When Colors Change : Ragamalikas in Carnatic Music
Nothing like adding a bit of color to pep up proceedings. And if the colors keep changing constantly, you can be assured of audience participation. Ragamalikas perform this function in many of the modern day concerts. As with any classification, we can have different types of classification for ragamalikas. I will categorize them as two and deal with it in two parts. The first type of ragamalikas are the composed ragamalikas. The second type is the one which happens in 'kalpana sangeetham'. We will start with the ragamalikas which are pre-composed. To start right at the beginning, we have the Navaragamalika varnam. As the name indicates the varnam is made up of nine ragas. There is a rendition of this by Trivandrum R S Mani, which is available commercially. I haven't heard any other ragamalika varnam as such and I am not sure if more ragamalika varnams exist. Hear MDR sing this Patnam Subramanya Iyer varnam in his inimitable style. One area where ragamalika comes to the res...