Carnatic Music : Understanding it

I have enjoyed carnatic classical music ever since i can remember. Having learnt both violin and vocal for several years it has always been something that has been close to heart and something that I have enjoyed immensely. Having learnt an instrument, decoding the music into its component swaras(musical notes) came naturally to me. And I never really did bother to learn the theory behind this form of music and how it has been structured.

When i was discussing this recently with a friend I realized how much more enjoyable it would be to listen to a concert, if one had the basic understanding even if one had not studied music.

So i decided to go one level deeper, and as i do so put my learnings down here for anyone interested in carnatic music. And hopefully I will learn a little more from some of you the more knowledgeable readers of this blog.

The Basics

The 2 main components of Carnatic music are the Raaga or Melody and the Thaala or the Rhythm/beat.

Raagas are built on top of the 7 basic swaras : Sa, Ri ,Ga, Ma, Pa, Da, Ni denoted in this article by S, R, G, M , P, D, N respectively. These are the western equivalents of Do, Re, Mi, Fa, So, La & Ti respectively.

S and P are prakruti swaras and have no variations.

The rest of the swaras have many variations, some overlapping over each other as shown below.

By comparison, using the common tonic "C" for a western musician

Carnatic		Hindustani	Western E.T.
Sa		Sa	"C"
Shuddha Ri	"Ri 1"	Komal Re	"D♭"
Chatusruti Ri	"Ri 2"	Shuddha Re	"D"
Shatsruti Ri	"Ri 3"	(Komal Ga)	"D♯"
Shuddha Ga	"Ga 1"	(Shuddha Re)	"D"
Sadharana Ga	"Ga 2"	Komal Ga	"E♭"
Antara Ga	"Ga 3"	Shuddha Ga	"E"
Shuddha Ma	"Ma 1"	Shuddha Ma	"F"
Prati Ma	"Ma 2"	Teevra Ma	"F♯"
Pa		Pa	"G"
Shuddha Dha	"Dha 1"	Komal Dha	"A♭"
Chatusruti Dha	"Dha 2"	Shuddha Dha	"A"
Shatsruti Dha	"Dha 3"	(Komal Ni)	"A♯"
Shuddha Ni	"Ni 1"	(Shuddha Dha)	"A"
Kaisika Ni	"Ni 2"	Komal Ni	"B♭"
Kakali Ni	"Ni 3"	Shuddha Ni	"B"

Source: Wikipedia

As shown above, the swaras R,G, D and N have 3 variations and the swara M has 2 variations.

Raagas are essentially combinations of these swaras and their variations. Each raaga is represented by an Aarohanam(ascending sequence) and Avarohanam(descending sequence).

There are 72 ragas where the Avarohanam when reversed will give us the Aarohanam. Or the Avarohanam traces the steps back from the Aarohanam.

For ex:

Aarohanam = SRGMPDNS

Avarohanam = SNDPMGRS

These 72 ragas are called Melakarta Ragas. I will explain how we arrive at this number 72 in my next post.