (changing the pallavi to Ananda lavanya Rama), Neelambari (Neela Varna Rama)

Patri was fantastic, he participated in the rtp as though he had four or six hands or as though he were several people.

We have a great speaker whose votes of thanks are always a pleasure to listen to who really gave words to all of our sentiments for the team.

[kittappa]

It had a strong Shubhapantuvarali tone

The sAdhAraNa gAndhArA in bhUpALam is responsible for the shuba pantuvarali like effect.

given to us by subbarama shastri.. srgpds, srgpmpds, etc.

It is Subbarama Dikshitar. Subbaraya Sastri has not composed in YAmuna Kalyani, only in Hamir Kalyani.

[harimau]

Bhupalam had a mournful, sorrowful shade to it, none of the expected morning brightness of the raga that accompanies dawn scenes in the movies. I was a little surprised by the effect, and realized later that her alapana was consistent with the song......

While the morning raga is commonly called Bhupalam by the common man, it is most likely Bowli which is brighter than Bhupalam.

There is confusion in the mind of the ordinary listener between the ragas Bhupalam, Bowli and Revagupthi.

[rajeshnat]

Ranganayaki
As stated in few posts above if Bhupalam has a subhapantuvarali feel it is indeed right . What ever u see as cinema drops where you have flute interludes with sun raising etc is all bowli though everybody thinks as bhupalam as cinema/drama propagates that way. The challenge is to differentiate revagupti and bowli which i personally still struggle.

As usual u have written a wonderful review , keep them coming. You have described patri in a different way though we are usually conditioned to hear more of his fireworks. He is a really brilliant and he should have taken the missing T role with his soga at times suga mrudanga talamu

[HarishankarK]

Kalgada can also be added to that list. It also sounds Bowli'ish.

[Ranganayaki]

I agree with all of you, I was just referring to the common perception.. and Harimau you may be right, I was thinking of my memory of the bhupalam in the movies, without much attention paid to swaras and I rarely get to watch any old Tamil movies. It is certainly possible that Bowli is what is played in the movies, though Bhupalam can be sung in a much brighter manner. Bhupalam can be said to get its swaras from 6 ragas, including todi, Shubhapantuvarali, dhenuka and these are not all equally mournful even though they all have the sadharana gandhara. Nor are they mainly mournful. Shubhapantuvarali, in spite of having exactly the same ri and ga as todi and dhenuka, and also having other notes that are higher than todi, is generally sung to a much more mournful effect. So my thinking was that this mournful or less sprightly effect of Bhupalam was a choice, probably an apt one by Pantula Rama. Bhupalam could have been more carelessly sung to a brighter effect and mostly we wouldn't have noticed or thought anything was wrong. So I appreciate(d) the thoughtfulness of her choice.

[Ranganayaki]

You have described patri in a different way though we are usually conditioned to hear more of his fireworks. He is a really brilliant and he should have taken the missing T role with his soga at times suga mrudanga talamu

Yes, Patri has been with us a few times now and I have heard his fireworks (which didn't put me off). This was completely different, but it did not surprise me. This time, it was all sogasu-gaaa mridanga taalamu. The thing was, he was imaginative and he was alert and consistent.. He had to be quick, to jump between them and alert not to forget to do what he intended to do. As a non-percussionist, I have no idea if it is hard to accomplish. But clearly , he had great ideas in this concert, and he was mentally very agile.

I am not what you mean by "t-role".

[Sindhuja]

Shubhapantuvarali, in spite of having exactly the same ri and ga as todi and dhenuka

Does Thodi have a ga? :p

And btw, thanks for the lovely review, Ranganayaki - I like that you mentioned her attire. That's something I've noticed too - it's always tasteful and minimalistic, and reflects her music (and her personality in general, I guess).

[Ranganayaki]

Does Thodi have a ga? :p

And btw, thanks for the lovely review, Ranganayaki - I like that you mentioned her attire. That's something I've noticed too - it's always tasteful and minimalistic, and reflects her music (and her personality in general, I guess).

Yes, I didn't think it was a coincidence. But it was hard to express without sounding as though I was making a silly, adoring comparison. I am so glad you perceived that. "Minimalistic" is exactly the word I would have used to describe both.

But your thodi-having-a-ga jab(??) at me? I'm sorry I don't get it, either as a joke or a serious question.

[Sindhuja]

Sorry - I was just thinking of the heavy gamakam in the Thodi ga (ri-ma-ri-ma), to the point that it ceases to be ga (I once in fact joked about "Heisenberg's gandharam": either Thodi ragam is precise, or the gandharam is, bot not both!) It doesn't even occur to me that shubhapantuvarali and thodi share a ga. Well, simply in terms of notes and numbers they do share a "ga2", but the ga sounds entirely different in each of them. If I'm right the plain ga is certainly used in thodi, but only occasionally, ornamentally.

Anyway, back to the topic - I've felt Bhupalam is indeed similar in feel to Shubhapantuvarali (kind of) - may be not as "mournful" but definitely serious and not sprightly...
I'd really love to hear her Lalitha - pl. let us know if there are any recordings available.

[vasanthakokilam]

Right, the common perception is way too ingrained for us to do anything about.

BhupALam is yet another clear example that the CM practice of assigning meLas to janya ragas is devoid of musical considerations. Bhupalam, though consistently classified under Thodi in CM, is very much like Subhapantuvarali. What else you can say after hearing sadAchalESwaram or in the ragamalika shree vishwanaatam bhajEham ragamalika or 'kadamba vanavasini' (Muthiah Bagavathar).

The bhupALam swara sequence in shree vishwanaatam bhajEham is quite illustrative
's r g p g d p S d; d g; R S; d; p g r s bhoopaaLa paalanam' .
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxS9uMP1T3g#t=263)

That little sequence S d; d G: R S; creates that characteristic haunting and mournful vibe.

[mahavishnu]

I once in fact joked about "Heisenberg's gandharam": either Thodi ragam is precise, or the gandharam is, bot not both!

Awesome! Love the expression.

That reminds of this joke one of my grad students emailed me just yesterday.

Heisenberg and Schrödinger get pulled over for speeding. The cop asks Heisenberg "Do you know how fast you were going?"
Heisenberg replies, "No, but we know exactly where we are!"

The officer looks at him confused and says "you were going 120 miles per hour!"
Heisenberg throws his arms up and cries, "Great! Now we're lost!"

[Ranganayaki]

I heard that snippet, VK, and it is actually what I was talking about.. Most of the lyrics are situated in the gpds range, with just the occasional ri and the general movement of the lyrics is up-scale. This is the lighter treatment I was talking about. Yes, it is way more staid than a raga like mohanam or hamsadhwani, kalyani but this is the lighter version of Bhupala. Ok, "sprightly" may be carrying it too far. Now the Bhupalam in Pantula's version.. It had much more elaboration in the poorvanga of the raga. The predominance of combinations of ri and ga itself makes it mournful. In addition, the general movement of sancharas were down scale.. If you can imagine that, you will see how that mournful effect (if you experience it in your snippet) is magnified. It becomes very very wrenching, compared to what you offered in your link.

[vasanthakokilam]

Ranganayaki: Yep, I know. btw, I first posted a link to Sudha's version which was much more sedate but Soundcloud deleted it due to it being a commercial version. It was only an illustrative snippet. Anyway, here is the Spotify url for it: https://play.spotify.com/track/7LrqSyo6QLlgYDyhsJR68D) . Found the SRJ rendition in youtube ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MksXNTfsl68#t=294 - no swaras)

[rajeshnat]

You have described patri in a different way though we are usually conditioned to hear more of his fireworks. He is a really brilliant and he should have taken the missing T role with his soga at times suga mrudanga talamu

Yes, Patri has been with us a few times now and I have heard his fireworks (which didn't put me off). This was completely different, but it did not surprise me. This time, it was all sogasu-gaaa mridanga taalamu. .....
I am not what you mean by "t-role".

The concert was dedicated to the two trinities SS and MD. The third missing trinity was Tyagaraja who is usually abbreviated as T . I meant the missing "T role" was sadguru thyagaraja.

[Ranganayaki]

Thyagaraja gets his own weekend in January or February, not too far from Bahula Panchami.. We have a Thyagaraja Aradhana with Pancharatna kritis, lots of individual and group singing, and a couple of concerts.

Swati Tirunal gets his weekend too and recently they had the first Haridasa Day where Vidyabhushana presented Haridasa kritis.

These are all annual events.

[vasanthakokilam]

That reminds of this joke one of my grad students emailed me just yesterday.

Heisenberg and Schrödinger get pulled over for speeding. The cop asks Heisenberg "Do you know how fast you were going?"
Heisenberg replies, "No, but we know exactly where we are!"

The officer looks at him confused and says "you were going 120 miles per hour!"
Heisenberg throws his arms up and cries, "Great! Now we're lost!"

Nice. LOL

René Descartes, who was hitching a ride with them and knew exactly where they were, interjected 'I don't think so' and poof he disappeared!

[Ranganayaki]

is that part of the original joke, vk? Or did you make that up? I hope you did, that would be cooler than if it had been a part of the joke .. I wish I really understood what Sindhuja and Ramesh are saying.. I sort of half get it, but I don't really coz I don't know these characters (except that they are physicists, or at least one is). It just sounds terribly funny, but I can't laugh!!

[mahavishnu]

Nice. LOL

René Descartes, who was hitching a ride with them and knew exactly where they were, interjected 'I don't think so' and poof he disappeared!

Now, that you continued on these lines, VK. There is actually more to the original joke... You might remember Schrödinger was in the car with Heisenberg when they were pulled over.

Now, the bemused officer looks over the car and asks Schrödinger if the two men have anything in the trunk.
"A cat," Schrödinger replies.
The cop opens the trunk and yells "Hey! This cat is dead."
Schrödinger angrily replies, "Well he is now."

[mahavishnu]

is that part of the original joke, vk? Or did you make that up? I hope you did, that would be cooler than if it had been a part of the joke .. I wish I really understood what Sindhuja and Ramesh are saying.. I sort of half get it, but I don't really coz I don't know these characters (except that they are physicists, or at least one is). It just sounds terribly funny, but I can't laugh!!

Ranganayaki, terribly sorry for hijacking this thread...
It was getting to be a very nice discussion about oscillating gAndhArams in tODi. Too bad even non-oscillating gAndhArams are waves.

[vasanthakokilam]

Schrödinger angrily replies, "Well he is now."

That is very funny! ROFL

I had heard that Descartes joke from a philosophy major as a stand alone one, I appropriated it here. (That version was about a bar tender asking Descartes if he would like a drink)

[Sindhuja]

LOL, Ramesh and vk!

Too bad even non-oscillating gAndhArams are waves.

Haha!!

In a parallel universe...
Shrodinger and Heisenberg get a ticket but fight it out in court saying there was no way the cop could have known how fast they were going since he knew where exactly they were.

Oops, what have I done to this thread Sorry, Ranganayaki!

[vasanthakokilam]

Talking of philosophy jokes,
Shankar and Madhav were visiting Chennai for a philosophy debate at the University Of Madras Chepauk building. During a break, they both wanted to cool off and wandered down to the beach. They were fascinated by the pav bhaji vendors. Shankar after studying the process for a while told the vendor ‘Make me one with everything’. Madhav said ‘Make it two'

[sridhar_ranga]

VKM,

Good their friend Ram(anuj) wasn't around.....he would have demanded the vendor to "make a qualified one with infinite qood attributes" (tasty, low calorie, sattvic, with a soul-body relationship between the inner and outer layers, etc. etc.)

[rshankar]

Sridhar, while rAm may have been, rAmAnuj was anything but sAtvik!

Anyway, it's probably the first time Descartes has contributed to the desecration of a thread! Maybe desecration is too strong a word, but you get the idea!

[sureshvv]

@rshankar: I think the Ramanujam referred to here is Ramanujar, the Vaishnavite philosopher, not the mathematician.

[sridhar_ranga]

Yes, I was referring to the philosopher to whom God was '"one with ananta kalyaana guna", not the man who knew infinity!

[rshankar]

Ranganayaki, sorry for further desecration of your thread and discussions.
Talk of a literal 3-ring circus:
I was thinking of a third person, neither the mathematician, nor the philosopher, but the literal rAmAnuj, the one whom the other two were named after, i.e., lakshmaN. LOL

[sridhar_ranga]

I was thinking

You think, there(fore) you are Ravi! (OK, I hear you, really enough Descartes for now but couldn't resist this last one!)

so, if you had really thunk this through any of the three major philosophies (or at least 2 out of those 3), you would have realized that the three Ramanuj's are but one!

OK, I am outta here before you and I get beaten with Sticks and Stones by the thread owner.

[Ranganayaki]

Ranganayaki, sorry for further desecration of your thread and discussions.
Talk of a literal 3-ring circus:
I was thinking of a third person, neither the mathematician, nor the philosopher, but the literal rAmAnuj, the one whom the other two were named after, i.e., lakshmaN. LOL

Ravi,

I know you were referring to Lakshmana as Ramanuj, not the other two. Neither of the two can be said to be non-satvik (we don't know of them in that way). Your split of the word made it amply clear. I wondered if you were also trying an anagram of Descartes in your choice of words - before you gave up . Otherwise I would wonder what's sacred here .

All of you, please don't apologize to me. I would have more to say only if someone says something that I can respond to. You didn't cut me off.

so, if you had really thunk this through any of the three major philosophies (or at least 2 out of those 3), you would have realized that the three Ramanuj's are but one!

OK, I am outta here before you and I get beaten with Sticks and Stones by the thread owner.

Are you referring to me, Sridhar_ranga? I am not the OP, it is not "my" thread.

[vasanthakokilam]

VKM,

Good their friend Ram(anuj) wasn't around.....he would have demanded the vendor to "make a qualified one with infinite qood attributes" (tasty, low calorie, sattvic, with a soul-body relationship between the inner and outer layers, etc. etc.)

The pav bhaji vendor, given to small talk, mentioned that he made a killing with a strange dude earlier in the day who asked to make him one with nothing. Shankar and Madhav shook their head in exasperation 'Jeez, that Gautham will never change'

[arasi]

"What pau bhaji vendor, where?" says Ni(k)hil. Or, was it Sarat? :ymsigh: