Musical Homage to Syama Sastri by Smt. Manda Sudharani

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divakar
Posts: 197
Joined: 26 May 2005, 06:06

Post by divakar »

Musical Homage to commemorate 180th Vardhanti of Sri Shyama Sastri.

5.2.2007 (Monday)
Tyagaraja Aradhana Trust
Kalabharati, Visakhapatnam

Lec-dem by Smt. Manda Sudharani on the life and compositions of Sri Shyama Sastri.

1. dayAnidhE - bEgaDa varNaM - Adi (A)
2. pAlayASumAM - Arabhi - tripuTa (madhyama kAla kriti)
3. ninnu vina gA mari - purvIkalyANi - vilOma cApu (A,S)
4. O jagadaMba - AnaNdabhairavi (A)
5. nannju brOva rAda - janaraNjani - miSra cApu (madhyama kAla kriti) (A,N,S)
6. kAmAkshi nI padayugamu - yadukulakAMbhOji swarajati
7. rAvE himagirikumAri - tODi swarajati
8. aMba kAmAkshi - bhairavi swarajati
9. vanajAsana vinuta - SrI - subbarAya SAstri
10. kAmAkshi lOkasAkshiNi - madhyamAvati (gItaM)

She gave a very nice lecture demonstration on the life and compositions of Sri Shyama Sastri. I jotted down some points of what she said.

Shyama Sastri had a good voice and interest in music but he was not from a musical family. One Sangeetaswami happened to come across Shyama Sastri and took him as his pupil. He adviced Shyama Sastri to go to Paccimiriyam Adiappayya.

'natajana paripAlini' a sanskrit composition in sAvEri rAgam was his first composition. He popularized Anandabhairavi by introducing gamakas to an otherwise folk tune. Just as Tyagaraja was instrumental in bringing to light the two meLakarta rAgams, kharaharapriya and harikambhoji. Most of Shyama Sastri's compositions were in telugu and a few in sanskrit. He is known for composing kritis which were suitable for singing in chowka kala.

She started with bEgaDa varNam (dayAnidhE) with a short alapana. she then sang a madhyama kAla kriti in Arabhi (pAlayASumAM). She sang alapana for pUrvIkalyANi followed by the kriti 'ninnu vina gA mari'. After singing this kriti she said that 'vilOma cApu' tALa in which this kriti was set allows for manodharma sangita and also for singing in two kAlas (madhyama and chowka). She said that compositions of great composers are such that they allow for variations in speeds while singing without compromising on the rakti aspect of the kriti. She sang the kriti in madhayama kAla (I felt it was rather brisk for this particular kriti. kind of biased, having listened to MDR's version). Anandabhairavi alapana was followed by the famous kriti 'O jagadaMba'. Then a brisk madhyama kala kriti in janaranjani 'nannu brOva rAda'. she did neraval at the line 'SyAma kRshNa sahOdari OMkAri' and ended with a brief kalpanaswaram.

Then she spent most time in explaining salient features of the most important works of Shyama Sastri, the 'maNitrayaM' (gem trio), she called it, swarajatis in bhairavi, tODi, and yadukulakAMbhOji. She dealt with each swarajati in detail, sang each charanam and paused to explain the mathematical aspects as well as the beauty in the kriti. She said that Syama Sastri was very good at laya aspects and incorporated the same in his kritis with such ease that while rendering the kriti the listener would be oblivious of the mathematical aspect. Generally, emphasis on laya while rendering kriti will mar the bhakti bhava of the kriti. But in Syama Sastri kritis this was not the case. Such was the greatness of his compositions.
She sang yadukulakambhoji swarajati first, then toDi swarajati. later she took up the bhairavi swarajati. She then told about Sri Subbaraya Sastri (son of Shyama Sastri and a disciple of Tyagaraja) and sang 'vanajAsana vinuta' in Sri rAgam. She ended the lec-dem by singing a gItam in madhyamavati composed by Shyama Sastri. interesting aspect was that the lines were rendered in two speeds (just as in a varnam).

It was a two hour lec-dem program.

humdinger
Posts: 191
Joined: 04 Jan 2006, 12:14

Post by humdinger »

Sri Divakar, great to see your reviews coming from Vizag. This one is particularly good with all those points you have been kind to share with us. Please keep up the good work!

rbharath
Posts: 2326
Joined: 05 Feb 2010, 10:50

Post by rbharath »

this is not the first time Smt Sudharani has sung an all Shyama Sastri concert. She has done that before a couple of times or so in madras.

Nice list and i m sure the concert should have been very enjoyable.

i hope more madras sabhas feature her.

gravikiran
Posts: 114
Joined: 14 Sep 2006, 08:46

Post by gravikiran »

>>>
He popularized Anandabhairavi by introducing gamakas to an otherwise folk tune.
<<<

Hmm...I wonder what is the musical/documentary evidence for a statement like this.
Anandabhairavi has been dealt with equally extensively by Shyama Shastry's contemporary Dikshitar as well. In fact, in Dikshitar's school Anandabhairavi is a pretty heavy raga and the SSP lists around 5-6 kritis (IIRC) of Dikshitar's in this raga.

Ofcourse, SS's anandabhairavi has become more popular over the ages compared to Dikshitar's.

rbharath
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Joined: 05 Feb 2010, 10:50

Post by rbharath »

ravikiran's arguement is very true.

also, only 2 of the 6 shyama sastri krits in Anandha bhairavi have the andhara gAndhAra usage. There are version of those as well, without the andhara gAndhAram. MD school sings anandha bhairavi as an upAnga rAgam. i dont think T has used the other gAndhAram either.

vijay
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Post by vijay »

Could someone explain the laya aspects of SS' compositions in more detail with some examples?

prashant
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Post by prashant »

Bharath: IIRC kSIra sAgara vihArA of tyAgarAjA has antara G usage [at least that's what I remember from a TMK version I heard some time ago].

Dikshitar's Anandabhairavi is sublime also with the addition of repertoire in 2-kaLai rUpaka - tyAgarAja yOgA, mAnasa guruguhA and daNDAyudapANim which really deserves to be brought out more. Even among the SS krithis, at least in my experience, it has been relatively rare to hear the krithis other than O jagadambA and marivErE gati - beautiful krithis both of them, but pAhi sri, mahilO ambA, himACalatanayA etc would be welcome in concerts top...

divakar
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Joined: 26 May 2005, 06:06

Post by divakar »

http://www.geocities.com/Vienna/Strasse/5926/shyama.htm

this site lists 8 kritis and 2 varnams in Anandabhairavi rAgam among Shyama Sastri's compositions.

ramakriya
Posts: 1876
Joined: 04 Feb 2010, 02:05

Post by ramakriya »

rbharath wrote:ravikiran's arguement is very true.

also, only 2 of the 6 shyama sastri krits in Anandha bhairavi have the andhara gAndhAra usage. There are version of those as well, without the andhara gAndhAram. MD school sings anandha bhairavi as an upAnga rAgam. i dont think T has used the other gAndhAram either.
AFAIK, MD school sings Anandabhairavi without antara gAndhAra, but with both dhaivatas - so it can't be classified as upAnga in the current context ( SSP definition of upAnga/bhAshAnga does not match what we think of these words today).

-Ramakriya

drshrikaanth
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Joined: 26 Mar 2005, 17:01

Post by drshrikaanth »

The Anandabhairavi 1st navAvaraNa kRti does feature te G3 (sumanasArAdhitAbjamukhi)

ramakriya
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Joined: 04 Feb 2010, 02:05

Post by ramakriya »

prashant wrote:Bharath: IIRC kSIra sAgara vihArA of tyAgarAjA has antara G usage [at least that's what I remember from a TMK version I heard some time ago].
Yes - that is true - but we can't really tell if that is a later addition I think.

Tyagaraja's other 2 kritis in this rAga (rAma rAMa nIvAramu and nIke teliyaka) do not have antara G prayOga AFAIK.

Here is one rendition of nIkE teliyaka pOyina:

http://www.musicindiaonline.com/music/c ... ragam.543/

-Ramakriya

ramakriya
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Joined: 04 Feb 2010, 02:05

Post by ramakriya »

drshrikaanth wrote:The Anandabhairavi 1st navAvaraNa kRti does feature te G3 (sumanasArAdhitAbjamukhi)
Thanks for pointing this out! I really forgot that usage.

SSP, however, does not mention antara gAndhAra at all.

-Ram

gravikiran
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Joined: 14 Sep 2006, 08:46

Post by gravikiran »

well my point was not about the antara gandhara usage at all [:)]
the G3 story is usually debatable especially because of the lack of proper documentation in either the Thyagaraja or the Shyama Shastry school (compared to the SSP of the venkatamakhin/dikshitar sampradaya). from what i have heard, there is no musical treatise which talks about the G3 usage of anandabhairavi (but let us leave it at that...)

i just felt that the statement attributing shyama shastry to popularising anandabhairavi was non-authentic and not backed by enough musical proof. just my 2 paise :)

as an aside, the SSP says that the chathurshruti (panchashruthi actually) daivatha was already in vogue during subbarama dikshitar's time.

arunk
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Joined: 07 Feb 2010, 21:41

Post by arunk »

dont we have 2 patantras tracing to Syama Sastry? Not authentic enough? We could check how they were taught.

Besides SSP while certainly deserves a lot of its reputation w.r.t authenticity was written *as recent as* the turn of 20th century :). I sometimes think its importance is over-emphasized just a little bit. It certainly opened previously non-existent avenues into MD's works - but it still is quite recent from a historical perspective.

Arun
Last edited by arunk on 09 Feb 2007, 22:01, edited 1 time in total.

drshrikaanth
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Joined: 26 Mar 2005, 17:01

Post by drshrikaanth »

Iam surprised by your comment Arun. If you can accept 2 oral pAThAntaras, the a written documentation by a direct, early descendant (Both by way of birth and in music training) of the composer has more weightage. And there was no contriversy about SSP as there was about Rangaramanuja Iyengar's work.

arunk
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Joined: 07 Feb 2010, 21:41

Post by arunk »

drs - To clarify my comment was not about doubting SSP (although read 3 below).

It was three fold
1. in many instances (as i had noted on sangeetham) absence of a krithi in SSP was somehow viewed by many as a negative thing. From what I could find, there was no scientific basis for that - it was just simply accepted that SSP was most authentic and hence absence from it immediately implied "something's fishy". It certainly is considered most authentic source for dIkshitar krithis, but here is one instance i find a tad too much weight given to it.
2. I was not talking about rangaramanuja iyengar per say although his patantra does count. You do have that (dhanammal) patantra and Smt. Vidya Sankar who all learned from direct descendants of SS. That should count more than what was apparent to me here. Although I do agree that even among them there are differences.
3. (this is my guess - and hence obvoisly very subjective) From evidence, most patantras we know of all composers (esp. trinity) exhibit variations even though all/most claim their versions to be authentic. While i am not that comfortable to immediately conclude that hence SSP must have variations, it is not an impossibility. To conclude it must be a rubber-stamp of exactly how dIkshitar must have composed down to the gamakas - i am not sure. I do certainly lean that way and but i cannot say it is scientifically proven (if we want to get into proofs).

Arun
Last edited by arunk on 09 Feb 2007, 23:04, edited 1 time in total.

ramakriya
Posts: 1876
Joined: 04 Feb 2010, 02:05

Post by ramakriya »

drshrikaanth wrote:And there was no contriversy about SSP as there was about Rangaramanuja Iyengar's work.
What was the controversy about RRI's work?

-Ramakriya

drshrikaanth
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Joined: 26 Mar 2005, 17:01

Post by drshrikaanth »

I fully agree with you comment 1. Absence from SSP does not automatically imply doubtful authenticity as much as presence confers authenticity (With a small margin of error).

Regards 2- Counts to a degree, no denying that. But more time has elapsed between them and the composer than was the case with SSP and subbarama dikshitar

Regards to 3, simply to assume by drawing parallels that there may be other pAThAntaras is clutching at straws. We have no reason to believe there is and nothing has cropped up until now, so we have to give SSP the due as authority.

arunk
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Joined: 07 Feb 2010, 21:41

Post by arunk »

drshrikaanth wrote:Regards to 3, simply to assume by drawing parallels that there may be other pAThAntaras is clutching at straws. We have no reason to believe there is and nothing has cropped up until now, so we have to give SSP the due as authority.
I certainly agree but let me try to elaborate my reasoning (still of course very subjective :). I think cm has a lot of personal interpretative element built into it - and the more you get immersed into it, the more "expressive" you feel about what you are singing - even to strictly learned, rehearsed stuff. This can give way to more of personal interpretive elements to creep in even under the strictest of traditions (IMO).

The level of detail in SSP for the gamakas in the krithis, I think is very impressive, but that 100% of them are exactly how dIkshitar taugh it and intended it to be sung so every time? I will certainly account for the possibility but I also like the possibility of minor variations that are in effect due to this personal interpretative element. This element IMO, can tend cement over time and thus get passed on to next generation of descendents and so on. This can possibly explain why different patantras exhibit variations. Of course in some (like in SSP's case), the tendency to "stick to tradition" may very strong that the variations remain minor as time goes on, and in others, maybe very wide liberties were taken resulting in drastic variations over generations (like different ragas for same krithi, or D1=>D2 for same krithi changing swarUpa of the krithi etc.)

Arun
Last edited by arunk on 09 Feb 2007, 23:25, edited 1 time in total.

grajesh10
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Re: Musical Homage to Syama Sastri by Smt. Manda Sudharani

Post by grajesh10 »

Namaskaram,
I am searching vocal rendering of another Arabhi krithi of Shyama Shastri - Sri Bahulamathi . In Sangeethapriya, there is a veena recording by late Smt. Ranganayaki Rajagopalan.
I have searched for the lyrics , but nowhere in the web I am unable to find it.
Can someone help me with lyrics , please and if possible the notations too.

Rajesh G

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