Thakur Jaidev Singh, a musicologist, writes that
Tradition refers to artistic principles and techniques based on accumulated experience. It has been aptly described as “social heritage.â€
On Tradition and the Inventive Principle in Music
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vijay
- Posts: 2522
- Joined: 27 Feb 2006, 16:06
A hotly contested subject indeed! You should've read Mr. MV Ramakrishnan's articles in the Hindu a few weeks back...anyway here's my 2 cents...
Most art forms (like living beings/species as perceptively observed by Mr. Singh) can only survive if they evolve. This evolution is primarily a response to changes in the environment - in case of art - society, social values, aspirations and so on. Rap music emerging out of the tatters of the African American social fabric is as much an example of the evolutionary principle as man's prehensile fingers or the tortoise's shell...
Carnatic music (or for that matter HM) confounds this generalization with 2 unique challenges:
The first is the strength of its grammar. Being such, any evolution that dilutes this aspect is a challenge to the very basis of the art..and to further the art form in a manner that is 1) capable of being understood in the context of its theory and 2) an improvement upon the dauntingly lofty heights of its aesthetics, requires the sort of genius that only comes along once in a few centuries.
It is our eternal fortune that such a manifestation repeated itself thrice (or perhaps 4 times depending upon the outcome of a parallel debate!) within a span of 75 years. Add to this the second coming of vidwans in the first half of this century and one can begin to comprehend why a meaningful "evolution" of CM is both unlikely and unnecessary in the foreseeable future....a pithy quotation from TNS aptly summarizes my ramble - "periyavallan ellam yerkanave pannitu poitta".
The other challenge comes from an instinct to "preserve tradition" - a nostalgia-fuelled zealousness that stifles any departure from a shared (but not necessarily valid) understanding of aesthetics. Carnatic music has, for better or worse, come to be associated with certain rosy notions about a glorious past with all its associated values. I am not really an opponent of such gatekeepers - in fact, I might very well be one of them! However, the objections of this category of purists rings with less convinction than those who object on strictly aesthetic grounds....
I also wanted to write about systemic shifts in theory (something like Quantum versus Classical physics) such as the Venkatamakhin classification but I have a feeling I have gone on long enough!
Most art forms (like living beings/species as perceptively observed by Mr. Singh) can only survive if they evolve. This evolution is primarily a response to changes in the environment - in case of art - society, social values, aspirations and so on. Rap music emerging out of the tatters of the African American social fabric is as much an example of the evolutionary principle as man's prehensile fingers or the tortoise's shell...
Carnatic music (or for that matter HM) confounds this generalization with 2 unique challenges:
The first is the strength of its grammar. Being such, any evolution that dilutes this aspect is a challenge to the very basis of the art..and to further the art form in a manner that is 1) capable of being understood in the context of its theory and 2) an improvement upon the dauntingly lofty heights of its aesthetics, requires the sort of genius that only comes along once in a few centuries.
It is our eternal fortune that such a manifestation repeated itself thrice (or perhaps 4 times depending upon the outcome of a parallel debate!) within a span of 75 years. Add to this the second coming of vidwans in the first half of this century and one can begin to comprehend why a meaningful "evolution" of CM is both unlikely and unnecessary in the foreseeable future....a pithy quotation from TNS aptly summarizes my ramble - "periyavallan ellam yerkanave pannitu poitta".
The other challenge comes from an instinct to "preserve tradition" - a nostalgia-fuelled zealousness that stifles any departure from a shared (but not necessarily valid) understanding of aesthetics. Carnatic music has, for better or worse, come to be associated with certain rosy notions about a glorious past with all its associated values. I am not really an opponent of such gatekeepers - in fact, I might very well be one of them! However, the objections of this category of purists rings with less convinction than those who object on strictly aesthetic grounds....
I also wanted to write about systemic shifts in theory (something like Quantum versus Classical physics) such as the Venkatamakhin classification but I have a feeling I have gone on long enough!
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arasi
- Posts: 16873
- Joined: 22 Jun 2006, 09:30
kanandago and Vijay, thanks for your thoughts.
We need a considerable number of stalwarts in every generation to preserve CM's accumulated wealth of tradition. However, if at present there are not those who chart their own ways-- with a strong grounding in the best of traditions, of course--it would be like dusting artifacts and displaying them in a museum for ever.
The museum in Chennai in the old days was called (in slang, of course) cetta college (dead place), and the zoo, uyir college (an alive place)! Before anyone calls innovators zoo animals, I would like to say that I mention this in reference to the museum alone!
Out of the old, something new and alive would sprout, becoming equally weighty in value as it evolves and makes its mark, as time goes by. Ah, evolving is the thing which keeps anything going (growing) and stops it from becoming stagnant.
As a tree doctor keeps a hundred year tree alive and well by taking care of it, the practitioners of CM and rasikAs should nurture the old with care but contribute to the future by letting music evolve too. That would add to its richness as new generation of musicians contribute something of their own and make CM vibrant for the next generation. The same goes for the generation that comes after and so on...
By evolving, I do not mean any mishmash of meaningless music presented in the name of fusion.
We need a considerable number of stalwarts in every generation to preserve CM's accumulated wealth of tradition. However, if at present there are not those who chart their own ways-- with a strong grounding in the best of traditions, of course--it would be like dusting artifacts and displaying them in a museum for ever.
The museum in Chennai in the old days was called (in slang, of course) cetta college (dead place), and the zoo, uyir college (an alive place)! Before anyone calls innovators zoo animals, I would like to say that I mention this in reference to the museum alone!
Out of the old, something new and alive would sprout, becoming equally weighty in value as it evolves and makes its mark, as time goes by. Ah, evolving is the thing which keeps anything going (growing) and stops it from becoming stagnant.
As a tree doctor keeps a hundred year tree alive and well by taking care of it, the practitioners of CM and rasikAs should nurture the old with care but contribute to the future by letting music evolve too. That would add to its richness as new generation of musicians contribute something of their own and make CM vibrant for the next generation. The same goes for the generation that comes after and so on...
By evolving, I do not mean any mishmash of meaningless music presented in the name of fusion.
Last edited by arasi on 26 Sep 2007, 19:48, edited 1 time in total.