Hindi compositions of Swati Tirunal

[Guest guest]

I have the Hindi compositions of the Travancore Maharajah Swati Tirunal (roughly

1810-1845) available - he is supposedly the first composer in Hindi from Kerala.

This is from a little book published in Thiruvantapuram by V. Aiyar.

Was wondering if these might be of interest to anyone (Y. Malaiya specifically

:-))

 

-Arun Gupta

[Guest guest]

Jitendra Abhisheki and K.G. Ginde are supposed to have worked on

the (Hindustani) musical compositions of Swati Tirunal. I wonder if

these recordings are available someplace.

 

Warm regards,

 

 

r

 

INDOLOGY, "macgupta123" <suvidya@o...> wrote:

>

> I have the Hindi compositions of the Travancore Maharajah Swati

Tirunal (roughly

> 1810-1845) available - he is supposedly the first composer in Hindi

from Kerala.

> This is from a little book published in Thiruvantapuram by V. Aiyar.

> Was wondering if these might be of interest to anyone (Y. Malaiya

specifically :-))

>

> -Arun Gupta

[Guest guest]

Y. Malaiya wrote:

>Maharaja Swati Tirunal must have been very familiar with the

>classical Hindi poetry. Some of the compositions remind one of

>Miran Bai.

 

There's also another schoarly view about Swathi Tirunal's

compositions. Chemmangudi Srinivaiyar, employed by Trivandrum royalty

and visiting from Madras, was popularising about Swati Tirunal's

compositions in many languages of India. The Maharaja died

when he was in his early 30s. But S. Venkitasubramonia

Iyer, with all his native roots in Trivandrum, Kerala,

published in his PhD thesis that many of the attributions

are really works of other music composers visiting the royal court.

Sri. Venkitasubramonia Iyer talks about the contributions

by Tanjore Quartet. The Tanjore Quartet (Thanjai Naalvar)

are Ponnaiyah, Vadivelu, Kittappa, Sivanandam Pillais,

traditional musician Othuvaar family originally from Tirunelveli.

Vadivelu played an important role in making the violin

a Carnatic music instrument, and it's the 4 brothers

who set the paddhati of present day Bharatanaatyam recitals.

Tanjore Quartet was close to Muttusaamy Diikshitar family also.

 

The Kerala musicologist, Venkitasubramonia Iyer's nephew

was my classmate (Chidambaram Subramanian, now at Washington, D.C.,).

And, I recall him telling how his uncle

waited until Chemmangudi, after a few years, left & then

published his findings. Probably all this in Venkitasubramonia

Iyer's PhD dissertation. Pl. also check

Venkitasubramonia Iyer, S., Swati Tirunal and his music.

College book house, 1975, Trivandrum.

 

---

 

In India, oftentimes we hear about works attributed to rulers.

A tamil example from literature is Tempavani. Supposed to

be written by Beschi, a Jesuit priest from Italy of the

17th century. M. Arunachalam, who the most descriptive

History of tamil literature till date and a prof. of Saiva

Siddhanta at Benaras Hindu university, has written many

articles in 1960s-70s in The Hindu, and in books, that

Supradeepa Kaviraayar is the real author of the Christian epic.

While, Viiramaamuni(Beschi) might have given the story

and told in prose, to compose 3000+ tamil verses

(that has intricate prAsam (same second syllable in each viruttam

verse) is not easy. We don't know anyone who has done

it ever since. It's noteworthy that Beschi himself didn't publish

Tempavani, it was done by Sir Walter Elliott (author

of Coins of Tinnevelly, & we have "Elliot marbles"

at the British museum taken from South India).

 

Regards,

N. Ganesan

[Guest guest]

INDOLOGY, "naga_ganesan" <naga_ganesan@h...>

wrote:

 

Ganesan's surmises sound plausible. As far as I know, Sri Semmangudi

was brought in the Swati Tirunal Academy by Muthiah Bhagavathar. It

is possible that Sri Semmangudi was given a corpus (already by

Muthiah Bhagavathar or by the Maharani or by the people close to her)

which he then edited and published.

 

Sri Semmangudi is a pre eminent vocalist of the Carnatic tradition

and is still living. Therefore as a matter of courtesy to a very

senior artiste, it may be best to avoid speculation. I will post this

query in Carnatic Music forums and try to elicit expert opinion. I am

also requesting Srini Pichumani, a snoring member of this list, to

rouse himself from his deep dream of peace and comment on this very

important topic.

 

Hope this helps,

 

Lakshmi Srinivas

[Guest guest]

I notice the pen name Padmanabha in the verses:

INDOLOGY

 

Was the same pen name Padmanabh used in other languages also?

 

I have noted a few poets using different pen-names in different

languages.

 

Yashwant

 

 

"naga_ganesan" wrote:

 

> Y. Malaiya wrote:

> >Maharaja Swati Tirunal must have been very familiar with the

> >classical Hindi poetry. Some of the compositions remind one of

> >Miran Bai.

>

> There's also another schoarly view about Swathi Tirunal's

> compositions. Chemmangudi Srinivaiyar, employed by Trivandrum

royalty

> and visiting from Madras, was popularising about Swati Tirunal's

> compositions in many languages of India.

[Guest guest]

INDOLOGY, "lsrinivas" <lsrinivas> wrote:

> Ganesan's surmises sound plausible. As far as I know, Sri Semmangudi

> was brought in the Swati Tirunal Academy by Muthiah Bhagavathar. It

> is possible that Sri Semmangudi was given a corpus (already by

> Muthiah Bhagavathar or by the Maharani or by the people close to her)

> which he then edited and published.

>

 

 

Sri. Chemmangudi was brought to Trivandrum from Madras by the

royal family. For a few years from Chennai. During those years

K. J. Jesudas took training. I don't know whether Harikesanallur

Muthaiyah Bhagavathar was alive by then, didn't he spend his last

days at the Mysore Wodeyar court?

 

The native Kerala musicologist Sri. S. Venkitasubramonia Iyer's

publications can throw some light on Tanjore Quartet's role,

and possibly other visiting musicians to the court.

 

Regards,

N. Ganesan

 

PS: Had the opportunity to explain and go around Houston Meenakshi temple

with the present day Maharaja, son & daughter-in-law (first time a

commoner was married, a great Mohiniyattam dancer). Maharani

Gauri Lakshmi Baayi is a good art historian and writer (she wries

often in The Hindu on southern temples) Her book on

Trivandrum Padmanabhaswami temple (BVB publication) is a

treasure I was given by the Royalty. They asked to come

and stay in their palaces as a guest (Forgot the name, Kanakakkunnu or

KaariyavaTTom). One of my mothers relatives, Sri Nataraj Kalingarayar

of Uthukuli was an ADC to His Highness in 1930s. Kollengode

Raja told that he arranged this.

[Guest guest]

This is a fascinating discussion. I cannot really contribute much except to

tell you what is in the booklet that I have.

 

1. Swati Tirunal died at the age of 35 (not quite early thirties). It is a

sufficiently

long life for the outpourings of genius - if it existed. (Mozart died at the

same

age).

 

2. The booklet says that "we have no records to know who taught the prince

Hindi. He was taught Persian even in his boyhood. Persian was an essential

part of the curriculum of the princes of Travancore Royal Family. The

teachers

who taught Swati Tirunal Persian were Dakkhinis of Madras. Their mother

tongue must ahve been Dakkhini which was later known as Hindustani.

There were many dependents of the Travancore Court who spoke Hindustani

and the Maharaja might have very easily learned this form of Hindi."

 

3. "The favourite court musician Anantha Padmanabha Goswami too might have

introduced the divine songs of Meera and Surdas to his master."

 

4. Hindustani musicians were welcome at Swati Tirunal's court, as per the

booklet

with these examples given :

 

(1) 1834 AD : Dasi Mangammal of Tanjore was presented with the sum

of Rs 300/- for singing Kannada and Hindustani songs nicely

 

(2) 1835 AD : Monthly salary was fixed for Sri Chintamani of Tanjore who

played Sarangi in the palace.

 

(3) 1835 AD : The Hindustani dances who had come from Khalikote were

given an extra sum, because they were not appointed on a monthly salary.

 

(4) 1835 AD : Lakshmandas and other three people who had come

from Gwalior to sing at the Court of the Maharaja were presented with

Vira-srunkhala (golden bracelet).

 

(5) 1835 AD : Syed Sulaiman, who played the musical instrument Svarabhit

was honoured with the usual presents.

 

(6) 1836 AD : Ananta Padmanabha Goswami (later on known as Meruswami)

came from the Court of Tanjore to the Royal Court of Trivandrum. He was

appointed on monthly salary with special honours of conveyance and a free

house to live in.

 

-Arun

[Guest guest]

The large difference in the no of compositions in the cidambara

Vadhyar publications and others.Incidentally it is generally believed

that Muttaiah Bhagavatar introduced 'hamsanandi' adapting it from

Sohini for the first time in Carnatic Music.Regarding the mudra

various synonyms of padmanabha like jalajanabha etc are used.

 

But in this Hindi composition, list we find the Hindustani ragamalika

sohini rUp. and later publications list swati Tirunal's composition

in hamsanandi.But then there were enough musicians like Meru Goswami

and others of Maratha lore who could have had a great

role in fine-tuning some of the compositions.

 

Another area that adds to the confusion is the role& history of the

Tanjore quartette.We find an extremely interesting petition by one

Sivanandam that the four of them had been teaching dance in the

temple for several years and that they shoud be reinstated.

 

I forget the exact year of the letter which is found in one of the

Saraswati Mahal publications and the year does not tally with the

current history of the quartette at all).If that letter is true then

the stories that Vadivelu became the Asthana vidvan when he was

barely in his teens cannot be true.The only way of knowing

these and other such issues in musical history is by allowing the

public access to the royal archives! Music-Historian B.M.Sundaram has

written that they returned to Tanjore for some time.

Interestingly a friend showed another clipping of an interview one of

the descendants of Swati Tirunal and he mentions a who's who list in

the court and I did not find any mention of the quartette.

 

By those and other evidences it seems that the stay of the quartette

in Trivandrum was for an extremely short duration.

 

Anyway it is an open truth that semmangudi did tune some of the

pieces like bhavayami raghuramam which was originally in a single

melody(saveri) to a ragamalika.So another line of reasoning goes -If

one was tuned, why not possibly some of the others??

 

Vidya

[Guest guest]

There is a web-site dedicated to Swati Tirunal :

 

http://www.swathithirunal.org/

[Guest guest]

INDOLOGY, "macgupta123" <suvidya@o...> wrote:

>

> This is a fascinating discussion. I cannot really contribute

>much except to tell you what is in the booklet that I have.

>

> 1. Swati Tirunal died at the age of 35 (not quite early thirties).

 

"His Highness demise took place at the early age of 33 exactly

in the year of Tiagayya's death, viz , 1022 M.E. (1847 A.D)"

(T. Lakshmana Pillai's article).

 

Regards,

N. Ganesan