Raaga Primer: Melakartha Raaga Paddhathi – The Chakras
Ajay Parasuraman The previous post explained the various sub-categories possible for the Ragas in the Hindustani system. You won’t be surprised to find out that there are similar classifications in...
View ArticleA Quickie on Taals
- Ajay Parasuraman In Sanskrit, the word ‘taal’ means ‘to strike with palms’. In Tamil, ‘taalam’ means ‘to clap’. In Hindi, the word means ‘beat’ and in Bengali, besides ‘rhythm’ the word ‘taal’ also...
View ArticleIdentity of a Raga: Part 1 – Reethigowla
- Ajay Parasuraman Identifying the raga of a composition requires ample kelvi njaanam. Listening to a lot of songs will help you know better the usages of swaras in the raga. Each raaga has it’s own...
View ArticleIdentity of a Raga: Part 2 – Darbari Kanada
- Ajay Parasuraman I had written about the raga Reethigowla last time. This post will be about the raga Darbari/Durvari/Durbari Kanada, which should compensate for the earlier post on a Carnatic raga....
View ArticleYamini 2011 – Gig Report
Performing art lovers from Bangalore were treated to yet another edition of music and dance all night, when Yamini 2011 came visiting on the 25th of January, 2011, at the open air theater in IIM...
View ArticleIdentity of a Raga: Part 3 – Naattai
- Ajay Parasuraman I know I’ve been away for an awfully long time. I’ve been extremely busy trying to get a(ny) company convinced that I’m fit to work for them, with varied results. Ok, enough said...
View ArticleUnderstanding Manipravalam
Songs used for the art form Kathakali are generally composed in Manipravalam. - Ajay Parasuraman This next post is about a form of kriti not everyone would be familiar with. It’s called manipravalam....
View ArticleIdentity of a Raga: Part 4 – Kedar
- Ajay Parasuraman Apologies for the really long break I decided to take. Hope to be more regular from now on. Maintaining the balance between Carnatic and Hindustani Ragas, my fourth edition of the...
View ArticleIdentity of a Raga (Part 5) – Gowri Manohari
First of all, apologies for the long long break in this section. We hope to be more regular in future, now with a new guest writer onboard. So here’s introducing Krithika Arvind. Krithika is a...
View ArticleIdentity of a Raga (Part 6) – Abheri
- Krithika Arvind Hi, this time its Raga Abheri, known as Bhimplasi in the Hindustani Sangeet. This is a very simple and yet a captive raga popularized through various genres like theatre and cinema,...
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