Endaro mahanubhavulu

"You are just fancied to jump too quickly to pancharatna krithis.......!!!"

This is what my teacher said when I proposed to her that I want to start my lessons in the pancharatnas. Even though it made sense, I could not quite control myself to ask her yet again, shortly after her first dialogue about my 'fancy'. She simply nodded, the quintessential 'Indian' nod, which neither meant a 'yes' or a 'no'. I could not help racing up my imaginations of being able to make my guitar sing those mesmerising compositions.

Usually, the practise was that my teacher would ask what I wanted to learn next when the current class was bordering completion. I would then ask something that interests me.

And finally, it did happen after four months. And in the most interesting way.

This particular class, she just finished teaching me 'anudinamu' (in begada) and asked me to play the whole krithi. I did, although with a lot of mistakes. (Afterall, I just finished learning this piece). She seemed to understand too. She turned up the shruthi volume and asked me to play another composition. And then, another one. And then, another one. I was sitting there thinking, 'why is she doing this???'. Though this was not uncommon in our classes, it was usually an indication of what was coming next. 'A MORE SERIOUS PIECE'. And such pieces are always interesting to me because they are all about new techniques, which I might not have known earlier.

Anyways, after her serial requests, she glances over my shruthi box (I always carry one, just in case there was a power cut. Battery power!!...heehee). She turns off her shrutih box and asks to plug in mine. My shruthi box is more like the real tambura shruthi. Hers was the electric drone of the yesteryears. It was a gift to her, years back. And I could tell for a fact that she liked the tone of my shruthi box. So far, so good....

Then start the starting verses of my new class..... "sa ri ri......ga ri sa......"

Could it be endaro mahanubhavulu?

Carnatic music........how could I not love you?

The message

I often feel that 'A medium is never the message'. The inherent source of all knowing is just constantly waiting for us to perceive it rather than to dissolve in an endless barrell of stiffened ego. However, the universe always tries to work in your favour so much so that even if you believe the other way to the fullest best, it is as good as following the alternative way.
If an artist is a medium and art the message, it is inevitable to emphasize on the message more than the medium. While adulation is impregnable to an extent, a genuine connoiseur can actually share the same space of the mysterious dimensions that the artist reaches out for manifesting an art. This way, the nature plans that both the artist and the audience are not two distinct entities. With the realization of such an experience, only the absolute is perceived. In this case, it so happens that both the artist and the audience have achieved the same effect, the difference being that the artist has put in additional effort not only to know the knowledge himself, but also establish a possibility of his art being experienced by an audience. It is a noble deed indeed, though not at the relaxed flexibility of the artists' control. But, at the same time calls for a lot of culture and sensitivity. It is perhaps not fallable to state that an artists' first requirement is sensitivity.

Brahma, the creator, gives up the responsibility of creation only to fully indulge in his consort's music. This is a perfect time for Shiva, the destroyer to create a new space for a new innings. Being a believer in the concept, I can humorize Vishnu, the preserver, to be asleep!!!! Boom.....there goes off a time bomb ultimately blowing off even time.
Boom......there goes off another big bang, again from nowhere (a blackhole to be specific) and a few millions of years later, there is life again.
We now acknowledge the prowess of the female energy and its embodiments in maintaining this absolutely mysterious maze of life.
In this regard, to re-connect all the points discussed above, an artist can ususally have access to the spaces from where life itself manifests.

The primordial sound

'O mind! Be drenched in the divine nectar of music......'

This is how saint-poet thaygaraja envisions the ecstatic realms of unbound creativity, sometimes manifesting itself as music. Modern science, especially quantum physics, is slowly unleashing the facets of the mysterious universe. According to the string theory, everything that we perceive as real through our physical senses (and that we cannot perceive) is a part of a humongous wave that has neither a start nor an end. The trick here being that the fabric of the wave is so intricate that the design allows (in fact, forces) that everything stays together at all points of time (or the lack of it).

The illusion of duality that is a mere cosequence of the trickery of various modes of sensory perception needs to be veiled to have a sight of what lies beneath. Why do we need to do this? Well, it just happens if it is intended to. How do we know this? Again, there are many ways as to 'get there'. But it would not be a mere parable for me to illustrate that the concept of 'God' which the religions were originally intended to, though have had their own shares of modifications and devastations of the central concept, still have a common practise that is ubiquitous to the world religions that have been eversince. And I lovingly refer it to as 'Music'.

This is my humble attempt to bring to surface the pioneering efforts of great composers who have been repeating yet again that music itself is an instrument, a tool to reach a place that is usually undescribable. 

'Let my flowers to you, my lord, be the seven notes that emanate out of your grace!'

Welcome to my blog-Nadopasana...................................