Muttusvami Dikshitar and Kalpagam Swaminathan Mami

[Guest guest]

Pranaams to devotees of shrImAtA,

 

As with most of my recent posts, this one is also long long overdue. I've wanted

to post this for many months now, and finally decided to just go ahead and do

so.

 

It is my firm conviction that the great composer Muttusvami Dikshitar is no

different from our beloved Acharyal Bhagavatpadal. It is not possible for

majority of us to even contemplate the vastness of his erudition. I know of

several shrividyOpAsakA-s (who are also rasikAs/practitioners of music) who hold

him in the highest possible esteem.

 

Vidwan R.K.Shriramkumar (who if I'm not mistaken belongs to the Shringeri

lineage) has talked about the beauty/depth of Dikshitar's compositions/vidvat @

http://ramsabode.wordpress.com/2008/11/19/lec-dem-the-beauty-of-sangeetham-sahit\

yam-in-muthuswami-dikshitars-compositions/

 

(or see http://tinyurl.com/d97geu )

 

There are several other scholarly articles on this great nAdopAsaka on the web,

for example,

 

http://sky.prohosting.com/guruguha/guruinmd.html

http://sky.prohosting.com/guruguha/advaita.html

http://sky.prohosting.com/guruguha/vr1.html

http://ssubbanna.sulekha.com/blog/post/2008/03/sri-muthuswami-dikshitar-and-sri-\

vidya-1-of-7.htm (or see http://tinyurl.com/ybt6a3e )

http://nadhasudharasa.blogspot.com

 

Of the very few people that I feel manage to bring out the true beauty/grandness

of his compositions is Vidushi Kalpagam Swaminathan, affectionately referred to

as Kalpagam Mami or simply Mami. Mami has been referred to as 'DikshitariNi' by

Musiri Subrahmanya Iyer for her rendition of Dikshitar krtis. There are some

articles online about Mami, for example:

 

http://sky.prohosting.com/guruguha/mamibday.html

http://www.carnaticdarbar.com/interviews_kalpagam.htm

http://egayathri.blogspot.com/2009/10/colossus-part-1.html

 

NO WORDS ARE ADEQUATE to describe both Mami's knowledge as well as her

simplicity, and the sheer joy that one feels in listening to her sing/play, and

we have been very fortunate to spend some time with her while in India in

June/July.

 

In any case, the purpose of this long post is to share some priceless recordings

of Mami singing/teaching 2 of Dikshitar's compositions on ambAl. These were

recorded at her residence with no advance notice, i.e., we just walked up to her

house and asked her to sing; and what is amazing is she never asked time to

" prepare " or refer to any notes. At 87, she can sing practically *any

composition of any composer* [she sang many many compositions during our several

visits to her house, most of which we never had the sense to record] without

having to refer to any " notes " or refresh her memory !!!

 

In

 

 

Mami sings the Kamalamba Navavaranam piece shrI kamalAmbikE avAva in ghaNTA,

which, to steal from

 

http://web.archive.org/web/20050121060058/www.sangeetham.com/knavavaranam8.htm

 

contains exquisite phrases like " santatam mukti ghanTA maNi ghOShAyamAna kavATa

dvArE " (similar to " mOksha dvAra kavATa pATanakari " ) and " karAngulinakhOdaya

vishNu dashAvatArE " (almost exact reproduction of the LS karAngulinakhotpanna

nArAyaNA dashAkritih).

 

In

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAjVRGKSZgI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQn1ETVpMD0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3fz9EIvLH4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=duJSKXWQwxM

 

Mami teaches the Dikshitar masterpiece gauri girirAjakumAri in gaurI (we wanted

to post this so any interested student can learn this masterpiece). The charaNam

lines of this brilliant composition are said to be an echo of the eight verse

sudhAsindhormadhye of the saundaryalaharI. See

 

http://www.guruguha.org/wiki/gauri.html

/message/264

/message/265

/message/266

 

A vINA version by Mami of this composition, recorded by her student Shri L.

Ramakrishnan (on her 87th birthday) is @

http://www.archive.org/details/gaurIgirirAjakumArI_SmtKalpakamSwaminathan2009081\

5

 

(or see http://tinyurl.com/yz7s42e )

 

In the abhayAmbA vibhakti kriti abhayAmbikAyAH anyaM na jAnE,

 

http://guruguha.org/wiki/abhayambikayah.html

 

Dikshitar glorifies his mother (who he descibes with pride as AtmarUpa

pratibimbA *madambA* in abhayAmbA jagadambA) with the most beautiful lines

 

bAlAdi nAma dhEya prakASinyAH kAlAdi tatvAntaH prakASinyAH

mUlAdi dvAdaSAnta prakASinyAH sthUlAdi maunAnta prakASinyAH

 

and praises Her as nAda-laya-gatyAH. With namaskaarams at the feet of Mami,

daughter of Abhayambal, who herself is nAda-laya-gatyA.