Bhakti saints and their contribution to Indian, Lecture notes of Classical Literature

Download Bhakti saints and their contribution to Indian and more Lecture notes Classical Literature in PDF only on Docsity! History of Indian Classical music Bhakti Saints and their contribution to Indian classical music Music in India from its origin to evolution and growth need to be viewed in religious perspective. In course of time some of the musical forms which were developed had little to do with religion or religious rituals- yet a classical singer even an improvised ‘raga alapa’ does it as a ritualistic act in the presence of God. In south India it is accepted that music has emerged out of religion, centred in and around temple and with worship. The idea of ‘bhakti’ implied loving adoration of God, made compositions of devotional songs as - Bhajans Stutis Kriti Nama Kirtana Padas Slokas Namavalis Sankirtans Padavalis Padam etc became increasingly popular. Padams - had religious devotional or philosophical themes. Bhajans - mean to sing in praise of God. It is rendered solo, or in group, but the latter is often termed as ‘Kirtan’, - Namavalis are the most common. Kritis (prose) - are mostly in Telegu, Sanskrit and Tamil. From the point of view of Indian Classical music the development of devotional music and its various form like: The origin of ragas is traced to a divine source. According to Narada, Krishna began to play murli, captivating the hearts of the Gopi’s by its sweet melody. Gopis then in the company of Krishna, each sang a song, which led to the birth of sixteen thousand ragas. Ragas are the representation of ‘ShivaSakti’ and ocean of love (prem rasa) which captivated in the heart of God Vishnu. The word ‘ta’ signifies ‘Gauri’, ‘na’ - indicative of ‘Lord Shiva’. ‘Tana’ thus makes one realise ‘Shiva-Sakti’. One of the peculiar feature found in bhakti songs like -Chandidas, Mira Bai,’Tulsidas’ and ‘Surdas’ was ‘banita’ or ‘chhap’, in which creator of the text and music entered their name in the text. The use of ‘banita’ are also noticed in ‘dhoa’ ‘kabita’ etc. Thousands of devotional songs only those have survived through the oral tradition, which appeal to the listeners due to quality of the text and also were appealing musically. The oldest composition that has come to us is ‘Charyagiti’ of Buddhist Tantrik or ‘Astapadis’ of Jayadeva on account of their lyrical beauty. ‘Vaggeyakaras’ composed their songs in wide variety of composition for which the term ‘ Prabandha’ genre is used by some scholar. Thus the ‘padas’ of ‘Namadeva’ were composed as Prabandha. ‘Padmanava’ the poet, wrote well known work ‘Kanhadade Prabandha’ in which he mention singing of ‘pada prabandha’. Some of the saints of Maharastra like’Eknath’ have sung ‘Saptapadis’, ‘Chaupadis’ etc. We have ‘Chaupadis’ in Hindi & Marathi by ‘Damodara Pandit’. In ‘Gorakh bani’ we have ‘Saptapadis’ & ‘Chaupadis’ which were forms of ‘Prabandha’. These bhajans, padas, kritis, songs were by oral transmission- preserved through ‘Guru- Sishya’ parampara. This was the main vehicle of transmission and preservation of these devotional songs. Even today we find ‘gharanas’ of traditional ‘bhajans & kirtan’ singers in different parts of India just we find ‘gharanas’ of classical singers. Later collection of padas, sakhis etc. were made by the disciples. But this does not seem to apply to the songs of JJayadeva’, ‘Vidyapati’, ‘Chandidas’, Snaneshwar’ (13"". century) and some other saints who had become very popular among the people. Thus the love songs of ‘Vidyapati’ were very popular among the women folk and they sang these on various occasions as wedding etc. Even today Maithili women’s culture is judged by the answer to the question ‘what songs of ‘Vidyapati can you sing? Even if the people under stood the raga of acomposition, in most cases they are likely to observe the characteristics of the raga to some extent only, but not in the strict classical sense. The ‘Guru Grantha’ was one of the earliest written of various types of ‘padas’,’dupadas’,’tipadas’,’chaupadas’,’panchapadas'’,’asthapadas’. The number of ‘padas’ Saints like Mirabai, Purandaradasa, Tyagarajee, Arunagirinath, preached through music and condensed philosophy in a song. Dimdima and Mrdanga are mentioned among instruments played by ladies for pleasure of king Ravana of Srilanka. Being well versed in the original Sanskrit and Tamil text in music. ‘Arunagirinatha’ wove the basic concept of musical grammer in his songs of the 16000 hymns(Triuppugazhs) - 1330 have been traced so far, besides work likes ‘Kandar’,’Alamkaram’, ‘Antadi’,’Kandar anubhuti”’ in classical metres & Tiruvalmppu’ a group of poem in ‘Chamdappa’ poetic form in a variety of metrical pattern made resonant with deep toned music. ‘Arunagiri’ drew from the new trends in composition which developed during 11°. - 14°". Centuries. Kirtan form evolved by ‘Haridas’ of Karnataka and Tallapaka. Composers of Andra Pradesh has talked about ‘Sapta Suladi tala’ parallel to the Marga and desi talas given by ‘Sarangadeva’ in Sangit Ratnakar. Instead of Pallavi and Anupallavi and ‘Charana’ he adopted his own form- where each pada is elaborated in ‘stanza’ of length-limited to four syllables corresponding to Tana-Tana or ‘Tanda-tana’. In elaborated form we come across - ‘Tisra’,’Chasturasara’,’Khanda’,’Misra’ and ‘Sankirna’ grouping arising out of ‘Sapta-tala-jati system. Bhatavetala, Vakuppu mentions five ‘Marga talas and names of many ragas- ‘Varati’,’Gaudi’ ,’Bhairavi’,’ Lalit’,’ Malhar’ ,’Bouli’,’Dhanyasi’ etc. Seven notes as given in Tamil music, are indicated in ‘Tiruppugazh Ariyayan Putpikka’. He also refers gammaks and technique of singing and playing instruments. He used the term ’Pancham’ when writing about instrumental music and mentions a number of instruments. One feature may be noted while studying about religious musical form and rhythm is what has been termed as ‘Responsorial monophony’ - when one person sings a devotional song in congregation repeats the line in the same manner or with little variation as possible. Though this is not common in ‘sloka’. This is noticeable in case of ‘kirtana’ and in the south ‘namavali’ performer and ‘pundarikam’. Monophony - music consists of a single melodic line. This term is considered under two categories: (i) Accompanied (ii) Unaccompanied ‘Kirtana’ may be performed solo or in congregation. We have no precise information how the text of ‘kirtan’ were set to music, or how they were originally sung. Poetic output of the ‘Alvira saints’ - Jaideva’ (12. century), ‘Namdev’(13". century),’Vidyapati’ (1360) ‘Chandidas’ (end of 14". century), ‘Arunagirinath’ and others were remarkably rich and varied. There was also considerable continuity in devotional form of singing. Jaidev’s ‘Gitgovinda’ was a source of inspiration to the composers of ‘Padavali-Kirtan) and is served as the background of padavali kirtan in Bengal, even inspire the Karnatak composers and south India. His work was the most important literary record during pre Chaitanya ‘Vaishnavism’ in Bengal. Music text relationship of devotional songs No modification in the text was attempted while singing ‘kirtanas’ and some other form of devotional songs such as ‘namavalis’ - only part of a line of the text occasionally omitted and a part of it was repeated by the solo singer to emphasize its importance. When a part was omitted sometimes the congregation completed the remaining part. In some of the ‘namavalis’ only one word replaced by another, the rest of the words in both the lines of the verse remaining the same. The changes in the verse are small and related to what has gone before. In ‘kirtana’, text of the refrain remains the same while the verses continuing the basic idea of the song, changes from verse to verse. Another factor which serves as a relation between the text and the music is - ‘Avarta(one cycle of tala) is of the same length as the textual line. Since in devotional music text has the importance over music, changes in the text lines consisted either repeating single word or fragments of line or even the complete lines. The saints laid great emphasis on the recitation of the Gods name. Time aspect of devotional songs - The performance time must have varied due to various reasons including the length of the text and the number of times a verse was repeated. Kirtan may consists of six or eight ‘charanas’, the last one often containing the ‘mudra’ of the composer and even today usual ‘kirtanas’ are musically and textually more complex, requires longer performance time than others. ‘Pundarikams’ -the simplest- requires the least amount of time to perform. ‘Namavalis’ may last for about ten minutes depending on the number of times the words and phrases are repeated. ‘Slokas’ are always performed in full - there may be some difference in repetition of some lines. ‘Kirtan’ takes more time and the text is longer. Verses time may vary from one composition to another and even from one verse to another within individual piece. Devotional composition like ‘Namavalis’ only one single line is repeated over and over again, the line comprised of two or three name of a deity. ‘Sloka’ usually consists of two or three lines may or may not be repeated. The main difference lies in the fact that they are sung in free rhythm. There is no ‘tala’ to mark the beat. The precise time measure of ‘kirtan’, ‘pallavi’, ‘pundarikams’ (which shows greater consistency in performance time) as sung in South India these days. At present, the correct rendering of the raga form of ‘Gitagovinda’ is very rare and differes from region to region, or from one ‘sampradaya’ to another, though it is claimed that correct rendering of ‘Gitagovinda’ gana are found in the temple of ‘Jaganath’ Puri in Orissa, but afterwards it was found that the musicans of Tanjore (Tanjavur) exhibit their superiority in the correct rendering of the tunes that are used in ‘Gitagovinda’. We find twenty four song (ganas) set to 12 clssical ragas and five talas by ‘Jaideva’ were somewhat different from the present time. The ragas in the ‘Gitgovinda’ are: (i) Malavgauda (ii) Gurjari (iii) Vasanta (iv) Ramkeli (v) Kanada (vi) Bibhasa (vii) Malva (viii) © Gundakiri (ix) Bhairava (x) Desakha (xi) Bhairavi (xii) | Desa-Vardi Talas are five as: (i) Yati (ii) Ektali (iii) Rupaka (iv) Nihsara (v) Astatala The same is the case with ‘Vidyapati’ padas (in praise of Shiva, Durga, Krishna, Radha, Gopals) and love songs of Chandidas had adopted many lines from ‘Vidyapati’. Three or four centuries- the whole of Eastern India resounded with a new type of literature ‘padavali’. From Bengal the name of ‘Vidyapati’ as a vaisnava singer spread to Orissa and Assam. The new literature was written in ‘Brij-bhasa’ of which the base was ‘Maithili’ language of ‘Vidyapati’. Three great vaisnva devotees of east are - Chaitanya of Bengal, Sankaradeva of Assam and Ramanand Raya of Orissa were inspired by the love songs of ‘Vidyapati’ . His hymns addressed to Durga are still recited in ‘Maithili’ homes. Lalit’ Gauri, Kedar, Kanada etc. in which ‘Stutis’ composed by him were to be sung, but their raga forms used in his time are not precisely known. Surdas knowledge of music was simply astonishing. In a single composition describing,’Shyam-Shyama-Krishna’ was there. He mentioned 6 ragas and 36 raginis. Sur sagar’ we find the mention of composition in raga Bilawal only 630 padas, in raga Sarang 605 in malhar - 328, In Ramkali - 245 and other ragas were also there. His ‘dhamar’ gitas are suitable for being sung in ‘dhruta laya’. He has sparsely mentioned the tala of his pada. Only 5 padas composed by him are in ‘tritala’. Surdas has a thorough understanding of fundamentals of Indian Classical music. He calls it one of the 64 kalas. He has discussed the concept of Nada in many of his pada and knew the importance of 22 srutis and sapta svaras. It is clear from his padas, that he knew about the concept of murchana, grama, tala, six ragas and thirty six raginis, alapa, tana etc. Bilawal, Sarang, Dhanasri, Malhar, were the favourite ragas of Sur. His ‘Sur-sagar’ begins with ‘Bilawal and ends with ‘Bilawal’. Being morning raga suddha svaras are most suitable for prayer. Some of the ragas which Sur has used for his verse are not in practice any more. He choose the raga keeping the theme in mind - like Sarang, Dhanasri, Kalyan etc. is used for Krishna lila, Panaghata lila, and Krishna pranks. Raga ‘Bilawal’, ‘Asavari, Lalit, Bhairav, Todi etc. are used for joyful occasion, when Krishna would be woken up by gentle singing uses ‘Lalit’, ‘Bhairav’, ‘Todi’, etc. and late in the night for Krishna sayana seva, ‘Adana’, ‘Maikauns’, ‘Kanada’ etc are used.