Ramana
P.S. Many of the people who take such "safe" measures are also the ones who insist that it is sufficient to sing the kritis of Thyagaraja, Syama Sastry, Dikshitar and perhaps Swati Tirunal.
Most of those of 'YESTERDAY' who, day in and day out..year in and year out, spoke volumes about the musical-glories of the past, of their Masters, of their Paramparas, of their ancient styles and hereditary assets, never exerted even their little-finger in the aspect of "PALLAVI singing". I can excuse their incompetence in this regard if need be. But, i have never tolerated and never forgive them for their wanton (and highly motivated) insolence in heartlessly discouraging even those few other (not yet prominent and not so successful) musicians, who, fervently wishing to preserve the 'sathya'-laya-oriented style of singing PALLAVIS as done in the good old days, were genuinely spending hours and hours in fruitful - truthful study, research, practice and pursuit. These sincere buy not so popular musicians were told and advised that such 'intricate' & 'involved' Pallavi singing was out-moded and out-dated and out of style and out of the reach of listeners!THOSE VERY SAME VIDWANS who time and again insisted that THEY WERE PRESERVING ALL THE ANCIENT, TRADITIONAL, HEREDITARY AND SAMPRADAYA-BOUND "MUSICAL HERITAGE".If only they had the open goodness to admit that certain of these ancient Pallavis were only out of _ THEIR - reach and far - from - THEIR - grasp and if only they had had the graciousness to faithfully encourage those others who were attempting laya-oriented truly 'Sampradaya - PALLAVIS', then, today this sorry state of affairs could have been totally avoided. Even maintaining a rhythmic-tempo of "Sarvalaghu-suddham" had to be considered as a great formidable (and at times 'unsurmountable'!) task by certain Vidwans of yesterday.And thanks to them, as already quoted, the present 'upto-date' Pallavi-singing brought into popular vogue by them is nothing different from a most-simple and most-elementary and most-bland "Arai-eduppu' Pallavi as in the first line of the song "Brovabharama" .. or, even that of a "sama-eduppu" Pallavi as in the first line of the song "Daarini Telusukonti"!!! One should truly be ashamed to call them (under the grossly misused title of) PALLAVI singing.
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Before being conferred the Title of "Mahaa", Sri Vaidhyanatha Sivan, on that occasion, chose to sing the raagam, "CHAKRAVAAKAM". The mere rendering of the raaga-aalaapana itself made the entire Sadas start wondering as to "What" Ragam it was!!! They had never heard it before! They could not 'identify' it! ........ (stuff deleted) This incident happened more than one hundred years ago. And...even TODAY... inspite of the passing of years, ragas like even Vakulaabharanam, Kokilapriya, Hemavathi, Bhavapriya, Gamanasrama, Dharmavathi, Natabhairavi, Shadvidamaargini, Sarasangi etc, etc. are YET TO BE MADE POPULAR AND EASILY IDENTIFIABLE BY WE MUSICIANS, TO THE AUDIENCE AT LARGE!!! (Leave alone ragas like Naaganandini, Navaneetam, Maanavathi, Dhaatuvardhini, Roopavathi, Jankaaradhwani, Raghupriya, Kosalam, Soolini, Chitraambhari, Kantaamani, Saalagam, Naasika Bhooshani, etc etc etc) Again, who is to be blamed for this sorry state of affairs? I personally can and shall blame only those who, all these years kept on singing REPEATEDLY (as per their self-imposed SAFE MEASURE) ragas like Kalyaani, Kaambhoji, Sankarabharanam, Bhairavi, Thodi, Keeravani, Karaharapriya, Shanmughapriya ... and I am afraid the list ends here...full-stop!
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