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Read Part 3
Seventy years
after the completion of Ramamatya's work came Venkatamakhin, a great luminary
in Carnatic Music, whose work called "Chaturdandi Prakashika" revolutionized
the very nature of South Indian music. He calls himself the disciple of
Tanapparya who is believed to be a Hindustani musician from the North. It is
noteworthy that the list of Desi ragas mentioned by Venkatamakhi includes
Vibhas, Hamvir, Bilaval, Dhanashri and Malhar which are now in vogue only in
the Hindustani system.
Venkatamakhi was
the first Indian musicologist who based his system of music classification on
a scientific platform. He classified Melas according to their svaras or notes
and determined their ultimate number by all possible combinations of svaras,
subject to certain limitations. He arrived at a total of 72 Melas or scales
(called thAT) in Hindustani Music) and then grouped the various derivative
ragas under the parent scales. Simple as it might now appear, it was left to
Venkatamakhi to work out an ingenious scheme like this for the first time in
the history of Carnatic Music. This scheme has ruled unchallenged for the past
350 years and has been accepted as fait accompli by great masters such
as Tyagaraja.
When Vishnu Narayan Bhatkhande undertook a tour of
South India in 1904 in search of manuscripts, he visited Ettayapuram, met the
celebrated Subbarama Dikshitar and was greatly inspired by the pioneering
contributions of that savant. Dikshitar had just completed his colossal work "Sangita
Sampradaya Pradarshini" in Telugu, of more than 2000 pages. Bhatkhande got
such useful information from Dikshitar on Indian musical theory and also the "Chaturdandi
Prakashika" of Venkatamakhi. He took it to Bombay and published it there,
marking it "For Private Circulation Only". The Madras Music Academy published
it only in 1934.
Bhatkhande, who adopted the pseudonyms of Chatura
Pandita and Vishnu Sharma in his works, realized the aesthetic basis of the
Janaka-Janya system of Raga classification current in the South and tried to
introduce it in Hindustani Music. He arranged most of the ragas of that system
under ten thATs and named them after the best known ragas. These ten parental
scales are:
| Hindustani
Thats |
Carnatic
Melas |
| Bilaval |
Shankarabharanam |
| Kalyan or
Yaman |
Kalyani |
| Khamaj |
Harikambhoji |
| Bhairava |
Mayamalavagaula |
| Poorvi |
Kamavardhani |
| Marawa |
Gamanashrama |
| Kaphi |
Kharaharapriya |
| Asavari |
Natabhairavi |
| Bhairavi |
Hanumatodi |
| Todi |
Shubhapantuvarali |
It is necessary
to mention at this stage that interest in Indian music transcended caste and
communal barriers and a number of Muslim rulers were generous patrons of Hindu
musicians. It is well known that the early Mogul rulers displayed religious
tolerance and revived the ancient arts of their Hindu subjects. Akbar, the
Great Mogul is mentioned in several Sanskrit works as a patron of music and
other arts and the illustrious singer Tansen was one of his court musicians.
Akbar is even stated to have visited Swami Haridas at Brindavan. Even in the
midst of wars and political upheavals, the Sultans continued to show their
munificence to music and musicians. Ghiaz-ud-din Muhammad, the Sultan of
Mandvi honured an Andhra musician with a gift of one thousand tolas of gold
for demonstrating the 22 srutis in his court.
Mandana wrote his "Sangitamandana" in the court of
Alim Shah of Gujarat. The Sultan of Kada, a city about 40 miles from Allahabad
collected a large library on Natya and Sangita and organized a conference of
musicians. Their combined effort produced a large work on music called the "Sangita
Siromani" which was completed in 1429 A.D.
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