Why students discontinue music lessons

Miscellaneous topics on Carnatic music
shankarank
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by shankarank »

RSR wrote: 24 Apr 2018, 21:19
The United States provides evidence of what results when the public sector is not involved in cultural promotion: the death of one orchestra after the next. Those who want to limit the state’s obligation to promote culture have forgotten that culture is both a hard and soft location factor for a community‘s desirability.
....
You put the onus on state. The state is doing immense encouragement to promote art teaching: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/20/954.

In addition the credit given to extra curricular, is the very reason even Carnatic music has so many students pursuing it in the U.S.

Orchestras die , because people lose the cultural sense/sacredness and don't come and listen and don't cultivate listening habbits! On top of that Western classical music has this secular baggage albatross around it's neck!

And you yourself listener via AIR/ 78 RPM(s). Now just finished hearing the joke on radio listeners from TNS interview posted in V&V. One person said to a vidvan : "I like to listen to you only via Radio" - subtext: "he can switch it off any time". :D

Now classical music, students learning stuff has opened up event conflicts with students themselves performing, draining the attention space of many concert listener as they feel obligated to attend these performances.

And this sacredness is fundamental! All else ( teaching methods, how much a student learns, who learns , whether all are able to learn) are all unimportant! nAlu vidvan irunda pOdum! Ok I will give you more - take 10!

RSR
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by RSR »

P-51
-----
TRY saying, it would be enough if we have 4 or 5 educated persons.See the absurdity.
what was the population of thamizh speaking state in 1930? what is it now-2020? ( 2 crores, 10 crores). how many knew English? how many graduates > how many migrated to USA ? how many engineers and computer-savvy youth?.. Elitists are missing this social revolution. In proportion , people who know a bit of Sanskrit has declined drastically. and may become nil in the next decade.
We must take a serious stand to spread CM especially Sathguru kruthis among the school children trough the state. The bonus is ETHICS

shankarank
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by shankarank »

People educated in different fields are in different proportion not the same. Unlike the output of most professions which result in a product or service you end up consuming, through music by listening you are elevated to the same state of consciousness as the composer or musician(if they are really). That is the difference!

I am not saying music should not be taught widely! By why is such a difficult thing that we keep talking about it? The reasons behind the wrong narratives need to be set straight first.

Saw this inspiring video come up on twitter - well there are lot of such videos on children doing things beyond their age over the years , but this one is special and the kid is teaching!

https://twitter.com/i/status/1363055092979572738

RSR
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by RSR »

not relevant. to the title of this thread.
Carnatic music is not and should not be a profession.
It should become part of everyday life of common people and that is possible only when it becomes State policy of education right from childhood. It is not the same as dedicted music schools.

msakella
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by msakella »

You may feel inspired by the kid's teaching music to another kid of the Twitter-video. But, believe it or not, with my very long teaching experience of more than 60 years and the self-introspection happened only by the grace of the Almighty after five years after my retirement, I felt the same video as suicidal teaching which has very blindly been followed by all our South Indians since many centuries. This blunder has accidentally been found by me very recently in 2001 and by honestly following the real method of learning our music I could very well save a lot of the invaluable time, energy and money of the poor aspirant for the first time in our history of music. Kindly read the following.

As a regular full-time music-teacher in Govt. Music College teaching to the students right from the basic alphabets continuously for 35 years me too taught to my students in the same suicidal manner and became satisfied as I could retire peacefully in 1996 in the absence of any academic inspection in my entire service (this is the greatness of our great country). But, after five years after my retirement, in an introspection blessed by the Almighty it was proved beyond any doubt that I was not fit to be a music-teacher at all. From then onwards my real and truthful life as a music-teacher started. In this respect I have written some interesting posts, 'Some helpful observations' beginning from the post No.625 of the main thread 'Bigginers Q & A - Learning Area' and the sub-thread 'AMS Easy Methods - 2007 CD' of this forum. If you are truly interested kindly go through them and give your valuable feedback. amsharma

viewtopic.php?f=9&p=369607#p369607

Pratyaksham Bala
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by Pratyaksham Bala »

msakella wrote: 18 Mar 2021, 14:35 ... ... redacted by admin ... ..
OMG!

The liberty allowed by this Forum was used for a long time to repeatedly abuse all other Music Teachers.

Now starts preaching of VIOLENCE against them.
This is a dangerous trend.

RasikasModerator1
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Joined: 29 Nov 2009, 07:03

Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by RasikasModerator1 »

@msakella Akella Garu, kindly refrain from using this kind of language in writing on a public forum which has an international audience. Please share your videos in the AMS thread in music school which was created for that purpose.

As moderators who have known you for over 2 decades, kindly stop talking about others or bashing other teachers in your posts and instead please focus only on your methods and contributions and your students and videos will speak what is needed.

We have been very free as we know you personally very well, but with our forum results being viewable all over the world on the first page of Google search, and social media everywhere, please try to present in a positive way. Your words have become your own worst enemy. Your anger and criticism is only hurting your own cause more than anything or anybody else.

Otherwise in the future we will be forced to separate grain from chaff and remove the unacceptable words and retain only the videos and musical explanations.

@Pratyaksham Bala We have also removed the offending text from your quote because these days it's not safe to let google or FB or twitter find such words. We might end up having a lot of explaining to do.

msakella
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by msakella »

Thank you all our brothers and sisters for having brought me to the right path. I shall certainly do the needful.. I am extremely happy to have you all behind me to protect me every time.
Thank you all once again. amsharma

Pratyaksham Bala
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by Pratyaksham Bala »

@RasikasModerator1

As suggested in Post #62 , the above post is best suited for the 'AMS Easy Methods' thread under Beginners Q&A - Learning area. You may consider moving it there.
RasikasModerator1 wrote: 18 Mar 2021, 21:12 Akella Garu, ... ... Please share your videos in the AMS thread in music school which was created for that purpose. ...

RasikasModerator1
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by RasikasModerator1 »

Dear members, we have moved the video links of @msakella to his AMS easy methods thread.

Pratyaksham Bala
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by Pratyaksham Bala »

.
Wonder whether, from all the old posts, blanket removal of words like 'Cheaters, Traitors, Rogues, etc.' used by the Member to insult other Music Teachers, is possible.

msakella
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Joined: 30 Sep 2006, 21:16

Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by msakella »

Excellent, congratulations. Removing these titles is far easier than changing them. Of course, you can do what you can! amsharma

msakella
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by msakella »

All musicians are my own brothers and sisters only.
Why should I abuse them? they my enemies?
No, not at all. If they rectify themselves they can do things very efficiently by which our entire society will flourish. Even if i use harsh words they are not responding. All these things could be understood to professional musicians only. Try some other way to change them to get our things done efficiently and honestly!

Pratyaksham Bala
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by Pratyaksham Bala »

Mods:

Please, please consider removing from all old posts words like 'Cheaters, Traitors, Liars, Rogues, Culprits, Hypocrites, etc.' used repeatedly by a Member to insult all other Music Teachers and Musicians.

msakella
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by msakella »

Excellent, all the non-music-teachers and others are damn worried of my harsh words, cheaters, liars, rogues etc., aimed at the honourable Karnataka-music-teachers and they all want to remove them forthwith. But, funnily, not even a single one of these teachers did ever come out open and condemned my action. As I was also one among these honourable gentlemen for much of my life I can very easily locate them unlike others. But, very sadly, none of these gentlemen is ready to realise as they themselves are very well aware that all those harsh words are absolutely true in their respect.

As you are the Admins and owners of this forum you have every right to do as you like. But, did any one of you are aware of the duties and responsibilities of these music-teachers and did any one of you verify whether they all are fulfilling their duties and responsibilities honestly and efficiently? No, you didn't do that. But, even now if you bring any such music-teacher along with his/her five best disciples and their study material I can very well prove my harsh words are very true. Can you do that, dear? msakella

msakella
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by msakella »

Since last few days each and every time i have been obstructed to post any lengthy post under the plea of an error obviously indicating some ulterior motive behind this. Excellent administration indeed!!! msakella

srkris
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by srkris »

Namaste, please clear your browser cache and retry. Else pls email it to me.

Unfortunately we are unable to fix every single IT error as errors can arise from different reasons or sources. There is no need for assuming any ulterior motives.

rajeshnat
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by rajeshnat »

Any case as a caution always type in notepad-save it, remove word wrap in notepad . Then copy and paste into this forum please. That way even when there is error, you always have a copy in notepad

ganesh_mourthy
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by ganesh_mourthy »

Not very tech-savvy to an extent of microdetails ...what is wrong with word wrap in notepad? I always do it.

rajeshnat
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by rajeshnat »

ganesh_mourthy wrote: 14 Jun 2021, 19:22 Not very tech-savvy to an extent of microdetails ...what is wrong with word wrap in notepad? I always do it.
When you type in notepad . we can type with word wrap as some times we have to reread and edit it . But with the wordwrap on and when you copy and paste it puts way too many line breaks . The best idea with word wrap off in note pad , copy the text from your typed notepad and paste it in our forum edit window . At the most all i usually do is just add one empty space for better readability.

Also another tip , it is almost in my muscle memory. Even this text that i have typed, it is too short to use the notepad . But whether laptop or phone , i do a select all - Ctrl C (copy) and then only submit button. Just in case by that step, i avoid any heartbreaking situation at times there is time out error when you lose all the content.

Always rule of thumb , type in notepad and save , copy in notepad and then come and paste here. I have roughly typed 14 MB of raw text content since the day sanjay subrahmanyan-sriram V pulled the :evil: plug without notice in sangeetham.com(i lost lot of posts in that era) , almost all my content that i typed here is in my personal notepad

ganesh_mourthy
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by ganesh_mourthy »

Thank you for your wisdom. I have always had problem on how to save the notepad. What to use ASCII or the other.Rarely , I saw that the words went random and scrambled when I opened it. And I started using notepad+ which has numbers.

Nick H
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by Nick H »

rajeshnat wrote: 16 Jun 2021, 09:53a select all - Ctrl C (copy) and then only submit button.
Ctrl-A Ctrl-C. No need to even reach for mouse and back to the keyboard!

This is a really good habit. Good insurance! Computers are fallible,

Humans are fallible too. Which is a major reason for discontinuing music classes!

Pallavisree1976
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by Pallavisree1976 »

Alot of students in the US, Canada, Australia, UK, and other foreign countries discontinue carnatic music because the teachers are too strict and uncompromising. the kids in these foreign countries are involved in other activities also such as piano lessons, karate class, tennis lessons, swimming lessons, violin lessons ( maybe western and indian or maybe only western), flute lessons( again maybe western and indian or just western) and plus extracurricular activites in school like maybe math team, science club, speech club, debate, etc... so, with all this, they may not have the time or energy for carnatic music.

Nick H
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by Nick H »

If they are still doing flute/violin as in Indian then they haven't discontinued carnatic lessons.

In general, though, the question was answered in the first few posts: kids get interested in, or have to prioritise, other things. Simple question; simple answer.

All the more credit to those who do keep up carnatic music seriously, even though they are satisfying the demands of academic and other things. I salute them!

Pallavisree1976
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by Pallavisree1976 »

Let's face it. Indian classical music (carnatic music or hindustani music also) is hard. it is not everyone's cup of tea. when one starts at a very tender age like 5, trying to memorize all the sarsli varsais, jantai varsais, dhattu varsais, mel sthayi exercises, thara sthayi exercises, madhya sthayi exercises, mandara sthayi exercises, keez sthayi excercises, alankarams, geethams, jattiswarams, swarajathis etc... are very difficult to learn. teachers can be very rigid and strict when teaching and this is why youngsters loose interest in carnatic music.

Nick H
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by Nick H »

Pallavisree1976 wrote: 12 Sep 2021, 19:19 Let's face it. Indian classical music (carnatic music or hindustani music also) is hard.
It is no harder, and probably much easier than the academic pursuits that these youngsters undertake. And if they have been at it since 5, and are still at it at, say 13, it is not going to be difficulty that puts them off.

So: No.

They leave because of academics, careers, members of opposite sex, perhaps not having been that keen in the first place.

thenpaanan
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by thenpaanan »

Pallavisree1976 wrote: 12 Sep 2021, 05:39 Alot of students in the US, Canada, Australia, UK, and other foreign countries discontinue carnatic music because the teachers are too strict and uncompromising. the kids in these foreign countries are involved in other activities also such as piano lessons, karate class, tennis lessons, swimming lessons, violin lessons ( maybe western and indian or maybe only western), flute lessons( again maybe western and indian or just western) and plus extracurricular activites in school like maybe math team, science club, speech club, debate, etc... so, with all this, they may not have the time or energy for carnatic music.
It is a complex issue. Teaching methods no doubt have a big role in this. There is virtually no pedagogy of teaching Carnatic music (or Hindustani music) as far as I know. The way CM is commonly taught has probably remained largely unchanged for centuries modulo the accommodations of modern life such as access to electronic sruthi boxes and live video. Our teachers are doing to their students what was done to them (and proudly so, if I may add). I cannot begin to tell you the atrocities being committed (last week I witnessed a ten-year old, who did not even know what the word "sruthi" means, belting out the aarabhi pancharatnam -- I asked and was told that her teacher thought it fit to teach her that kriti) but we don't have any commonly accepted guidelines on what should be taught in what progression and at what level of capability. Does the Music Academy conduct any committees for such guidelines?

I am not aware of any serious discussion in the community about new teaching methods. There is a heck of lot of lec-dems on youtube of late on gamakas and subtle differences between ragas, sthala puraanaas embedded inside kritis and other exotica, but absolutely no videos on the basic question of how to teach CM better. The teaching methods in other areas are dramatically transforming but ICM teaching methods have always been the same. Perhaps the next generation of expatriate students in these countries will evolve radically new methods of teaching and force it on our CM world. I know Sri Sarma has been talking in these parts about his teaching methods, but the very fact that his is a lone voice is evidence for my hypothesis.

But this issue is not confined to teachers alone. Parents have a role to play in this as well. I have seen parents force the training on unwilling children -- no doubt it works beautifully when it does, but we never hear about the countless many who are completely turned off the music in adult life because of the compulsive nature of their childhood training. Mind, I don't really have an answer to this question myself -- I have my own children and it is a daily internal struggle for me on how hard to come down on my kids on the matter of music practice.

Next, one has to ask to what end are we teaching this art form to our children. Especially for children growing up in Western countries but for everyone else as well, this is a very difficult question to answer. First of all, 99.999% of the students are not going to become professional performing artists. Second, if we are teaching them the art so that they can enjoy listening to it as adults, note that there is a tremendous competition in the form of other genres of music that may be equally attractive and more accessible. What would make Carnatic music viable as a competitor in this new age? Third, there is no cultural milieu in Western countries for these students to fit into in adult life where knowledge of Indian classical music would be advantageous or useful. Contrast this with, say, knowledge of some basic bhangra dance steps. I have seen many Indian-origin young adults being able to connect with each other on college campuses because of their common knowledge of the dance moves or, to a lesser degree, of popular modern Bollywood songs. Knowing these last two things may actually help in creating social ties for these young people whereas this is not so at all for ICM. For the impossibly minute fraction of kids who make it to Berklee or some other music school, it is not Carnatic music that they go to learn or perform there.

Compare this with learning a Western instrument -- piano, flute, drums, etc -- even with elementary training these kids can find other players to connect with, join bands or choirs, and they even find a wide variety of genre possibilities that they can choose according to their taste. There is no comparison at all between the different types of Western Classical-related sub-genres and their equivalents in India Classical music. So the bottomline is that the most likely outlet for Carnatic music for the next couple of generations will be the odd temple concert and annual NavarAtri celebrations, hardly the best platforms for high quality exposition.

Last but not least, it is ironically very challenging to be an innovative teacher in Carnatic music in spite of all this. This is not a complaint -- just an observation -- that ICM is largely very conservative and devoted to purity. We as a community do not take readily to new ideas. We want the old stuff and we are happy with it. The evidence is the preponderance of youtube videos devoted to finding new hidden things about old compositions as opposed to new ways of presenting the music. Any major deviation is immediately labeled as not Carnatic. Given this disposition it is going to be an uphill battle to keep Carnatic music relevant to future generations in these foreign countries. I was once enraptured by an accidental bunch of young Indian-Americans jointly rendering a totally irreverent version of parAtpara (in vAcaspati) and I was glad that Carnatic music was a vital ingredient in their boisterous enjoyment. Unless we embrace these alternatives (much like the Carnatic version of "The shape of you") we are not going to make it. The first generation of children may take up the art due to parental influence but their children and their children's children have no chance. Unless something changes.

-T

Nick H
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by Nick H »

@thenpaanan, Your answer is very down-to-earth, and very realistic, and... a trifle depressing, because it suggests to me that the question is not so much why do the students give it up, as why would they continue?

There are other non-classical opportunities for the students of CM (perhaps more for the instrumentalists than the vocalists?) but it is still probably true that it is easier to sidle up to a group with a western flute or saxaphone in the hope of joining in, than with with a sitar.

I attended a concert of wonderful British-Asian music in London, a couple of years ago. The music was composed, and led, by a sitarist with a Yorkshire accent (and a Yorkshire sense of humour too). The emphasis was that this, albeit played by people of Asian origin playing mostly Indian instruments, was not Indian music: it was the music of there-and-then British Asians.

I also know of a young morsing/mridangist who works with rap, beatbox, all kinds of stuff (some of which I am too out-of-touch to even put a name to). The musical skills can travel interculturally, beyond the rather contrived "fusion" of a decade or two ago. But my paragraph 2 probably still applies.

Can only say that I see enough dedicated youngsters to know that CM is not dead yet. Enough not only to keep it alive, but to provide enough competition to each other to ensure that there will be more artists than stages.

rajeshnat
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by rajeshnat »

thenpaanan wrote: 15 Sep 2021, 00:07 I was once enraptured by an accidental bunch of young Indian-Americans jointly rendering a totally irreverent version of parAtpara (in vAcaspati) and I was glad that Carnatic music was a vital ingredient in their boisterous enjoyment. Unless we embrace these alternatives (much like the Carnatic version of "The shape of you") we are not going to make it.

-T
About 10 years back there was a spoof like song connecting Barack Obama US elections , where some youngster from NJ/NY sang paratpara replacing with US elections . I enjoyed that, may be you are referring that.

rajeshnat
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by rajeshnat »

thenpaanan wrote: 15 Sep 2021, 00:07 first generation of children may take up the art due to parental influence but their children and their children's children have no chance. Unless something changes.
-T
With an assumption say abhishek raghuram is comparable to GNB, we have adequate count of practioners who can give great music. What is missing is the ecosystem of sabhas and count of concerts . Way back in 2001 , i recollect say 30 days 30 concerts in krishna gana sabha, we had nadopasana srinivasan conducting almost 20 concerts a year other than dec,Hamsadhwani holding 20 concerts.In USA also SIFAS, CMANA etc did have say 20 concerts etc. I recollect how till 2010 say musicians if they tour kerala they would have 4 concerts in small towns and villages on a weekend.

More than the next gen kids taking up, it is lack of not having the next gen sabha patrons like Nadopasana Srinivasan, Safe Ramabadran and his brother CMana Rajagopalan from USA which is a bigger lacuna for CM that needs to happen. The comfort of hearing online has killed live CM and dedicated listeners for sure.

As they say we have to first build the park which is having more sabhas and associations all over

Great points T.

thenpaanan
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by thenpaanan »

Nick H wrote: 15 Sep 2021, 02:30 @thenpaanan, Your answer is very down-to-earth, and very realistic, and... a trifle depressing, because it suggests to me that the question is not so much why do the students give it up, as why would they continue?
Nick, it was my intention to force us as a community to ask that last question. We are in my opinion taking too much for granted when we say that somehow this will survive. I have no doubt it will. Thrive perhaps not, but survive, surely. There is a sufficiently large population of interested people on the planet to keep it going. The question we have to ask ourselves is is this enough or do we want more?
Nick H wrote: 15 Sep 2021, 02:30 There are other non-classical opportunities for the students of CM (perhaps more for the instrumentalists than the vocalists?) but it is still probably true that it is easier to sidle up to a group with a western flute or saxaphone in the hope of joining in, than with with a sitar.
In some instances a sitar may be more advantageous due to its relative rarity but the player has to be ready and willing to play along (pardon the pun).
Nick H wrote: 15 Sep 2021, 02:30 I attended a concert of wonderful British-Asian music in London, a couple of years ago. The music was composed, and led, by a sitarist with a Yorkshire accent (and a Yorkshire sense of humour too). The emphasis was that this, albeit played by people of Asian origin playing mostly Indian instruments, was not Indian music: it was the music of there-and-then British Asians.

I also know of a young morsing/mridangist who wszorks with rap, beatbox, all kinds of stuff (some of which I am too out-of-touch to even put a name to). The musical skills can travel interculturally, beyond the rather contrived "fusion" of a decade or two ago. But my paragraph 2 probably still applies.
My point is that this kind of interaction seems strictly unidirectional -- people use their Carnatic skills to enter and perhaps influence those other genres but I dont see this in the opposite direction. Can we get some beat-boxers to sit on a Carnatic stage a la konnakol, please? Since you are a mridangist, can I ask you this -- I have once performed a Carnatic concert with just a Western-trained pianist. It was so much fun I cannot begin to describe the experience. The obvious observation is that the piano serves or can serve both as a melodic as well as percussive accompaniment. So why not use a piano in its full range as a percussion instrument in a Carnatic concert instead of a mridangam that can play only three notes?
Nick H wrote: 15 Sep 2021, 02:30 Can only say that I see enough dedicated youngsters to know that CM is not dead yet. Enough not only to keep it alive, but to provide enough competition to each other to ensure that there will be more artists than stages.
I should emphasize that I was making my comments only with respect to the next generation(s) in the diaspora -- I do not have any claim to knowledge about the current scene in India.

-T

thenpaanan
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by thenpaanan »

rajeshnat wrote: 15 Sep 2021, 09:48 More than the next gen kids taking up, it is lack of not having the next gen sabha patrons like Nadopasana Srinivasan, Safe Ramabadran and his brother CMana Rajagopalan from USA which is a bigger lacuna for CM that needs to happen. The comfort of hearing online has killed live CM and dedicated listeners for sure.

As they say we have to first build the park which is having more sabhas and associations all over

Great points T.
Thanks, Rajesh. First of all I should emphasize that my comments were only directed at a previous poster who was asking about students in western countries. I have no connection to the current scene in India and am not really capable of commenting about that.

My own take on the question of sabhas and patronage is that sabhas are a thing of the past. The venue has shifted online and that is where most of the future lies. We will probably see the formation of online sabhas of people who interested in particular sub-genres of Carnatic music such as purely instrumental, specific language kritis, Carnatic music slanted towards devotional music (i.e. somewhere between "pure" CM and bhajan music), Carnatic music in the service of pilgrimage, Carnatic music mixed with other influences (Hindustani, western, perhaps even African or Middle-eastern), and so on and so fort. There is an infinite spectrum of possibilities and a huge audience for these things who find the current fare opaque/boring/stifling/formulaic/antiquated/insert-desired-pejorative-here.

There will always be the purist heartland in Mylapore or thereabouts (and its reflection in Cleveland) but its hold on what constitutes "Carnatic" will weaken. Some artists will always think of a concert at the Music Academy as the ultimate, and Sangeet Kalanidhi as the epitome of perfection, but there will large Carnatic-based communities who will not care.

I sense we are getting farther and farther from the original topic of this thread.

-T

shankarank
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by shankarank »

We could give the challenge to the machines! If they could reverse engineer much of it through their learning, they could also spit out a teaching method. And that would be person-neutral. As no person is willing to bell the cat. And no other person is willing to listen.

Machines will be more trusted like the computerized horoscopes or the Android vaastu compass.
Last edited by shankarank on 17 Sep 2021, 08:07, edited 1 time in total.

thenpaanan
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by thenpaanan »

shankarank wrote: 16 Sep 2021, 13:39 Machines will be more trusted like the computerized horoscopes or the Android vaastu compass.
:D I did not think of it in this way! Indeed, machines are preferred in unexpected places. To carry your thought slightly further I would like to have a robot to strum an acoustic tanpura!

-T

shankarank
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Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by shankarank »

That is meta mechanical engineering transcending the electronics. Difficult to build a machine that moves a spec of dust from point A to B. That is the kind of precision you are demanding. It may equal or exceed what is required to learn and teach music :lol:

shankarank
Posts: 4042
Joined: 15 Jun 2009, 07:16

Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by shankarank »

If by diaspora , we don't mean Sri Lanka or Singapore, rather one of those Western countries, say predominantly U.S.A, I have few issues to raise.

How is the Sruti (listening!) happening with these kids? Their own language and phonetics is highly constraining and boxes them into a controlled nasal. To be loud and shout is against etiquette!

When we played cricket in my childhood, the temple nearby would be playing Smt. MSS or Sirkazhi Govindarajan. With Smt. MSS it was not simply bhajans and chants :( - but not any extensive repertoire either. It would be the familiar Sri Annamacharya kirtans as well as the mainstream Kanjadalayadakshi with it's rolling landing syllables. And Saroja Dala nEtri as well. Don't remember any Sri tyAgaraja kritis being played. Before Sri Jesudas tarangini cassettes , Smt. MSS recordings were the ones that were accessible in Cassette form - here I mean those were the ones Moms were willing to pick up.

The morning Trichi AIR relays listened to by Grandpas - Dr BMK, Soolamangalam sisters, Madurai Mani Iyer are less frequent comparatively - those are vacation days/holidays as it used to be 11 AM or so. In a city that produced a lot of musicians, an ancient city of Madurai - there was no AIR even!!

The 4 hour nadasvaram is a thing of the remote past! What rAga Alapana - boring!! :lol: . A person living close to ancient temples like Sri Meenakshi temple stopped having such experiences. The best we could muster was a Mallari and Jagajjani with Sri Kunnakudi during ulaga tamizh mAnAdu (World tamizh conference at Madurai) of MGR times.

And most if not all people who posted in this forum (the knowledgeables that we fret haven't returned!) have a Sruti that is beyond measure, much greater than those outside of Chennai in smaller cities, who had no access to a tape recorder.

These kids need to pick an icon of their choice in current times and hook on to them. It could be a mainstream carnatic person or any artiste of cine fame or pop classical genre familiars like Rajesh Vaidya. I suppose they could find an icon that comes close to their nasality. ;)

Now the situation in India:

Recently in a large team meeting we went though hobbies of each one and there was this Anglo-american who mentioned about World music as his passion. He was rattling out names like Zakir Hussain, Chaurasia and Shivkumar Sharma! An Indian from Thanjavur ( can you imagine?) , a person who is generally knowledgeable about our culture, could only respond with his big name : A.R Rahman.

Even Mandolin Srinivas did not make his list.

I bet you the situation is the same with kids ( of upper class/caste/economic - whatever strata!) that land up in a premier institute like IIT from the North or even deep south ( even as early as 1980s). None of them would know any names. It seems there is no familiar or popular person in Carnatic Music. Not even MSS or not even BMK. That is in larger India. I shudder when I hear all the big officials, governors, PM names being mentioned in the congratulatory list of messages received for Smt. MSS kalanidhi event. https://youtu.be/KVS_2EK1NFM?t=351

There was this national Quiz by Siddarth Basu in Doordarshan in 1986/87. A clip of Sri Semmangudi was played and asked to be identified. We were all thrilled as Maduraiites that one of the contestants came close enough to wrongly guess Sri TNS as the artiste. :lol: - I guess that was the best they could muster from the standard quiz prep (GaDam taTTutal! - a very popular term for memorization) :D . For the World music lovers, that POT is a metallic sound to be thrilled about - as they devour the exotica from native culture with their national geographic perspective. Whereas it has turned into a pejorative for us! How surreal can it get?

Siddharth Basu was such a quiz icon, the IIT brought him to have a quiz for the campus Kendriya Vidyalaya kids on Physics. Of course when Sid Basu says correct he wouldn't know really :lol: . They had two professors to assist him :mrgreen:

P:S : I am the only reporter of CM scene from 80s 90s and 2000s may be other than @rajeshnat . People in this forum are still stuck in 60s and before. That tells a story by itself isn't it? Is CM dead beyond those times or what?

msakella
Posts: 2127
Joined: 30 Sep 2006, 21:16

Re: Why students discontinue music lessons

Post by msakella »

Yes, dear. You are damn right to put this out boldly. I am not a well educated person like you all having much acquaintance with the stream of many words in this foreign language. But, I can tell our CM was dead even beyond those times. msakella/amsharma

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