Divinity of Music

[Guest guest]

There can't be two opinions that music is a divine aspect as the same has a soothing effect on the nervous system of the singer as well as the hearer.It just takes one to a different plane when deeply absorbed.In this Carnatic Music plays an important part.Even in puranas one can see Ravana despite some of his negative aspects was a great Siva Bakta,a connoisseur of music,an exponent of veena(incidentally he used veena as a symbol in his flag of his ratha),an erudite scholar of vedas etc.Once he did penance to Siva for a number of years for some boons which if granted would make him an invincible person and Siva never appeared and Ravana in his anger tried to lift the Kailasa mountain where Siva was seated with his consort Parvati.The mountain raised a little bit and an angry Siva by just pressing with a finger of his foot crushed the hand of Ravana.Realising his mistake he took out his stomach and made a veena of the nerves and recited song in Kamboji for a number of years.Siva

always merciful and benign to his ardent devotees was pleased and appeared before Ravana and gave the boons.We need not dive deep whether such a thing is possible as to take out the stomach,singing for a number of years and all those things as our mythology has been created in such a way.

The point is that by singing in a pleasant way the mind gets calm and composed.The tradition of conducting music festivals in Chennai during December and at Trivandrum during Navaratri can be taken as a guide.During the music festival of December one can see a galaxy of carnatic exponents giving great concerts in differnt musical sabhas.The doyens of Carnatic Music like Semmangudi,Ariyakudi,Maharajapuram Viswanathaier and his son Santhanam, KVN,Balamurali,Seshagopalan,Chembai etc of the male singers and MS,MLV,Bombay sisters Saroja and Lalitha, Brinda-Mukta etc on the female part and everso many budding artists cluster the city and the music lovers run here and there to different sabhas to hear the rendering of the music by the doyens.Of course most of them hv left this world but the impact they hv created is still vibrating.

So the case with Navaratri festival at Trivandrum.It actually emanated from the time of Swati Tirunal Maharaja who himself was an expert in music and his compositions run to more than 500 in different languages.An ardent devotee of Sri Padmanabha the presiding deity of the royal family he was instrumental in starting the Navaratri festival in the Navaratri Mandapam.He took great interest in codifying and grouping of certain ragas and thus made the Navaratri Kirtanas.It is compulsory for all the singers to render the Raga Alapana,Taanam before taking up the song itself.As in Chennai here also all the doyens of music found opportunities to show their mettle in the Navaratri Mandapam.Each day a singer will sing in one raga and for nine days nine ragas are rendered.The Regent of the Royal family will present on all the days as the same was treated by Swati as an offering to Saraswathy.Of course the greatness and festivities that accompanied during the regime of royal family may not

be there but still the tradition continues.The Nine Ragas and Kirtanams selected are as follows day wise.

1. Devi Jagajjanani in Sankaraparanam

2. Pahimam Sri Vaghiswari in Kalyani

3. Devi Pavane in Saveri

4. Bharati Mamava in Todi

5. Janani Mamava in Bhairavi

6. Saroruhasamajaya in Panthuvarali

7. Janani Pahi in Suddha Saveri

8. Pahi Janani in Nattakuranji

9. Pahi Parvatanandini in Arabhi.

 

The singers hv to stick to this schedule all the years.

When one talks abt the vocal artists it shuld not be forgotten that there are great instrumental artistes who also took part in the above festivals like in Violin T N Krishnan,T.V.Gopalakrishnan,Chowdiah,Lalgudi.Kanyakumari Chandrasekhar to say a few and in Veena Balachander,in Mridangam Umayalpuram Sivaraman, Palghat Mani iyer and so on and so forth.It is actually a thing for sadness that most of them are no more and the original glitter that accompanied has of course lost its charm to a great extent.Of course time will fill the gap as a number of young artistes are coming up.

 

Such is the power of music that it is discovered that even the plants like music and cows give plenty of milk by hearing music.The whole cosmos is also vibrating with sound of OM which can be heard by the spititual aspirant in his deep meditative state.When the waves lash the shore there is music.In many hospitals music is played in the form of hymns,prayers as it is founfd that the patients recover quickly by this method.When we say Carnatic music we shuld not forget the great contributions made by Thyagaraja,Muthuswamy Deekshidar,Syama shastry popularly known as the Trinity of music composers in eulogy of God,Purandaradasa whose hymns of Lord Balaji also has its own stamp.Of course with the development of the western music of beat and rock the present day generation has developed certain liking.But the Carnatic and Hindustani music are time tested and they hv their own place and nothing can replace them.

 

Hare Krishna,

agraman

 

 

India Matrimony: Find your life partner

online.