Music And Movies

July 25th was the 111th birth anniversary of Semmangudi Srinivasa Iyer. On this occasion I had written a thread on Twitter on him. I am expanding it here and saving for future reference. One of the aspect of his music that I love is the way he structures a krithi. There are many ways to sing a krithi. Semmangudi believes in structuring the krithi in such a way that it is highlights the development of a raga. By structure, I mean his selection of sangatis, how many times you repeat a line, how you phrase the words, the pauses, everything. This gives it an order. And once this order is established, it is repeatable. The important thing is just not just the selection of sangatis but in which order they are sung. The idea is to slowly reveal the range of the raga. Each sangati must very naturally flow into the next one. This is how the edifice of the raga is built using the krithi. Once this structure for a particular krithi is established, this becomes what is commonly called as a ...

I strongly hold the view that women have been very instrumental in ensuring the continuing popularity of carnatic music. While the number of male musicians may be more, it is women in the form of mother and sister who have inculcated the taste for carnatic music in many a youngster. I can vouch for my own interest in carnatic music developing from my mother. She used to sing quite well, though she was not formally trained. I used to regularly take her help in identifying ragas and that slowly translated into a mammoth interest in this great art form. I know of many friends who also have a similar experience in their formative years. Another important thing is the number of rare krithis that many women (who are not musicians) know. When my classmate visited me with his family, I was pleasantly surprised to hear a rare Tyagaraja Divyanama sankeetam being sung by his wife. My colleague's wife rendered an outstanding 'Sree Bhargavi' of Dikshitar much to my surprise and awe !!!...