Carnatic music is revered by many especially in South India, in regions like Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andra Pradesh and Kerala which have given rise to many eminent Carnatic greats like Mysore T Chowdaiah, T R Mahalingam, M S Subbalakshmi, M L Vasanthakumari, and the list goes on and on.
The advent of Carnatic Music ragas began in the early 14th century, when there was the advent of the Mughal particularly during the reign of Mughal emperors of Delhi. While the Northern part was influenced by the Persian and Arabic musicians giving rise to Hindustani music that adorned the courts of the rulers, the South developed a distinct style of Carnatic music on his original lines. However, both styles have the same fundamental aspects.
Ragas came into being during the Vedic times, when the hymns were sung in temples as early as 4th and 5th Century BC If you go to a Carnatic music concert, you notice the tones and music, each tune or song is a different raga. So how is a raga defined?
Ragas in Carnatic music is made of a sequence of individual notes and is the simplest form of a musical tone, with gamakas and chamakas giving a variation in intonations. The first class while teaching Carnatic music is the Aarohanam and Avarohanam which are the ascending and descending tones. After mastering this, the next step is to learn the phrases of ragas. Due to the complexity of the art form, a student usually learns Carnatic music mandatorily from a Guru. The Guru teaches the student to distinguish between each raga as there are different types of ragas and let us see how they are classified into different types.
The classification of Ragas laid the base of using formulae for creating new Ragas. Later in the late 1750s, the Trinity of Carnatic music- Tyagarajar, Muthuswami Dikshitar and Shyama Shastri encouraged dynamic development in Carnatic music.
There are 72 Carnatic music ragas in this type of ancient music known as the Melakartas / Janaka ragas or the parent ragas. It is from these ragas that the other ragas are formed. This classification was first done by an eminent artist, Ram Amatya, where he is considered as the mela system in Carnatic music.
For instance, in lower Sa, the upper Sa and Pa are considered as Swaras. Ma then, has 2 variants and the remaining Ri, Ga, Da and Ni have 3 variants. In total, these combinations make up the 72 ragas. The Melakarta Ragas are further classified into Janya ragas like Sudha Madhyama and Prati Madhyamas. Below which there are many Janya ragas or the offspring ragas. This was a significant form of classification later done by a learned scholar named Venkata Makhi in the 17th century.
Alapana is sometimes a kind of Carnatic music raga, however, it is more of a form of Manodharma while singing in raga. In Sanskrit, Alapana means to communicate or to talk. Here, if you have seen a singer at a concert, before beginning, they tend to sing in ragas and Alapanas, where they seem to be adjusting their intonation or warming up before the event commences.
There are three distinguishing parts to Alapana. First, it is adjusting your tempo to the kind of song you are about to render. Starting with a low note, the singer then takes it to a higher-level note. The second aspect is Raghavardhini. This is a prominent part of the Alapana. The last session is the Magarini. This goes at a faster pace, where the singer scales through the passages of the whole range of raga.
Our main goal at Taala is to concentrate on teaching the notes and syllables, but also provide the in-depth meaning of each note, swara and ragas, keeping alive the ancient form. The Carnatic music ragas are standard across all South Indian languages, be it Kannada, Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam and more. The beauty here lies in the fact that everyone pursuing this music must learn to sing songs in all languages. Hence, Carnatic music knows no bounds when it comes to language.
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