Super Star's Simple beginning...

Movie: Aboorva Raagangal
Director: K. Balachander

Katcheri after nearly 4 years

Venue: Jamshedpur Madras Sammelan
Violin concert by Lalgudi G. J. Radhakrishnan and Vijayalakshmi
After a gap of nearly 4 years, I attended a live katcheri yesterday.. Live katcheri is a luxury these days.. it provided me the much-needed break from my 'Youtube-d' existence. The concert was unique in several aspects... To start with there was no Varnam which was surprising ..
Varnam is like the 'morning coffee' in a concert. It imparts the necessary freshness in the beginning.
Ariyakudi Ramanuja Iyengar wrote
"Like my guru, I have never begun a concert without singing a varnam at the commencement. It imparts mellowness to the voice and a flavour to the subsequent rendering of kritis or ragas."
(http://www.narada.org/ariyakudi/tradition.html)
but the varnam was substituted well by the 'brisk' Kriti in Nattai raagam.
for those of you who are interested in knowing about varnams, check out the link below.
http://arvindsdad.blogspot.com/2009/10/varnams.html
and the other interesting thing was the announcement of the song, raagam etc before starting the song by the artists themselves.. may be that was because the concert happened in Jamshedpur. maybe in Chennai, it wouldnt have been necessary.. though i believe it would destroy the thrill of guessing the raagam during the raaga alaapanaais.. for a learner, that would be the real test... but thankfully, the artist announced the raagam etc only at the end of the raaga aalapanai for some songs.. so the fun of guessing the raagams was still there.. the guessing exercise normally brings to light lots of doubts and questions that one has in his/her mind. One such doubt/ confusion that came up yesterday was between sudhdha dhanyasi, abheri and bhimblas. from the aalapanai, i could not figure out which one it was. Though the raagam happened to be aabheri, i got satisfied only after referring to my new Carnatic music bible - 'wikipedia'. How did I miss the 'R2' in the abheri..
the arohanam-avrohanam for the 3 raagams are:
Abheri: S G2 M1 P N2 S - S N2 D2 P M1 G2 R2 S
Sudha dhanyasi: S G2 M1 P N2 S - S N2 P M1 G2 S
Bhimblas: N2 S G2 M1 P N2 S - N2 S G2 M1 P N2 S
It is all about permutation and combinations- the nCr and nPr concept.
(sudhadhanyasi raagam reminds me of 'Unnal Mudiyum thambi' movie.. and who can forget the famous dialogue of Gemini Ganesan after listening to Kamal's Filmy- adaption of the raagam in 'Punjai Undu' song.. " Ithu sudha dhanyasi a? illla asutha dhanyasi!!!")
"carnatic music" for K. Balachander is like "darkness and rain" for Maniratnam.. All K.B's movies will definitely have a bit of carnatic music somewhere in a corner..

forgot to tell u about the thukkada section of the katcheri.. with 2 bharathiyar songs and 2 'Lalgudi special' Thillanas, it was the perfect finish to the wonderful concert...

A.R.Rahman way of Composing Music... an Interesting post.

Came across an interesting post about A.R.Rahman's way of composing music.. truly awesome.

Here is the link.

http://rahmaniac.wordpress.com/foundation/

Read the post and you will get to know more about Mr. A.R.Rahman, B.E (software engineering), if there is one!!!!!

Raagam Thaanam Pallavi - Linear Algebra :-)

The comparison may seem odd but kindly don't feel offended... Raagam Thaanam Pallavi(RTP) is one of the most complex form of singing in carnatic music.. It is like "namma ooru kalyana saapadu" (south Indian Marraige feast). It will consist of all the items from payasam to aviyal.

RTP brings out the vastness of a raagam. It is also technically very demanding, especially the pallavi portion which involves a lot of mathematics.

Just to elaborate the complexity involved:

"What happens here is that, first the musician performs an elaborate neraval on the pallavi line. Then he launches into the mathematical innovations. Here the pallavi line is rendered in different speeds keeping the tala constant. Then on some occasions and when suitable to some talas, the pallavi is kept constant and the tala is changed to different speeds. These constitute the anuloma and paratiloma portions. So if a pallavi is set to Adi Tala 4 kalai, then the anuloma is rendered in the following way: The tala is kept constant and the pallavi is rendered in succeeding degrees of speed. So the next speed will entail singing the pallavi twice in a single tala cycle or avarta. Then tisra will be performed. Here the artiste sings the pallavi line three times in a single avarta. Finally the next speed where the pallavi line is rendered 4 times in a single avarta. In the case of pratiloma, the pallavi is constant and the tala is changed from 4 kalai to two kalai and then on to 1 kalai. After this comes the kalpana swara portion. This is usually followed by a ragamalika of swaras and sometimes another tani avartanam to the percussionists."

I tried to put the above theory in mathematical terms and the following is what I got:

Let T and P be Tala and Pallavi respectively

Case 1: T= X, where X is a constant

P = f(v)

Case 2: P= Y, where Y is a constant

T = g(v)

where v is the speed (swaras/sec) and f and g are functions of speed.

?%$#@@#%^^&&

( Please read the article @ http://archives.chennaionline.com/musicnew/CarnaticMusic/174th.asp

for better understanding of RTP)

But inspite of all this, I dont understand why Carnatic Music comes under 'Arts' Group. Infact, Carnatic Music should be a part of applied mathematics.

But when you listen to our T.N. Seshagopalan's RTP in shanmukhapriya, it looks so simple..as simple and elegant as Federer's aces.. Hats off to our T.N.S's genius.

Here is the T.N.S's Raagam Thaanam Pallavi in shanmughapriya raagam.

http://www.mediafire.com/?sharekey=06061c46c04184aaed24a2875c7fa58ea40e72e383fe8d845be6ba49b5870170

(Link for Download).

Joy of Giving Week @ XLRI!!!

Yesterday the Unveiling ceremony of 'Joy of giving week' took place at XL... (curious to know what it is?? check this link http://www.joyofgivingweek.org/). a wonderful initiative by an IIMA alumnus..

For an hour we went on a virtual ride to the other side of India... the one that we see daily on our way to offices, colleges, temples etc.. The side whose 'needs' form the bottom most portion of Maslow's pyramid.. and the speakers have indeed opened our eyes..

"If you can't feed a hundred people, then just feed one"- Mother Teresa

Give and let live!!!!!!!!!!!

Happy Independence day!!!!!

Thai aval pol oru jeevanillai
aval kaaladi por sorgam veru illai
Thai mannai pol oru bhoomi illai
bhaaratham engalin swaasamae

Maa Tujhe salaam!!!!

Jai Hind

Redemption

Its been nearly an year since "I" visited my own blog, let alone others. I attribute it to the innumerous MBA entrance exams that I happened to write, the subsequent group discussions and interviews, the subsequent admission tensions, the subsequent struggle to get the relieving letter from a PSU and the subsequent first-term-at-a-top b school euphoria. Having crossed half the well(padhi kenaru) to be precise, 3-4th of the first term, 12.4555% of my MBA, I felt like visiting this chandramukhi-vettayapuram-Blog of mine. Nothing has changed, same posts are still there in the same place and more interestingly, no body has visited this dreaded place in the last one year. How sad? people talk about globalisation, flattening of the world, opening up of economy and all, but how come nobody is listening to me? I believe I must seek gyan from the Marketing prof's in my B-school and probably outsource the advertising division of my Blog to Rediffusion Y&R, just as Airtel did. but poor fellows, what will they do.. if airtel doesn't have towers for network conncetivity, how can AR Rahman increase the Airtel's revenues.

By the way, I came across an interesting ad of airtel recently. Here is the link.

http://adsoftheworld.com/media/print/airtel_housewife?size=_original

So, i have decided to concentrate on my core competency rather writing some 'bakar' in my blog and thereby polluting the bloggosphere.

I will be writing about Music and more about Carnatic music.

Word of caution: Don't jump to a conclusion that this authour is an authority in Carnatic Music or whatever. NO. Iam just a learned fan of Carnatic music and so through this exercise, I learn and You learn.

So its WIN-WIN situation.

Lets start.