The Tamil Padam: A Dance Music Genre of South India 9814968560, 9789814968560

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The Tamil Padam

The Tamil Padam

A Dance Music Genre of South India

Matthew Harp Allen

Published by Jenny Stanford Publishing Pte. Ltd. 101 Thomson Road #06-01, United Square Singapore 307591 Email: [email protected] Web: www.jennystanford.com British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. The Tamil Padam: A Dance Music Genre of South India Copyright © 2023 Jenny Stanford Publishing Pte. Ltd. All rights reserved. This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without written permission from the publisher. Cover image: Brahmadesa Siva temple, near Cheramadevi, Tirunelveli district (Courtesy of David Theron Sanford). ISBN 978-981-4968-56-0 (Hardcover) ISBN 978-1-003-33638-9 (eBook)

Table of Contents List of Figures List of Plates Maps Preface

1. Introduction 1.1

2

1.1.3 Murugan

5

1.1.1 Devi–The Goddess 1.1.2 Saivism

1.1.4 Vaishnavism

The Two “Love Rajas” and Two Languages

1.5

Padams and Family

1.4 1.6 1.7

1

Hinduism

1.2 1.3

xi xiii xv xxi

Padams and Dance

3

5

6

6

7

Padams and Gender

10

Goals, Methods, Limitations

16

Previous Scholarship

13

14

1.7.1 A Living Repertoire

18

2. Kings, Devotion, Patronage, and Padams

21

1.8 1.9

2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5

Selection of Core Group Synopsis

Emergence of Tanjavur as a Center for the Arts The Colas 2.2.1 King Raja Raja Cola, Nambi Andar

Nambi, et al. The Nayak Period in Tanjavur Shift to Vaishnavite Patronage Nayaks of Tanjavur

19

19

21

22

24

26

27

29

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Contents

2.6

2.7

2.5.1 Sevappa 2.5.2 Achyutappa 2.5.3 Raghunatha 2.5.4 Sringara Padams: Early References 2.5.5 Vijayaraghava 2.5.6 Padams at Court 2.5.7 Denouement of the Telugu Nayak Line The Maratha Rajas of Tanjavur 2.6.1 Venkoji/Ekoji I 2.6.2 Sahaji I 2.6.3 The 18th Century: A Word about Padams 2.6.4 Serfoji I 2.6.5 Tulaja I The Period of Anarchy 2.7.1 Pratap Singh 2.7.2 Tulaja II 2.7.3 Reverend Schwartz 2.7.4 Amar Singh at Tiruvidaimarudur 2.7.5 Serfoji II 2.7.6 Sivaji II

29 30 31 32 34 36 38 39

40

42

44

44

45

47

48 49 53 56 61 63

To Compose 3.1.1 Changes Over Time in Melody and Text Biographies of Composers Composer: Muttuttandavar 3.3.1 Dating His Life 3.3.2 His Life Story 3.3.3 Transmission of Muttuttandavar’s Songs 3.3.4 Publication of Muttuttandavar’s Songs 3.3.5 Early Tamil Kritis and Padams 3.3.6 Rhythmic Aspects of His Kirttanams 3.3.7 Without Understanding 3.3.8 God Coming in Procession

67

68

70

72

72

74

77

79

80

82

83

85

3. Composers of Tamil Padams 3.1 3.2 3.3

67

Contents

3.4

3.5

3.6

3.7

3.8

Composer: Papavinasa Mudaliar 3.4.1 His Life 3.4.2 Transmission of His Compositions 3.4.3 Papavinasa Mudaliar and Tiruvarur 3.4.4 His Oeuvre 3.4.5 Flowering of Ninda Stuti Composer: Marimutta Pillai 3.5.1 The Central Narrative 3.5.2 His Work 3.5.3 Ninda Stuti Composer: Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar 3.6.1 The Village of Uttukkadu 3.6.2 Transmission of His Songs 3.6.3 Revival of His Compositions 3.6.4 The Dancing Krishna Composer: Arunacala Kavirayar, Sirgari 3.7.1 Story of His Life 3.7.2 The Poet and the Musicians 3.7.3 Arankerram (Premiere) 3.7.4 Caveat 3.7.5 His Work and Its Popularity 3.7.6 The Musical Settings of His Songs 3.7.7 Discovery of Five Additional Songs 3.7.8 Padams and the 19th Century Composer: Ghanam Krishna Ayyar 3.8.1 Kumbakonam and its Surroundings 3.8.2 A Mid-Point Between Worlds 3.8.3 His Youth 3.8.4 The Ghanam Style 3.8.5 Three Patrons and Three Songs 3.8.5.1 Patron 1: The Moopanars at

Kapistalam 3.8.5.2 Patron 2: Raja Amara Simha at

Tiruvidaimarudur

86

87

89

90

92

93

98

99

100

103

106

106

109

111

112

115

116

117

118

120

120

122

123

125

126

127

131

132

134

137

137

139

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Contents

3.8.5.3 Patron 3: Kaccirangan of

Udaiyarpalaiyam 3.8.6 Kacciranka’s Nod of Assent 3.8.7 Padams on Vishnu and Murugan 3.8.8 On Ranganatha of Srirangam 3.8.9 Third Caranam of Engumayamana 3.8.10 Murugan at Palani 3.8.11 Murugan as the Holder of the Spear 3.9 Composer: Kavikunjara Bharati 3.9.1 Family and Early Life 3.9.2 Madura Kavi Bharati 3.9.3 The Composer at Court 3.9.4 An Elephant Among Poets 3.9.5 The Aragar Kuravanji 3.9.6 His Padams: Tone, Tune And Tamil 3.9.7 Geography and Repertoire 3.9.8 Two Padams and Two Legends at

Kunrakkudi 3.9.8.1 Cur, the “Mango Demon” 3.9.8.2 Valli and Devayanai, Murugan’s

southern and northern wives 3.9.9 The Kuravanji Dance Drama 3.10 Composer: Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar 3.10.1 Sources 3.10.2 “The Book” 3.10.3 Subbarama Ayyar’s Possible Guru 3.10.4 Subbarama Ayyar’s Possible Patrons 3.10.5 Velur: The Place of Subbarama Ayyar’s

Padams 3.10.6 Authorship 3.10.7 On Murugan as Muttukkumaraswami

of Velur 3.10.8 On Murugan as Kumaresar of Parani 3.11 Composer: Gopalakrishna Bharati 3.12 Other Songs in the Study

144

150

152

152

153

154

155

155

156

158

159

160

161

163

163

166

166

168

172

174

175

175

178

179

180

181

187

188

189

193

Contents

4. Texts, a Quiet, Private Corner 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 4.8

4.9 4.10 4.11 4.12 4.13 4.14 4.15 4.16 4.17 4.18 4.19

A System of Texts The Ashta Nayakis (Eight Heroines) Classical Tamil Poetry: Akam and Puram Bhakti Poetry An “Export and Reimport” of Erotic Bhakti? A Triad of Characters Directions of Address Evolution of Three-Part Structure from

Two-Part Structure The Number of Caranams Progression Through the Form in Performance Pallavi, the Sprout: Throwing the Idea Anupallavi, “The Lord Whose Fame Ever Grows” Murugan Atop His Mountains Caranam: “In My Tender Youth” Presentation of Compositions by Group Discussion: A Corpus with Fuzzy Edges Organization of the Repertoire: The Indirect

Stance Weaving of Akam and Puram Elements Conclusion

195

196

198

200

201

204

205

Principle of Selection of Material Qualities of Raga 5.2.1 “Major” Ragas 5.2.2 Rakti Ragas 5.2.3 Ghana Ragas Varnamettu: Setting a Tune Autobiographical Astonishment at Recognizing a Phrase The “Border Lines” Product and Process in Genre 5.7.1 Opening up the Notion of Genre

245

247

247

248

249

252

253

254

256

257

259

5. The Musical Organization of Tamil Padams 5.1 5.2

5.3 5.4 5.5 5.6 5.7

195

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206

207

209

210

212

212

213

235

239

241

242

245

ix

x

Contents

5.8 Three Ragas 5.8.1 Bhairavi 5.8.1.1 The music academy of Madras 5.8.1.2 Raga classification as a living

process 5.8.2 Kambhoji 5.8.2.1 Yadukula Kambhoji: A fellow

janya 5.8.3 Todi 5.8.3.1 Conservative usage 5.8.3.2 Expanded usage 5.9 Varnamettu in the Literature and Musicians’

Conversation 5.9.1 Composer or Artisan 5.9.2 Varnamettu Vis à Vis Phrase and Alapana 5.9.3 Varnamettu and Hindustani Chalan 5.9.4 Varnamettu and the Folk 5.9.5 Varnamettu: A Snap Shot of Raga 5.9.6 Varnamettu in Terukkuttu 5.9.7 Melody and Meter in Mettu 5.9.8 Tala in the Padams 5.9.9 Padams Set to Multiple Talas 5.9.10 Varnamettu Across Four Tala Cycles 5.9.11 Music

6. Conclusion 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4

Epilogue The Hindu of Madras Dance Programs Old and New Worlds

Bibliography Appendices Index

259

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268

269

272

273

276

278 279 280 281 284 284 286 288 290 290

293

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297

303

307

310

313

327

419

List of Figures 1.1 Family of Vïna Dhanammal.

1.2 Kings and composers.

2.1 Nayaks of Tanjavur.

2.2 Maratha Rajas of Tanjavur.

3.1 Relationship between Ghanam Krishna Ayyar and U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar.

3.2 Kavikunjara Bharati family lineage.

3.3 Works of Kavikunjara Bharati.

3.4 Nayakas of Subbarama Ayyar padams.

4.1 The Ashta Nayakis.

4.2 A “Bhakti Trail”.

4.3 The characters.

4.4 Movement through a three-part structure of padam.

4.5 Group A, Nayaki to Sakhi.

4.6 Group B, Sakhi to Nayaka.

4.7 Group C, Nayaki to Nayaka.

4.8 Group D, Devotee to Lord.

14

20

30

41

133

156

159

182

198

204

205

207

214

222

226

230

4.9 Group E, Sakhi to Nayaki.

234

5.2 T. Balasaraswati Javalis by raga.

247

4.10 Akam and puram elements in Tamil padams. 5.1 Padams by raga in particular collections. 5.3 Perception of raga usage across genres. 5.4 Varnamettu and performance. 5.5 Pitch set, Bhairavi raga.

5.6 Pitch set, Kambhoji raga. 5.7 Pitch set, Todi raga.

5.8 Approximate Swarasthanas, Todi raga. 5.9 Englobing of melodic elements.

238

246

250

258

260

266

270

271

274

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List of Figures

5.10 Melodic with compositional elements. 5.11 Tala settings of Tamil padams. 5.12 Tala cycles.

275

288

292

List of Plates 1.1 Murugan as Parani Andavar “Lord of Parani Mountain”

From Doraiswamy Kavirayar (1874).

1

3.1 Title page of Subbarama Ayyar 1875 (or 1935).

176

6.2 Vina Dhanammal, The Hindu, December 9, 1932.

305

6.1 Tirugokarnam N. Manikkam, The Hindu, December 17,

1932. 304

6.3 Harmonium Advertisement, The Hindu, January 29,

1930.

6.4 Mylapore Gowri Ammal Program, January 3, 1932

(courtesy of Smt. Nandini Ramani).

6.5 T. Balasaraswati Program, 1933–34 (courtesy of

Smt. Nandini Ramani).

6.6 “Devi the Dancer,” The Hindu, August 26, 1933.

306

308

309

311

About the Maps

The template for the maps that follow was taken from the political map of Tamil Nadu in L’Hernault 1978 (Carte I: Tamilnad Districts et Taluks). Bold solid lines indicate district boundaries, while lighter dotted lines indicate taluk (sub-district) boundaries. Additional geographical information was gathered from S. Seetha 1981:516 (Map of Tanjore Showing Places of Musical Importance), and C.D. Maclean 1982 and 1987 (various maps and text descriptions). Placement of some of the smaller towns (such as Kunrakkudi or Uttukkadu) on the maps was determined from textual (not visual) references and is therefore in some cases tentative.

xvi

Maps

Map 1 State of Tamil Nadu (Southeastern India).

Maps

Map 2 Important Murugan temples of Tamil Nadu.

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Maps

Map 3 From Ramanathapuram to Pondicherry.

Maps

xix

  Map 4 Patrons of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar.

xx

Maps

Map 5 Tanjavur District.



Preface Padam: A quiet private corner Between 1984 and 2002, it was my great good fortune to study Karnataka (also spelled Carnatic) classical music with Sri T. Viswanathan, a senior musician whose family roots are deep in the dance music as well as concert music traditions of South India. During this time, I slowly came to my own understanding of the place that the dance-music genre called padam occupies in the soundscape of Karnataka music. For me a padam well-sung or danced is one of the quiet private corners of this world. Experiencing a padam performed in my teacher’s family refers me to a world beyond itself, beyond self-conscious “art,” much in the same way Paul Cézanne’s paintings of the wooded country around Mont St. Victoire in the south of France take me out of the crowded museum gallery right through the painting into those quiet sunny woods, or the way the inexorable progress of a Bach fugue takes me out of my cluttered living room to a still place. There is a clarity that comes from the quiet unfolding of order, without perceived attempts to attract or dazzle. I treasure quiet private corners of all kinds and have found padams to be such places, as I have found the music of T. Viswanathan and his family to be such music—especially in the realm of the dance of T. Balasaraswati, Viswa’s sister and world-renowned Bharata Natyam dancer; Lakshmi Knight, Balasaraswati’s daughter and dancer; and Aniruddha Knight, Lakshmi’s son and renowned concert artist currently building a strong and vibrant school in Chennai. Nanri (Thanks)

I was told many times in Chennai upon thanking someone for something, “We don’t say ‘thank you’.” Friends told me that if I really needed to say something in such situations, nanri would probably be the best word to use. From then on, I wore out that

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Preface

poor word in Chennai. Looking up nanri in the Tamil Lexicon, one finds “goodness; help, kindness, benefit, favour; gratitude; virtue, merit.” I would like to express my deepest gratitude, affection, indebtedness, in short nanri to the many people who welcomed Julie and I into their homes and lives in Chennai, especially: Sri T. Sankaran, Sri Yadav Sankaran and family, Smt. G. Sulochana and family, Smt. T. Muktha and family, Smt. T. Brinda and family, Sri Suresh Palanivelu and family, Sri V. Tyagarajan and Sri V. Nagarajan and families, Dr. K.S. Subramanian and family, Dr. N. Ramanathan and Smt. Hema Ramanathan, Sri S.V. Seshadri and Smt. Meera Seshadri, Smt. Nandini Ramani and family, Sri K.V. Narayanaswamy and family, Sri Sankaranarayanan and Smt. Saraswathi and family, Smt. Anandhi Ramachandran and family, Sri V. Ramnarayan and Smt. Gowry Ramnarayan and family, Sri S. Guhan and Smt. Shanta Guhan, Dr. Pappu Venugopal Rao, Sri N. Pattabhi Raman and his colleagues at Sruti, Smt. Sudha Anantharaman, Sri Karaikudi R. Mani, Sri Ramnad Raghavan and family, Sri K. Santhanam and family, Srinivas Krishnan and his LEAP students, the late Smt. Savitri Rajan, Smt. Sundaresan, and our dear neighbors in Kalakshetra Colony Smt. Ahalya Santhanam, Sri Swaminathan, Smt. Rama, Priya, Venkat and Woofer. To colleagues throughout South India, my deepest thanks for sharing their knowledge of padams: Sri Kasinath Durai of Ramanathapuram, Smt. Vanaja Jeyaraman and Smt. Viji of Cidambaram, Smt. T.A. Sundarambal and family of Mayiladuturai, Sri B R. Kalyanaraman and family of Kumbakonam, Smt. K. Banumathi and family of Kumbakonam. For the time they took to speak with me on multiple occasions, nanri to Sri T.S. Parthasarathy, Dr. Ritha Rajan, Dr. Ranganayaki Ayyangar, Dr. S. Seetha, Smt. (K.R.) Madhavi Rajagopalan, Sri B.M. Sundaram, Dr. Amrit Srinivasan, Smt. Nandini Ramani, Sri V.A.K. Ranga Rao, Dr. Arudra, Sri S. Natarajan, Sri S.V. Seshadri and Smt. Meera Seshadri, Sri Jagannathan and Smt. Anuradha Jagannathan, Smt. Kalanidhi Narayanan, Smt. Alarmel Valli, Sri S. Ramakrishnan of Cre-A: Publishers, Dr. S.S. Janaki, Smt. Rama Ravi, Sri S.R. Janakiraman, Sri S. Rajam, and for excellent bookbinding, Sri P. Justin of Jansi Printing and Binding Works, Mandavali. For their help in my collecting 78 RPM recordings, nanri to Sri V.A.K. Ranga Rao, T. Sankaran and N. Pattabhi Raman. For early dance

Preface

programs and other invaluable documentation regarding dance history, Smt. Nandini Ramani. Nanri to colleagues who have helped me navigate Ethnomusicology and South Asian Studies: mridangam maestro Trichy Sankaran, James Cowdery, David McAllester, Charles Capwell, Nazir Jairazbhoy, Amy Catlin, Bonnie Wade, Regula Qureshi, Daniel and Arundhati Neuman, Eugene Irschick, A.K. Ramanujan, Vijaya Nagarajan, Indira Viswanathan Peterson, Davesh Soneji, Margaret Walker, Hari Krishnan, Sarah Morelli, Zoe Sherinian, Yoshitaka Terada, Ramnad Raghavan, Jayendran Pillay, Stan Scott and Dora Hast, Richard Wolf, Michael Nixon, Philip Wagoner, Saskia Kersenboom, William Jackson, James Lindholm, Samuel Sudananda, David Shulman, Martha Selby, T.M. Krishna, Robert Lancefield, and my life partner Julie Searles. For dozens of long conversations and hundreds of leads tossed my way from his bottomless well of experience, as well as for many acts of generosity and human kindness, I am deeply in debt to Sri T. Sankaran. Almost every part of this work bears the mark of Sri Sankaran in one manner or another, from its inspiration in the most general sense to its realization in the smallest parts. Sri Sankaran and his cousin-sister Smt. G. Sulochana, his cousin T. Muktha, and their children, were Julie’s and my guardian angels during our time in India. For helping me in the translation of Tamil padams, above all I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Smt. G. Sulochana, who worked with me steadily and patiently for over four years on two continents. Without her help, I doubt that the song translations would have ever reached a stage where I would have put them before the public. I can only hope that my knack for choosing the wrong interpretation from the Tamil Lexicon provided her with a store of good chuckles. The members of my PhD committee have collectively been responsible for teaching me that despite all its bookish trappings scholarship is an oral tradition. Thanks to David Reck for incisive comments on the first draft. To Jon Barlow whose observation “It looks like one big fifty year music making” upon seeing an early draft of the Performance History (in the Appendix) made me look at Tamil padams as a whole as well as a series of discrete songs. To Mark Slobin for pushing me to view padams in a variety of disciplinary contexts while not forgetting that I

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Preface

am telling a story. And to T. Viswanathan, musician, scholar, guru, advisor, friend, without whom this work could not have been conceived or carried out. Institutionally I am grateful for the support of Wesleyan University. I am additionally deeply grateful to the American Institute of Indian Studies, which supported this work through a Junior Fellowship for doctoral dissertation research, and for the continuing assistance and friendship of Dr. Shubha Chaudhuri, Director of the AIIS Archives and Research Centre for Ethnomusicology in Delhi. Finally, I would like to thank Jenny Rompas for so strongly supporting this project, and Arvind Kanswal for his expert editing and design skills.

Chapter 1

Introduction

Plate 1.1 Murugan as Parani Andavar

“Lord of Parani Mountain”

From Doraiswamy Kavirayar (1874).

The Tamil Padam: A Dance Music Genre of South India Matthew Harp Allen

Copyright © 2023 Jenny Stanford Publishing Pte. Ltd.

ISBN 978-981-4968-56-0 (Hardcover), 978-1-003-33638-9 (eBook)

www.jennystanford.com

2

Introduction

Velum mayilum tunai invoking the protection and guidance of the holder of the lance and rider of the peacock The title page of the 1875 edition of the padams of Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar contains this dedication. Almost every book of Tamil padam texts begins in a similar manner, whether the padams are composed “on” 1 one or another deity or even on human patrons. The deity must be invoked and propitiated to ensure the success of any endeavor. So, we begin with an invocation of and introduction to the divine personages who figure in the Tamil padams. Murugan, for reasons shortly to become clear, is the deity most closely associated with the Tamil padam genre. Of central importance to the study of the Tamil padams is that Murugan is the nayaka2 par excellence. He is the deity heralded by composers and danced by dancers as the “hero” of the Tamil padams.

1.1 Hinduism

A brief description of the three main all-India great tradition Hindu deity complexes will help serve as an introduction to the following discussion: God + Goddess Siva + Parvati

God + Goddess Vishnu + Lakshmi

God + Goddess Brahma + Sarasvati

Beginning at the left, let us discuss these deities and their family relationships. Siva and Parvati have two sons, the elder Ganesa, the elephant-headed god, lord of obstacles and lord of beginnings;3 and the younger Murugan, among whose other 1I

will follow the common South Indian English usage of saying a song is written “on” a particular deity, and set “in” a particular raga and tala. 2The semantic field of the term nayaka stretches from King (or King’s agent) in the realm of the political to hero, the desired object of the love of a nayaki (heroine) in the realm of poetry, music, and dance. 3See Paul Courtwright, 1985.

Hinduism

names are Subramania, Karttikeya, and Velavar. The Vaishnavite complex is conceived of somewhat differently, Vishnu is said to have 10 avataras or incarnations. The two among these ten who will appear during the course of this study are Krishna and Rama. Of relevance to our study are their polygamous and monogamous temperaments, respectively. The god Brahma has no active cult of worshippers, having lost this privilege by some episodes of divine misbehavior, leaving Siva and Vishnu the two great gods of contemporary Hinduism.

1.1.1 Devi–The Goddess

The subject of the goddess is a complex one within Hinduism. Alongside and/or outside of the role of consort for the great gods in the all-India great tradition of Hinduism, Devi (one of many names for the goddess) stands on her own, and is the central focus of worship for many Hindus. The primary koyil (temple) in which Siva resides in the city of Madurai in Tamil Nadu4 is known affectionately to most devotees as the Minakshi amman koyil; the goddess Minakshi (nominally Parvati, as she is wed to Siva) and her shrine is the primary focus of devotion in that ancient temple complex. David Shulman describes how throughout the Tamil country in place after place the local tala puranas,5 collections of (his)stories associated with particular temples, show that the goddess was the original inhabitant of a place and it was she who attracted the god to come and settle in that spot. “The goddess provides the very foundation of worship, and in this way, she is associated with the concept of pratistha, the firm support upon which life rests, surrounded with disorder and chaos. Life is rooted in the goddess as a repository of power and a focus of stability. Moreover, the goddess is earthbound, identified with the soil from which

4Madurai

and most all of the place names in this study are locations in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. 5“Every work of this class records the traditions that have grown up around a shrine and its locale, and that are used to explain and to sustain the shrine’s claim to sanctity.” David Shulman, 1980:4.

3

4

Introduction

she creates the divine image. The god may be drawn to the site by the goddess and be rooted there by marriage to her.”6

The goddess lies outside the explicit rhetorical structure of padams; that is, the padam “situation” most often involves a nayaki, heroine, in a state of pining, longing, pique, or other variety of love-in-separation, whose desire is directed toward a nayaka, hero, who is almost always explicitly identified (though not at the beginning of the composition), either as a god or as a glorious god-like human patron. Communication between these two is often mediated through a sakhi, known as the friend, companion, or maid of the nayaki. Though we will not see specific goddesses per se as characters amongst the dramatis personae of padam, the dancer who brings the padams alive through her abhinaya (the language of gesture) has herself a long association with the goddess. The women of the hereditary social group known as the devadasi community, the only community to perform the dance form now known as Bharata Natyam until the third decade of the 20th century, were considered themselves to be calanda devi, walking goddesses, by virtue of the fact of their ritual marriage, and life in service, to the god of a particular temple.7 Married to god they could never become widows and were therefore nityasumangali, always-auspicious women.8 The devadasi community was for hundreds of years the hereditary custodians of the padams we will come to know in this study. When we hear the nayaki or sakhi speak in the padams, when we feel her joy and sorrow, when we experience her sharp tongue and her ready wit, let us remember that in the social and cultural context of the 17–19th centuries in which the padams of this study were composed (almost exclusively, according to most historians, by men), her voice was that of the goddess. 6D.

Shulman, 1980:139. 1985:110. Marglin’s study is of the devadasis of Puri in Orissa state, therefore, the linguistic terminology differs from that in Tamil Nadu, but the essence of the “walking goddess” is the same. 8Kersenboom-Story, 1987. 7Marglin

Hinduism

1.1.2 Saivism Let us now examine the Saivite and Vaishnavite worlds in a bit more detail, especially with respect to how they intersect the padam genre and the Tamil language padam in particular. The Saivite world can be expressed in its most condensed form  as follows: Siva, his consort Parvati, and their two progenies Ganesa and Murugan.

Siva+Parvati

|

Ganesa

Murugan(Subramania)

In addition to having two sons, Siva himself takes many forms. Two forms in which we will see Siva portrayed in this study are as Nataraja, King of Dance, whose worship is centered at the temple of Cidambaram, and as Tyagaraja, King of Renunciates, at the temple of Tiruvarur in Tanjavur District. One form which Siva does not take to naturally, however, a role central to this study, is filled by his younger son.

1.1.3 Murugan

In the all-India scheme of Hinduism, Murugan is equated with Subramania (among his other Sanskrit names are Skanda, Kumara, and Karttikeya), the second of the two sons of Siva and Parvati. He is also, however, an ancient indigenous deity particular to the Tamil linguistic area in southern India. There is evidence to show that Murugan gradually became a son of Siva as part of the long process of the intertwining religious streams of the South Asian subcontinent.9 He has continued, however, to retain a separate 9On

Murugan see Clothey (1978), Zvelebil (1973, 1991).

5

6

Introduction

and independent identity. Murugan resembles Krishna in many respects, as a youthful lover and warrior god; in fact, his consonances with Krishna appear more substantial than those with his father Siva, especially from the point of view of this study, concerned as it is with gods as male romantic leads for the padams. As a nayaka or hero, Murugan is ideal, as is Krishna. At this point, let us briefly move to consider the world of Vaishnavism where we find our other Love Raja, though he is rarely encountered in padams in the Tamil language.

1.1.4 Vaishnavism

In Vaishnavism, it is considered that the great god Vishnu has no children, but 10 avataras or incarnations. The two whom we will study below are Krishna and Rama. As far as their potential as nayakas or heros for padams, they represent different ideals, to the extent of being almost polar opposites. Rama is entirely devoted to Sita; at the broadest level of plot, the great epic Ramayana is centered around Rama’s rescue of his beloved from Ravana of Lanka. C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar lionizes Rama as “the ideal man, the true husband, the faithful lover, and the champion Monogamist of India,”10 while ruefully admitting that this has not given much material to the composers of padams with which to create attractive settings for dance. Instead, it is Krishna who is known India-wide, and indeed around the world today, as the exponent and example par excellence of erotic devotion in Hinduism.

1.2 The Two “Love Rajas” and Two Languages “Murugan and Krishna are your only candidates for Love Raja.”11

Murugan from the Saivite world and Krishna from the Vaishnavite have been taken much more often as the nayaka for padams than any other manifestation of deity. They appear to exist, however, in different linguistic realms. One of the findings of this study has 10C.R.

Srinivasa Ayyangar, 1948:172.

Narayanan, personal communication, Chennai, 1990.

11Kalanidhi

Padams and Dance

been that very rarely have composers of Tamil language padams chosen Krishna for their nayaka. Due to cultural, historical, and linguistic factors, Krishna is found hardly at all in padams in the Tamil language, reigning supreme in the padam literature in Telugu, while Murugan’s domain is the padam literature in Tamil. Krishna and Murugan, each in their separate sphere of padam influence, represent similar qualities, however: youth, beauty, physical prowess, mischievousness, and the ability to create mayam or illusion. They both have a relationship with Kama, the god of love always with a bow at the ready, poised to shoot his flower arrows and inflame the passions of the nayaki.12 Having given a very brief précis of the world of Hindu deity here, let us move now to consideration of the padam.

1.3 Padams and Dance

Padams are love songs. If forced to define the padam in a singleclause minimal-adjective sentence, I probably could not improve on this. Padams are one of the genres of musical composition associated with the South Indian dance form today known as Bharata Natyam. Padams are most often performed in the context of dance concerts, but are also sometimes sung in kacceris, vocal or instrumental concerts of Karnataka (South Indian classical) music. Padams have been composed in all of the four major South Indian languages: Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil, and Telugu. Padams in Telugu and Tamil far outnumber those in the other two languages, and those in Telugu have received more scholarly attention than those in Tamil. In a dance performance, a padam is sung by a vocalist (ideally if rarely the dancer herself), accompanied by one or more singers plus supporting musicians and interpreted by a solo dancer (sometimes a group) using a mimetic gestural technique called abhinaya. Padams come at a particular place in the margam, 12In

the Tamil padams, Kama is almost always cast as a separate character, not as (a facet of) the nayaka. Kama is said to be the son of Vishnu and Lakshmi, and Murugan is a nephew to Vishnu by virtue of the fact that his (Murugan’s) mother Parvati is Vishnu’s sister. The genealogy of deities is found to vary from region to region in India; this is a variant from Tamil Nadu reported by T. Viswanathan.

7

8

Introduction

literally path, of a Bharata Natyam performance.13 The two main technical divisions or components of Bharata Natyam are nritta, usually called “pure dance” in English,14 and nritya or abhinaya, mimetic gestural technique, expressive dance. This margam is a sequence that introduces and then integrates these two main technical components over the course of performance. Within the context of a full dance performance, padam is not just a free­ standing genre of song, it is also a place within a process. It is part of a whole psychological and physiological exposition of technique and emotion. The dancer and musician T. Balasaraswati eloquently described this sequence and its importance to her: “I believe that the traditional order of the Bharatanatyam recital, namely, alarippu, jatiswaram, sabdam, varnam, padam, tillana and sloka is the correct sequence in the practice of this art, for revealing the spiritual through the corporeal.

“The greatness of this traditional recital-pattern will be apparent even from a purely aesthetic point of view. In the beginning, alarippu, which is based on rhythm alone, brings out the special charm of pure dance. The movements of alarippu relax the dancer’s body and thereby her mind, loosen and coordinate her limbs, and prepare her for the rest of the dance. Rhythm has a rare capacity to concentrate. Alarippu is most valuable in freeing the dancer from distraction and making her single-minded. “The joy of pure rhythm in alarippu is followed by jatiswaram where there is the added joy of melody. Melody, without word or syllable, has a special power to unite us with our

13The

margam, the specific sequence of genres or items followed in many dance performances, is the product of a famous family of dance teachers and musicians who lived in the first half of the 19th century, four brothers known as the Tanjavur Quartette. They composed in many of the genres of the margam as well as setting its sequence (though they are not known as composers of padams). It is their codification which Smt. Balasaraswati felt to be the correct, complete program for Bharata Natyam’s performance. 14“Pure dance” in the South Indian context refers not to purity in any general sense, but to dancing which does not contain the second main component, nritya. That is, pure dance is dance concentrating on rhythmic and formal aspects alone, not on the expression of a text through the language of abhinaya.

Padams and Dance

being. In jatiswaram, melody and movement come together. Then comes the sabdam. It is here that compositions, with words and meanings, which enable the expression [of text through abhinaya] of the myriad moods of Bharatanatyam are introduced.

“The Bharatanatyam recital is structured like a Great Temple: we enter through the gopuram (outer hall) of alarippu, cross the ardhamandapam (half-way hall) of jatiswaram, then the mandapam (great hall) of sabdam and enter the holy precinct of the deity in the varnam. This is the space which gives the dancer expansive scope to revel in the music, rhythm and the moods of the dance. The varnam is the continuum which gives ever expanding room to the dancer to delight in her self-fulfillment, by providing the fullest scope to her own creativity as well as to the tradition of the art.

“Pada-s now follow. In dancing to pada-s, one experiences the containment, cool and quiet of entering the sanctum from its external precinct. The expanse and brilliance of the outer corridors disappear in the dark inner sanctum; and the rhythmic virtuosities of the varnam yield to the soul-stirring music and abhinaya of the padam. Dancing to the padam is akin to the juncture when the cascading lights of worship are withdrawn and the drum beats die down to the simple and solemn chanting of sacred verses in the closeness of god. Then, the tillana breaks into movement like the final burning of camphor accompanied by a measure of din and bustle. In conclusion, the devotee takes to his heart the god he has so far glorified outside; and the dancer completes the traditional order by dancing to a simple devotional verse... “At first, mere metre [alarippu]; then, melody and metre [jatiswaram]; continuing with music, meaning, and metre [sabdam]; its expansion in the center-piece of the varnam; thereafter, music and meaning without metre [in the padams]; in a variation of this, melody and metre [tillana]; and in contrast to the pure rhythmical beginning, a non-metrical song [sloka] at the end. We see most wonderful completeness and symmetry in this art. Surely, the traditional votaries of

9

10

Introduction

music and dance would not wish us to take any liberties with this sequence.” 15

Padams (and the related genre javali) occupy a quiet private comer in the course of dance performance. Placed in between the varnam on the one hand and the tillana on the other, both of which involve extensive nritta or pure dance sections, in padam the dancer uses her abhinaya to interpret the text (and ideally the music as well) of the songs. In this study, though we necessarily concentrate on padam as the “whole”―looking from different angles, at its inspirers, patrons, creators, performers, texts, music, and performance history―let us not forget that it is part of a larger whole formed by its unity with dance.

1.4 Padams and Gender

Padams are composed by men and danced by women. This is what seems to be asserted generally, albeit lacking much in the way of documentation. With some notable exceptions in the 20th century of women composing (such as Smt. Ambujam Krishna) and men dancing (I met several men studying Bharata Natyam in Chennai), I feel that this blanket statement is substantially accurate to describe the genre. None of the thirty songs in the study group for this dissertation are known to have been composed by women, though there are four songs of unknown authorship among them. I found documentation of no dance performances of any of the padams in this study by men. The singing of padams has been associated primarily, though not exclusively, with women. Today among singers for dance in Chennai (known as Madras in the colonial era), there are men as well as women, and T. Viswanathan himself was a noted singer of dance music in addition to being a senior concert artist. In his article “Women Singers,” T. Sankaran has given an illuminating and pungent historical overview of women’s participation in musical performance in South India: 15T.

Balasaraswati 1991:10–11, English translation by S. Guhan. (Parentheses are in original); [Text in brackets added]. Throughout the book, I will follow the convention by which brackets denote the text I am adding to quotations.

Padams and Gender

“When you attend a Carnatic music concert today, by a man or a woman, you find the same pattern in the programmes: a series of songs, some prefaced by alapana, with niraval and svaram embellishing a line in the song, perhaps a ragam-tanam-pallavi. In my younger days and before my time that was not the case. One could draw a clear line of demarcation between the music of men and that of women. The concerts for men were marked by intellectual acrobatics in the pallavi which took up the major portion of the concert... When men gave a concert inevitably it turned out to be a competition. Challenges were hurled back and forth between the main artiste and his sidemen. Often the aim was to show up the weak points of his adversary. Men sang with different accompanists at different times. “When women sang it was usually with the same accompanists at all times. Instead of competition there was co-operation. The programme was well rehearsed, neatly presented and pleasant to hear... In those days singing was considered taboo for women of quality... Even the professional class of women who sang [i.e., the devadasi community] were not accepted as the equals of men because their singing was confined within accepted boundaries. While they never attempted niraval and kalpanaswara or any other complex intellectual feats, they did perform raga alapana to a limited extent. Gramophone records... furnish evidence for this fact.

16T.

“Women were particularly known for singing Tamil lyrics. The Mudaliars and Chettiars, prominent merchant patron groups, encouraged them in this practice. Here we may say that while Tamil Isai, “Tamil Music,” is a recent movement, singing in Tamil especially by ladies was greatly appreciated in the past. Kancipuram Dhanakoti Ammal could sing Tamil compositions for hours... After lubricating the voice with the initial varnam, women would launch into a series of songs in a full three hour concert. Padams and javalis were a must and were eagerly awaited.” 16

Sankaran, 1986:60.

11

12

Introduction

In the context of women’s vocal music concerts, padams were an important ingredient. We see from Sankaran’s description that women’s concerts featured above all the presentation of many compositions, while men’s concerts involved far fewer compositions, concentrating instead on improvisational forms. Sankaran said that, in addition to the incongruity of men singing padam texts, the type of competitive singing men were used to doing actually hardened their voices in a way which made them unsuited for singing padams: “My grandmother Vina Dhanammal never agreed to males singing padams: she said it will be incongruous for a moustached whiskered man to sing ‘my husband is calling me!’ My grandmother used to say that. The reason being, that the women have more advantageous voices to negotiate these padams than males. And males, their system is already accustomed to fighting, svaram, talam, and all that. She wouldn’t allow anybody to clap [loud clap] like that. The keeping of tala should be noiseless. Or it should be internalized in your mind, that’s all. Men never sang padams. Because it was erotic; and, they specialized in this improvisational music like pallavi. And so, padams were left to women who had better voices for them.” 17

Sankaran’s opinion on the suitability of padams to the female voice is seconded by the eminent male vocalist Sri Semmangudi Srinivasa Ayyar:

17T.

“Men did not sing too many padams... Padams were meant for dancing and slackened the concert tension. But when women sang padams, it was mellifluous. How beautifully [Smt. T.] Brinda handled them! Papa [Venkatarama Ayyar] and I once accompanied the maharaja and maharani of Trivandrum to Kutralam. Brinda was also there. I asked her to sing at the palace. Why don’t you learn those padams?’ the maharani asked me. ‘My voice doesn’t have the strength to handle them’, I replied. But the maharani insisted and so I learnt three padams and three javalis in three days. Fiddle Papa chuckled, ‘You can’t sing such pieces.’ When Brinda

Sankaran interview, December 31, 1987, Chennai.

Padams and Family

and I sang together Papa was really surprised. Everyone was pleased. It is very difficult for men to sing padams. The male voice is hardened by constant swara singing. But women’s voices have softness and flexibility. Padams are musically very valuable indeed.” 18

1.5 Padams and Family

One family in South India has been particularly associated with the padam genre since the late 19th century, the family into which the renowned woman musician Vina Dhanammal was born in 1867. The names of members of this family will be appearing throughout the study, so Fig. 1.1 is included as a reference for the reader. It gives a partial family lineage, including only family members who are mentioned in the course of this dissertation.19 Vertical alignment of names indicates that the persons concerned are all children of the person named above (i.e., Vina Dhanammal’s four daughters are Rajalakshmi, Lakshmiratnam, Jayammal, and Kamakshi). Vertical alignment does not indicate the same date of birth. The respectful suffix ammal is sometimes attached to a woman’s name; so, in the text, Lakshmiratnam, for example, may be called Lakshmiratnammal. T. Sankaran said that the early names in this genealogy were not known to him, but were remembered by his aunt Jayammal: “In this genealogical tree, the first names, Papammal and Rukmini Ammal, these are just names to us. I had never heard these names before, when Jayammal told us about these names. We never knew about their existence, their biography or their contribution to music. The only name which has been discussed in my own memory, for which the date is also given, is Kamakshi Ammal (ca. 1810–1890), who is the maternal grandmother of Vina Dhanammal,

18Srinivasa

Ayyar, Semmangudi, 1986:24. As this is a translation of an interview from Tamil, it is not clear which Tamil word has been translated into English as “strength”. T. Viswanathan found “strength” a confusing word in this context. 19For a more complete chart of the family lineage, the reader may refer to V.K. Narayana Menon, 1963.

13

14

Introduction

my grandmother. Kamakshi was a court dancer in Tanjavur. And she was also the teacher of Vina Dhanammal, her granddaughter. So Kamakshi Ammal was the first real person in flesh and blood known to us. Vina Dhanammal’s last daughter was named after this lady.”20

Figure 1.1 Family of Vïna Dhanammal.

Vina Dhanammal, around whom the above genealogy revolves, was a revolutionary figure in the recent history of music. She was an extraordinary musician who remains alive today in the minds of those who have heard her music through a set of 78 RPM gramophone recordings that she made under less-than-ideal conditions. A detailed treatment of her is beyond the scope of this study.21 She, her children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren have immeasurably enriched the world of music and dance.

1.6 Previous Scholarship

My experiences and observation of Indian music and India more generally were heavily conditioned by the good fortune I had 20T.

Sankaran interview, December 29, 1987, Chennai.

reader may consult Sruti 23/23S, June–July 1986, for a variety of articles

on Vina Dhanammal and her family’s heritage.

21The

Previous Scholarship

to study music and spend over fifteen years in association with Vina Dhanammal’s grandchildren T. Viswanathan, T. Sankaran, T. Ranganathan, and T. Muktha, and also T. Balasaraswati’s daughter Lakshmi Knight, and their cousin sister G. Sulochana. Through this study, I will be drawing on many sources. There has been only one previous monograph-length study dedicated to the Tamil padams and their composers. This was by K.R. Madhavi (Smt. Madhavi Rajagopalan), who wrote her M.Litt. thesis in 1960 for the University of Madras on this subject. Besides Madhavi’s work, the available information on the Tamil padam composers is in the form of brief newspaper or journal articles, or brief biographical introductions to books of song texts. One of the composers in this study, Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, was the subject of a 35-page biographical essay in Tamil by U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, but very little is known about the lives of many of the other composers. The biographies constituting Chapter 3 of this study are partly an attempt to assemble and collate the available information from different sources. More scholarly attention has been given to padams in Telugu than in Tamil, especially to those of the famous 17th-century composer Ksetrayya who has been the subject of at least one biographical study in English, that of B. Rajanikanta Rao (1981). For reference on padams and a host of musicological subjects, the work of P. Sambamoorthy and Dr. S. Seetha has been invaluable, and Jon Higgins (1993) gives a thorough treatment of the music of Bharata Natyam, devoting a chapter to each of the genres of the margam in turn, including padam. Padams as interpreted in dance have been the subject of extensive attention by scholars such as Kapila Vatsyayan, Mohan Khokar, Sunil Kothari, and others. As an ethnomusicological study of a genre of Karnataka music and dance, my dissertation comes in a long line of scholarship about Indian music in the English language which has been thoroughly reviewed by Harold Powers (1965) and characterized by Regula Qureshi as “Indic Musicology”: “The discovery of Sanskrit treatises by British Indologists, around 1800, led to Western attempts to interpret them and also to describe their subject, Indian art music. In response, Indian scholars too began to focus on rendering

15

16

Introduction

their musical tradition into an English-language framework. The resulting effort by both Western and Indian authors writing in English led to the development of what is appropriately called Indic musicology.

“Predictably, much of this work has been carried on within the Indian scholastic tradition by drawing heavily on the body of classical writings and often addressing related problems such as the classification of melody types..., or the measurement of pitch relationships... With few exceptions... a strongly theoretical orientation has also characterized the many general works on Indian music.”22

As such, I have tried to make the study as open as possible to readers with a general non-specialist interest in India. The framing of the study has also benefitted greatly from work on the genre by Jeffrey Kallberg (1988) and Appadurai, Korom, and Mills (1991), which exhorts us as scholars both to deconstruct and reconstruct received terminology, and to look beyond static textual and musical structures to their interpretation and reception in performance, in our delineations of the genre.

1.7 Goals, Methods, Limitations

As a non-Indian musician and scholar who came relatively late to an interest in India and its music, it is critical for the success of the study that I carefully articulate its goals, methods, and its limitations. Linguistically, my training in Tamil is such that I can carry on basic conversation, ask basic questions in restaurants, pick my way carefully through newspaper headlines, or navigate travel around the metropolis of Chennai (formerly known in the colonial period as Madras). With the help of Tamil-speaking consultants, especially Smt. G. Sulochana of Chennai and the Tamil Lexicon (the OED of Tamil–English dictionaries), I was able to arrive at detailed translations of about 50 songs over the 22Regula

Qureshi, 1986:7. In this passage, I have removed specific citations, which Prof. Qureshi gives for examples of the various studies (indicated by “…”).

Goals, Methods, Limitations

course of four years of work. I have not tried to translate the texts into poetry, but to render them on two levels, a word-for­ word correspondence and a running prose translation. I am not able to evaluate the texts of Tamil vis-a-vis Telugu padams, or to accurately assess the extent of Sanskrit influence on the Tamil padams, my experience with both Telugu and Sanskrit being minimal. Nor do I attempt to characterize the Tamil of the Tamil padams vis-a-vis that of classical Sangam Tamil, the Tamil of the Tevaram hymns of the 6–9th centuries, or 21st century spoken Tamil. Chronologically, I have chosen to write about composers who lived and worked from the 17th to 19th centuries, also about their performers and their patrons. These songs form the bedrock of the padam repertoire of the family of my teacher at Wesleyan University, T. Viswanathan. The composers of the 17th to 19th centuries also constitute a coherent group for study purposes in that these are the composers whose padams were performed by the traditional devadasi community of dancers and dance musicians, up through the third decade of the 20th century. Geographically and comparatively, I place the Tamil padams in a general and suggestive manner within the networks and webs of interlocking traditions of sung poetry throughout India. In the course of the study, I discuss the idea advanced by some scholars that the Tamil padams might be seen as comprising two streams of bhakti, devotional expression, indigenous Tamil bhakti, and an exported and re-imported bhakti.23 The links between padam and the thumri of Hindustani music, the ashtapadis of the Gita Govinda of Jayadeva, or the devotional hymns of the Sufi sect of Islam, could all be fruitfully explored by a suitably well-informed linguist. I would indeed be gratified if aspects of the present study eventually serve as building blocks in a larger enterprise, without forgetting the unique aspects of this genre. 23According

to this line of thought, after having been born in southern India in the middle of the first millennium A.D., bhakti both stayed in the south and traveled north. The travels of one stream took it up through northern India, finally returning south in the time of the Vijayanagar empire, reaching the court in current Tamil Nadu with the Telugu Nayakas in the 16th century. The other stream remained in Tamil Nadu. This idea will be taken up for consideration in Chapter 4.

17

18

Introduction

Major limitation: padams are dance music, but attention to dance or an examination of abhinaya in padams is beyond the scope of the present study. This is the limitation I feel most acutely in presenting the subject of padams to the reader. As rare a gem a padam is as music, its identity as a padam is heavily conditioned by its suitability for dance. In Bharata Natyam, padams are a platform or scaffold upon which an activity of an entirely different order is built through dance. I would be delighted if this study might serve, similarly, as a platform upon which companion studies in dance could be built, and as a kind of reference manual that could give young dancers insight on the historical and social context of the songs they are learning. I dearly hope it will be useful to dancers as they undergo their daily practice and their choreography of new work.

1.7.1 A Living Repertoire

The study group of the Tamil padams for this book consists of 30 songs. At the conclusion of my research in Chennai, I had documented a living repertoire of the Tamil padams numbering approximately 150. By living repertoire, I mean padams for which I was able to find evidence of performance at some point during the 20th century. In addition to the compositions known in the family of T. Viswanathan, the kinds of evidence I collected and considered were 78 RPM recordings (made in India starting in ca. 1902), documentations of performance contained in dance programs (which appeared for the first-time ca. 1930), and written or oral references that a particular padam was known to have been performed by a particular person. One additional extraordinary resource was the discovery of a six-volume catalog of 78 RPM recordings published between 1929 and 1931.24 It documents hundreds of recordings that were in print or only recently out of print at that time. 24This

is the Gramaphon Sangeetha Keerthanamirdam (published 1929–1931). A copy is in the archive of Sampradaya, a research institute and archive for music and dance in Chennai.

Synopsis

1.8 Selection of Core Group I narrowed this group from approximately 150 down to a study group of 30 compositions by deciding to focus my study on padams occurring in only a small number of ragas. After some deliberation, I fixed the number of ragas at three, choosing Bhairavi, Kambhoji, and Todi. These are three of the ragas most commonly used to set the Tamil padams (statistics on raga frequency in padams are found at the beginning of Chapter 5). The selection by raga was my one intervention into the total living repertoire as I had constituted it. After excluding from the study all but three ragas, I then became as inclusive as possible. I especially wanted to be inclusive with respect to what types of texts could be considered padam. Some of the compositions that are in this study, notably those of Group D and especially the one composition of Group G (see Chapter 4) are not considered padams by all observers. But I have seen or heard each of the 30 songs characterized as padams in at least one situation, either in conversation or in print media, so I considered the inclusion of “borderline padams” in the study group to be helpful in determining the shape and boundaries of the genre. With respect to music, I was initially shocked (and later gratified) to find that the performances in the study group selection ran the gamut from the sublime to the not-so-sublime, sometimes within the spectrum of recorded examples of one and the same padam. I was eventually gratified because this eventually led me to questions such as where qualities such as “classicalness” and “folk” inhere, in compositions “themselves” or their interpretation, in the products of music, or the processes of music.

1.9 Synopsis

Chapters 2 and 3 move diachronically through the history of kings and composers pertinent to the padam genre. In Chapter 2, the stage is set by a review of the political history of the region of South India beginning from the time of the Colas, and focusing on the Telugu Nayaks and Maratha Rajas of Tanjavur, the period

19

20

Introduction

from 1532 to 1855. It was during this time that the padam genre developed and matured. In this chapter, materials from the differing perspectives of musicologists and historians have been collected and compared. Chapter 3 contains an introduction to the practice of constructing biography for this period in South India and then biographical sketches of eight composers of the Tamil padams. Material from a variety of sources has also been collected and presented in the chapter. Figure 1.2 gives an overview of the chronological relationships within the groups of kings and composers figuring in the study.

Figure 1.2 Kings and composers.

In Chapters 4 and 5, we consider the study group of 30 compositions synchronically, as a repertoire of texts and music. Each of these chapters explores what constitutes core qualities and peripheral qualities for the Tamil padam genre. Finally, in Chapter 6, the study concludes with a brief discussion of 20th-century performance history, suggesting implications for future study. The Appendices include a performance history, complete translations of the padams, and edited transcriptions of a selection of the padams illustrating varnamettu in two ragas.

Chapter 2

Kings, Devotion, Patronage, and Padams 2.1 Emergence of Tanjavur as a Center for the Arts To prepare the ground for understanding the development of the padam genre, we will begin by describing the development of the city and district of Tanjavur (often spelled “Tanjore” during the period of British influence) as a center for the arts, the place where padam was most actively patronized between the 17th and 19th centuries. Tanjavur lies 175 miles south-southwest of Chennai (formerly Madras) in the current state of Tamil Nadu (a part of the Madras Presidency under the British), just about halfway between Chennai and the southern tip of India at Kanyakumari (Cape Comorin). Its importance as a center of patronage for the arts is largely due to its situation in the middle of the richest rice-growing area (Tamil nel) in South India, where the river Kaveri (also spelled Cauvery) divides into many branches as it flows east toward the Bay of Bengal.1 Intensive agriculture has been practiced in the Kaveri delta for millennia. It is not the earliest known political center in South India, this honor being reserved for Madurai, another 90 miles south-southwest from Tanjavur, said to have been the 1The

“Revenue District” of Tanjavur under the British comprised 3,708 sq. mi. Maclean 1893/1982:876.

The Tamil Padam: A Dance Music Genre of South India Matthew Harp Allen

Copyright © 2023 Jenny Stanford Publishing Pte. Ltd.

ISBN 978-981-4968-56-0 (Hardcover), 978-1-003-33638-9 (eBook)

www.jennystanford.com

22

Kings, Devotion, Patronage, and Padams

seat for the third and final of the ancient Sangams (academies of Tamil literature) at least 2,000 years ago.2

2.2 The Colas

Tanjavur’s significance as a political center dates from the time when it became the seat of the Cola chieftains, who took the town sometime before 850 A.D.3 and whose imperial heyday was from approximately 1000–1200 A.D.4 At its height, the Cola kingdom established a trade network and considerable political influence throughout southeast Asia.5 Under the Cola umbrella vast temple complexes were constructed throughout the Kaveri delta region. Bronze statuary of Hindu deities was produced, epitomized but not exhausted by the now worldfamous images of Siva as the dancing Nataraja. The Cola rulers were worshippers of Siva and especially patronized the cult of Nataraja6 whose seat is at Cidambaram, near where the Kollitam (Coleroon), the largest branch of the Kaveri, empties into the sea.7 2The

First and Second Cankam (Sangams) are believed to have been located further south, on land now submerged off the southern tip of the subcontinent. 3K.A. Nilakanta Sastri, 1955:166. 4N. Subrahmanian, 1972:179. The Colas, Ceras (approximating the current Kerala state) and Pandyas (centered around Madurai) were the three earliest regional political groupings in South India, dating from “as early as the third and fourth century B.C.”, and “the son and daughter of Asoka made treaties with them.” A. Panditar, 1971/1984:125. “Six hundred years after the Sangam age as a political force had come to a close, the Cholas, one of the three famous royal families which had ruled over Tamilaham then and had declined consequent on the Kalabhra invasion, revived. ... Tanjavur, later famous as the earlier capital of the imperial Cholas... is not heard of earlier than in the hymns of the early Alvars... It ... was the capital of a petty ruling family, the Muttaraiyar... The Cholas, it seems, ruled as petty princes from Palaiyarai which is near Tanjavur. Though the Cholas were not politically powerful, they never forgot their traditional identity and the need to revive and recapture the lost position of primacy in a third of the Tamil country.” N. Subrahmanian, 1972:164–5. 5Including Indo-China, Malay Archipelago, Indonesia, Cambodia, Burma, and Ceylon. C. Collin Davies, 1947:28. 6“Parantaka I (907–955 A.D.) was a staunch devotee of Nataraja of Chidambaram. ...From this time on, Nataraja ... became the kulanayakam or the family deity of the Colas.” B. Natarajan, 1974:19–20. 7In South India, the cults of particular deities are most often associated with particular spots, and major deities such as Siva have distinct names and identities at particular places. See Shulman, 1980; Clothey, 1978.

The Colas

The magnitude of Cola patronage of the arts, and the integration of the Kaveri delta area under Cola overlordship, is often illustrated by scholars through reference to the “inscription in the Tanjavur Brihadisvarar Temple recording Sri Rajarajadevar’s grant to 614 persons including 400 dancing girls for temple service.”8 Four hundred women9 are listed individually by name in the inscription, along with which temple in which outlying town they have been transferred from in order to serve in the new Brihadisvara Siva temple at Tanjavur, which house in which street has been given to them, and the share they are to receive.10 A sample entry is given here: “To Seramangai, a girl (who has been transferred from the establishment of the temple) of Lokamahadevi-isvara at Tiruvaiyaru, (and who resides in) the first house of the southern row (Siragu) of the temple on the south (of the temple), one share.”11

The inscription goes on to reveal that similarly, women have been transferred from all over the Kaveri delta region to this new and greatest temple which King Rajaraja has had constructed. Aside from the women doing music and dance service, 66 drummers, 6 dance teachers (Tamil nattuvan or annavi), 5 singers, 3 Vedic and 4 Tamil chanters, and other musical specialists are listed, along with “lamplighters, sprinklers of water, those who carry minor things in procession, potters, dhobies, barbers, astrologers, blacksmiths, tailors, coppersmiths, carpenters, goldsmiths, lute players, and accountants” for whom “rules for their guidance and their share of gifts are mentioned.”12 8A.

Panditar, 1917/1984:148.

best-known term for temple dancing women is devadasi, which according to

the research of S. Kersenboom-Story “occurs not earlier than the Chola period.” The Cola period saw a profusion of terms for these women, given by KersenboomStory with translations. Kersenboom-Story, 1987:28. 10“The value of each share (which consisted of the produce of one) veli of land was to be one hundred Kalam of paddy.” A. Panditar, 1917/1984:129. 11Tiruvaiyaru is a small village about six miles north of Tanjavur. It is the place where the composer Tyagaraja’s death anniversary is now celebrated on a grand scale yearly in or around the month of January; it is also home to A Nagaswaram College. 12A. Panditar, 1917/1984:149. 9The

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This story of a king building and populating a temple raises a vital point, that is, the inextricability of the sacred and the royal through much of South Indian history.13 This is reflected linguistically as the Tamil word for temple, koyil or kovil, comes from “ko”, “emperor, king, great man, eminent person, father.”14

2.2.1 King Raja Raja Cola, Nambi Andar Nambi, et al.

King Rajaraja, as an ideal royal devotee, is further associated with the recovery of the Tevaram hymns, bhakti (devotional) songs on Siva written between the 6th and 8th (or 9th) centuries A.D. by 3 of 64 devotees known as Nayanmars,15 songs which had mostly if not totally fallen out of practice by Rajaraja’s time (985–1013 A.D). As told by B. Natarajan, Rajaraja, a devout Saivite was deeply distressed that these songs were not available. He heard of a young boy named Nambi Andar Nambi, who had received direct instruction from Ganesa (known also as Pillaiyar), the elephant-headed elder son of Siva, and went to him to request his help. The young Nambi: “[P]rayed to Pillaiyar, and He [Pillaiyar] revealed to His disciple [Nambi] that the hymns would be found in a room in the rear of the Hall of the Lord of Dance at Chidambaram, with the seal of the hymnists’ palms impressed on the door. Then the King, accompanied by Nambi, went to Chidambaram and told the men of Vedic lore what had been revealed to them. The temple authorities declared that the room would open only if those who set the seal came back. Whereupon the king conducted a festival for Nataraja, took the idols of the Tamil trio in procession round the temple, and stationed them in front of the room to the west of the Hall of Dance of the Lord. The seals became visible and the sealed room

13“His

authority is expressed in two foci: his court and the temple, especially temples serving the purpose of a sacred platform for the imperial coronation ritual.” Kersenboom-Story, 1987:30. 14Entry in Tamil Lexicon. 15See N. Cutler 1987, I. Peterson 1989, D. Shulman 1990.

The Colas

opened. A heap of cadjan leaves swallowed partly by white ants was found within. Oil was poured over the heap and the surviving leaves recovered. The king was distressed beyond words to find such large-scale destruction of the holy texts. Then a divine voice from on high said that there was in them whatever was needed for his times, and this gave the king some solace. Nambi then had the leaves collected and arranged. The hymns of the trio formed the first seven of the twelve books of the Tirumurai canons of the Saivites.”16

In the Saivite Tevaram hymns and the corresponding Divya Prabandham hymns of the Vaisnavite Alvar saints (together forming the corpus of what is commonly known as Tamil bhakti poetry), we will find a major stream feeding into the later Tamil padam genre, textually and perhaps musically as well.17 N. Subrahmanian places the decline of Cola power in the last quarter of the 13th century. In 1311, the army of Malik Kafur, the general of Sultan Alauddin Khilji of Delhi, was able to reach Madurai, deep in the heart of southern India. He destroyed or damaged some of the great Hindu temples at Cidambaram, Srirangam, and Madurai during approximately a six-month stay in the south, then returned north laden with riches, leaving “the southern Hindu states in a pretty demoralized condition.”18 Muslim influence increased as Jalaluddin Ashan Shah established the Sultanate of Madurai in 1329–1330. Kumara Kampana, son of one of the founders of the Hindu Vijayanagar empire19 based in the present-day state of Karnataka, and Governor of its southeast region, invaded and took control of Kancipuram and then 16B.

Natarajan, 1974:115–116. stream may consist of an exported and reimported erotic bhakti poetry and song, originating at least partly in the bhakti hymns of Tamil Nadu, traveling north and, then, five or more centuries later, returning south to Tamil Nadu during the Nayak period with Telugu speaking colonists from the disintegrating Vijayanagar empire. This idea is discussed further in Chapter 4. 18N. Subrahmanian, 1972:278. 19“In 1336, the first king of a new Hindu state, Harihara I, was crowned in the new capital called Vijayanagar (City of Victory), situated on the southern bank of the river Tungabhadra.” Kersenboom-Story, 1987:31. 17Another

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Kings, Devotion, Patronage, and Padams

Madurai. Along the way, he “restored Ranganatha of Srirangam to His habitat,”20 leading to what is known as the Nayak Period of South Indian history.

2.3 The Nayak Period in Tanjavur

The word nayak or nayaka has the literal meaning of captain, soldier, or headman,21 and a semantic field wide enough to embrace both political ruler, as in the case of the Nayaks of Tanjavur, and lover or hero, in the case of the padam genre. As a political and military entity, the term Nayak seems to have come into use in the early 16th century during the reign of the Vijayanagar Emperor Krishnadevaraya (1509–1529): “The centralisation of political power of Vijayanagara necessitated the advent of deputies to represent the government locally in Tamilnadu; these were assigned military fiefs from which they drew revenue. The deputy rulers were called nayaks and belonged mostly to the Telugu and Kannada nobility.” 22

The question of to what extent a particular Nayak (installed at or one of the other imperial outposts) would be an independent sovereign as opposed to a loyal servant of the Vijayanagar Emperor who appointed him, has requisitioned much ink from the pens of historians and need not unduly detain us here; but a few remarks will help place the term in context. Burton Stein states that Krishnadevaraya made a “bold attempt to extend the reach of central authority” of the sovereign, 20From

the poem “Madhuravijayam” by Ganga Devi, Kumara’s queen, quoted in B. Natarajan, 1988:7. Ranganatha is the name for Vishnu at Srirangam, one of the major centers of Vishnu worship in India. Kumara’s capture of Madurai is placed in 1380 by N. Subrahmanian, 1972:278; B. Natarajan (1988:7) says that Kumara’s successful campaign ended in 1371 and that he died in 1374. B. Stein (1989:28) dates the campaign between 1365 and 1370, characterizing it as “as much a propaganda as a military success because it was memorialized in numerous inscriptions over the southern peninsula proclaiming a new dharmic kingship and an end to Muslim oppression.” 21Lexicon. Or, “military chieftain” after N. Subrahmanian, 1988:33. 22S. Kersenboom-Story, 1987:32.

Shift to Vaishnavite Patronage

part of which comprised the recasting of provincial governors as Nayaks: “Before his time, the ubiquitous Vijayanagara term for the bond between lesser lord and king was karyakarta, that is “agent”, a seeming denial of any autochthonous authority by the king’s chiefly subjects. Those with the title of nayaka in Vijayanagara times represented a new kind of local lordship...” 23

At the same time that Krishnadevaraya was attempting to consolidate his influence throughout the kingdom, however, the new institution of the Nayak was itself working against his desire: “The nayaka regimes appear to have come into existence around 1530, well before the sacking of Vijayanagara [in 1565]. Though some historians haggle about when it is appropriate to speak of these purported Vijayanagara successors, there is general agreement that it might well have been around 1530. Given this agreement, there is a paradox that has never been faced, much less resolved, in Vijayanagara historiography. It is this: at the moment that the kingdom was at its greatest during the reign of Krishnadevaraya, who died in 1529, ‘successor’ regimes existed, and the kingdom, or ‘empire’, was beginning to be partitioned into independent states consisting of some of its richest parts: Tanjavur, Madurai, Gingee, and Ikkeri.” 24

2.4 Shift to Vaishnavite Patronage

The Nayaks brought with them to Tanjavur the later Vijayanagar royal family’s preference for the worship of Vishnu, which marked a major, although perhaps extremely gradual, change from the Saivism of the Cola period.25 Although writers stress 23B.

Stein, 1989:63. Stein, 1989: 121 [brackets added].

25The first Vijayanagar Emperors were themselves Saivites: “The later period of

Vijayanagar rule was characterised by the ascendancy of Sri Vaishnavism as the ‘state religion’. Whereas the earlier rulers had considered Siva, in the form of Virupaksa, their tutelary deity, later kings became Vaishnavas with a predilection for Sri Venkatesa of Tirupati and for Sri Ranganatha of Srirangam. 24B.

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the catholicity and tolerance of the nayaka rulers for different religious sects, it is apparent that there was a degree of discord as a result of such changes in royal patronage of deity. Regarding tensions at one location, B. Natarajan states: “The history of Chidambaram in the days of the Vijayanagar emperors is largely one of acute religious hostility and sectarian disputes between the Saivites and the Vaishnavites, the followers of Nataraja and Govindaraja, respectively.”26

Cidambaram is perhaps an exceptional case of religious sectarian tensions in that the temple houses images of both Siva and Vishnu in close proximity. A further passage from Natarajan quotes Father N. Pimenta, a Jesuit priest who witnessed the following events at the Cidambaram temple when in 1597 A.D. Krishnappa Nayaka was supervising the improvements he had ordered in the temple of Govindaraja within the great Siva temple: “Whether it were lawful to place the signe of Perumal [Vishnu] in the temple at Chidambaram, some refused, others by their legates importunately urged, and the Naichus [Nayak] of Ginji decreed to erect it in the temple... The priests of the temple which were the Treasurers withstanding and threatening, if it be done, to cast down themselves from the top. The Brachmanes of the Temple swore to doe the like after they buried the former, which yet after better advice they performed not... Krishnappa went on without hesitation. Whereupon the priests, climbing one of the high gopurams of the temple, started to cast themselves down while the Nayak was in the temple...

About twentie had perished in that precipitation on that day of our departure, whereas the Naichus angrie, caused his gunners to shoot the rest, which killed two of them, the rest

With the ascendancy of Venkata II (1586–1614), Sri Venkatesa officially took the place of Sri Virupaksa.” S. Kersenboom-Story, 1987:37. Kersenboom-Story regards this change as also a change toward sweeter and more erotic aspects of bhakti, from the more “fierce” devotion of Saiva bhakti. 26B. Natarajan, 1972:51.

Nayaks of Tanjavur

wandering in uncertain places. A woman also was so hot in this zealous quarrel that shee cut her own throat.”27

He also reports that centuries earlier, in the Cola period under its Saivite rulers, the Vishnu (Govindaraja) image of the temple had been taken out and “thrown into the sea, the original home of Hari.”28 This is apparently a bit of levity on the part of the Rajaraja Cholan Ula, the literary work in which the incident is mentioned, as one position of Vishnu (Hari) is reclining in sleep upon the ocean of milk. In this case, however, his placement in the ocean appears not to have been voluntary. Natarajan thinks it possible that there was no Vishnu worship at all in the temple between the 12th and the 14th centuries.

2.5

Nayaks of Tanjavur

The Nayaks of Tanjavur were at the outset, then, appointed officials of the Vijayanagar Empire. As the power of the Empire sustained a severe blow at the battle of Talikota in 1565, the Nayaks were soon independent and even in the position of protecting and harboring their favorites among the Vijayanagar royal family.29 Figure 2.1 shows the Nayak lineage at Tanjavur.

2.5.1 Sevappa

The first Nayak was Sevappa (Sivappa), who held office from 1532 to 1560. He brought with him from Vijayanagar as both his purohit (family priest) and chief minister Govinda Dikshita, an illustrious scholar who was the author (or co-author with Raghunatha Nayak) of the treatise on music, Sangita Sudha. Govinda Dikshita was also the father of Venkatamakhi, author of the Caturdandi Prakasika, the seminal theoretical work for contemporary Karnataka music. Govinda Dikshita served for many 27B.

Natarajan, 1972:59. Natarajan, 1972:51. 29In 1614, Raghunatha Nayak harbored Sri Ranga, the designated successor to Venkata II of Vijayanagar. K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:8. 28B.

29

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Kings, Devotion, Patronage, and Padams

years as minister (and in the youth of Raghunatha Nayak, regent as well) for the first three Tanjavur Nayaks.30

Figure 2.1 Nayaks of Tanjavur.

2.5.2 Achyutappa

After Sevappa Nayak, his son Achyutappa Nayak ruled from 1560 to 1600.31 His name is known as a great patron of the arts partly because of an incident that resulted indirectly in the establishment of the Bhagavata Mela dance-drama tradition: 30“By

sheer merit, he shot into fame from humble beginnings and stayed for three successive reigns in the highest position as Minister (from about 1575 A.D. to 1634 A.D.)” B. Natarajan, 1988:16. 31B. Natarajan (1988:11) dates Sevappa’s rule from 1532 to 1580, saying that Achyutappa was “co-ruler as Yuvaraja until 1580,” when he ascended the throne on his father’s passing. For B. Stein (1989:133) the “practice of ruling kings installing their sons as heirs-apparent (yuvaraja) makes a nonsense of the pious reiteration of historians that the nayakas of the 16th and early 17th century were merely royal officials. For the people that they ruled and from the inscriptions that they caused to be engraved, they were kings, even though they acknowledged the superior kingship of the rayas [Vijayanagar emperors].”

Nayaks of Tanjavur

“Tradition has it that once after taking meals on the full moon day, he inadvertently ate betel leaf with his left hand. In order to make amends for his sin, he gave away an entire village as free gift to five hundred Brahmin families for the avowed purpose of promoting art and learning. This particular village was Melattur, which grew to be the famous centre of Bharata Sastra and exponents of the art, who set up the tradition of Bhagavata mela natya.”32

Dr. S. Seetha describes Achyutappa Nayak as a “great devotee” of Lord Ranganatha, that is, Vishnu at the major temple of Srirangam near Trichy.33 Vishnu as Rajagopalaswami at the temple of Mannargudi, 22 miles ESE of Tanjavur, eventually became the special family deity of the Nayaks.34

2.5.3 Raghunatha

Raghunatha Nayak, the second and favored son of Achyutappa,35 ruled in Tanjavur from 1600 to 1634.36 From this date onward, quite a bit more information about the specifics of rulers’ patronage of the arts becomes available than is available for the early Nayak rulers. Dr. S. Seetha feels that it is from the time of Raghunatha’s reign that Telugu literature and song 32S. Seetha, 1981:30; see also B. Natarajan, 1988:13, and B. Rajanikanta Rao, 1981:14,

who notes the historical connection between the Bhagavata Mela and Kuchipudi dance-drama forms: “It was during the last quarter of the 16th century (1569–95) that some batches of Bhagavata Mela families from Kuchipudi in Krishna district of Andhra went down South to Tanjore district. They obtained from the King of Tanjore, Achyutappa Naick (1565–1614) Achyuta Rajapuram and colonised there. They continued their avocation of presenting dance-dramas. This place latterly came to be known as Melattur.” 33S. Seetha, 1981:30–31. 34Also known as Dakshina Dvaraka, Mannargudi is a center of Krishna worship. 35“When Achyutappa died in 1600, three hundred and seventy women of his harem committed ritual suicide. Problems of succession followed. Achyutappa had imprisoned his elder son and preferred his probably second and possibly favourite son for the throne; and when he died, this favourite son, Raghunatha, killed the imprisoned brother of his and ascended the throne.” N. Subrahmanian, 1988:34. 36Variant versions are: B. Natarajan (1988:11) from 1584 to 1634, co-ruling as Yuvaraja until 1614, “when the father Achyutappa abdicates in favor of the son;” and B. Stein (1989:122) who calls Raghunatha the son of Sivappa.

31

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became patronized on a large scale in Tanjavur.37 Poetic works from his court hail Raghunatha as a great dancer and expert on the theory of dance. Dr. Seetha quotes the Raghunatha Abhyudaya, a kavya, poetic work, written by Raghunatha’s “favorite mistress” Ramabhadramba which describes the dance hall (natakasala or natyasala) of Raghunatha’s court. This work goes into some detail regarding the process of a performance there: “The natyasala was beautifully ornamented with gems of various colours, laced cloth and gave a dazzling appearance. Followed by a retinue of dancers and scholars, the king arrived at the natyasala. The gayakas, connoisseurs, also assembled to witness the dance and drama that were to be presented. In keeping with the tradition of Bharata’s stage dramatics, the flute was sounded first. Even before the curtain was raised, the dancers arrived on the stage and their getting ready for the performance was informed by the auspicious sounds of the tinkling bells of the anklets. Ramabhadramba describes the dancer as beautiful and clever in expressing her ideas through her exquisite abhinaya [gesture language] and the manipulation of her eyes and facial expression. ... The court dancers performed in a bewitching manner to the accompaniment of sweet music.”38

2.5.4 Sringara Padams: Early References

In the Raghunatha Abhyudaya on Raghunatha Nayak, references occur to sringara padas, songs on the theme of love, with all the richness and variety of experience this implies. The sringara rasa, the juice or flavor of sringara, consists of two main divisions: sambhoga and vipralamba sringara, denoting respectively love in unity and in separation; the second is felt by most rasikas to offer the most scope for interpretation in abhinaya (see V. Raghavan, 1951 or Higgins 1993 for greater detail on Sanskrit 37S.

Seetha, 1981:47.

38S. Seetha, 1981:45–46. Note the similarity to the description of the King’s procession

into the hall, in the song Collum vakai ellam [A1], composed in the early 19th century at Tanjavur.



Nayaks of Tanjavur

aesthetic terminology with respect to padams). This is an early reference to the type of song which we would today recognize as a padam: “The sakhis sing desya ragas and sringara padas composed by their mistress to the accompaniments of tambura, vina, flute, cengu, rabab, mukhavina, dande, etc.” 39

The first reference to the great composer of Telugu padams, Ksetrayya, also appears during Raghunatha’s reign, as one of the artists of the day who held Raghunatha to be an expert vainika (performer on the stringed instrument vina) and scholar.40 We see, then, that Raghunatha Nayak is portrayed by his courtiers as an eminent musician, dancer, and scholar 41 as well as a munificent patron. We also have seen evidence that a dance genre known as padam is by this time being patronized at court. At this point, the evidence suggests that padams in the Telugu language were patronized at the Nayak court and not those in Tamil, although other evidence suggests that padams in Tamil were being composed at this time, outside of court circles, by Muttuttandavar, a devotee of Nataraja who was from Sirgari near Cidambaram (see Chapter 3). During Raghunatha’s tenure, another ‘first’ is the mention of European presence in the vicinity of Tanjavur:

39S.

“It was during the reign of Raghunatha Nayak that the arrivals of European merchants on the Coromandal Coast occurred in strength. The Portuguese had already established themselves in Nagapattinam and in Santhome in Chennai, on the east coast. The English who had attempted to establish a factory in 1624 were not successful in doing so, but this period also saw the arrival of the Dutch and the Danes on the east coast.”42

Seetha, 1981:49. Seetha, 1981:31. 41As an author (or as a co-author with his minister Govinda Dikshita) of the musicological treatise Sangita Sudha. 42N. Subrahmanian, 1988:36. The Coromandal (or Coromandel) Coast refers to the southeastern coast of India. It is the Anglicized form of cola mandal, “region of

the Colas.”

40S.

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As a political leader, Raghunatha appears to have been relatively skillful and successful in preserving if not expanding his power, unlike virtually every following ruler, it is our job to consider. The gravest excess of his reign may have been at the outset when he is said to have murdered his imprisoned elder brother in order to assume office. He married the daughter of the Nayak of Madurai in 1617 in an attempt to stabilize the alwaystense relations between the two Nayakdoms, just one year after the Madurai Nayak transferred his capital to Trichy, just 20 miles west of Tanjavur. He supported the Vijayanagar Emperor Venkata II against his enemies43 and supported Sri Ranga, the designated successor of Venkata II; he later supported the forces fighting against those who killed Sri Ranga, a civil war that brought devastation to parts of the region around Tanjavur.44

2.5.5 Vijayaraghava

The final Telugu Nayak of his line, Vijayaraghava, who ruled from 1633 to 1673, enjoyed as great a reputation as a patron of the arts as did his father Raghunatha, but earned the scorn of historians as a duplicitous and cowardly ruler.45 A trail of promises and broken alliances, threats, deceit, abject surrenders in the face of superior force or strategy, and then more promises which are themselves broken at the earliest opportunity—such a litany is told by historians, ending with the “one heroic act which that 43“When Venkata became emperor (1586), Raghunatha (heir apparent) and grandson

of Sevappa, fought like a lion under his master’s banner against the troublesome Madurai Nayak.” K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:8. 44“The English factor at Masulipatam wrote (1625-26) as follows: ‘pasents brought thousands of their young children to the seaside selling there a child for five fanums (2sh. 6d) worth of rice, transported from thence into other parts of India, and sold again to good advantage, if the gaines be good that ariseth from the sale of soules.” N. Subrahmanian, 1988:35. 45“There is a slight suggestion of the ways of Aurangzeb (his Moghul contemporary) in the doings of this Nayak; both did away with their brothers, both imprisoned their own sons, both were deeply religious and both brought their respective kingdoms practically to a close and under pressure from the Marathas; but the comparison can go no farther for Vijayaraghava possessed none of the heroic qualities of the last great Moghul Emperor. N. Subrahmanian, 1988:37.

Nayaks of Tanjavur

Nayak did in his life,”46 Vijayaraghava dying in battle fighting the enemy side by side with his son Mannaru Das, who he had just released from prison. The female members of his family were locked in his palace, which was blown up by prearranged signal upon his death. Vijayaraghava is said to have been deserted by most of his officers: “For, Vijaya had ravished the wives and daughters of his officers, and 700 wives and 15,300 concubines adorned or crowded the harem of this pious king.”47 Set off against this story are accounts of his piety and descriptions of life at court, where music, dance, and poetry continued to be splendidly patronized.48 A drama from his court “celebrates the great devotion of Vijayaraghava to Brahmins and his interest in feeding 50,000 Brahmins daily.”49 A contemporary account quoted by N. Subrahmanian is worth reproducing at some length here:

46N.

“Proenza’s account of Vijayaraghava’s religious exercises makes interesting reading: ‘The Nayaka of Tanjore spends the whole of December in the midst of his idols. Two hours before sunrise he wakes up to go to the sanctuary of Mannar [Mannargudi] which is his place of delight; he remains there five hours wholly engaged in shedding on the God’s head a continuous stream of sweet smelling flowers; the cultivators of the environs have been ordered to bring them from hour to hour so that they might always be fresh. While the prince offers this sacrifice in his mysterious solitude, the whole town takes part in this noisy solemnity. Here is what he never misses to celebrate in honour of his spiritual master. The guru (Kumara Tatacharya) is seated in a niche richly adorned by the dames of the court; in another niche shining with gold and precious stones, are placed the slippers of the guru, and the king, going on foot, a censer [vehicle in which incense is burnt] in hand, precedes the slippers, and the

Subrahmanian, 1988:47. Subramanian, 1928/1988:9–10. Subramanian stresses in a footnote, “But all

available testimony points to his great piety.” 48“Vijayaraghava’s reign was marked by his personal devotion to the cause of religion, patronage of arts and letters and by an exceeding indifference to the welfare of his subjects.” N. Subrahmanian, 1988:42. 49S. Seetha, 1981:61. 47K.R.

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Kings, Devotion, Patronage, and Padams

censers during the whole procession, which must proceed thus through the different streets of the town. The guru would not be satisfied with these honours once a year; whenever he entered the palace or came out of it, he was always carried in a rich litter in the midst of Brahmans charged with the censer, like an idol.”50

Through the proclivity of the Christian commentator to ridicule the activities he describes, the piety of Vijayaraghava remains evident. The devotion of the ruler to his guru (teacher, preceptor) is graphically described; indeed, some commentators and historians feel that the Nayaks and later the Maratha rulers were virtually ruled by their ministers and/or gurus.51 “Mannar” (Mannargudi, the Tamil king’s abode) is specifically mentioned as the favored place for family worship; its location 22 miles ESE of Tanjavur means that it would be quite a journey in a carriage or on horseback even if one did rise “two hours before sunrise” to make the trip. The naming of Vijayaraghava’s son “Mannaru Das” (servant of Mannar) is also indicative of the family’s devotion to Rajagopalaswami, the form of Vishnu at Mannargudi.

2.5.6 Padams at Court

Vijayaraghava was a dedicated patron of the arts. His minister Venkatamakhi (son of Govinda Dikshita who had been the minister for the earlier Nayak rulers) wrote Caturdandi Prakasika, the work which set out the basis for the 72 melakartas (scale types which today have the force of parent ragas) of the South Indian raga system. Ksetrayya the composer of Telugu padams 50N.

Subrahmanian, 1988:42–43. Subrahmanian does not give a citation for Proenza. feels this, but he of course would have a missionary’s bias, that the Brahmin ministers surrounding the king would not let him (Schwartz) get too close for fear he could convert him. K.R. Subramanian says that polygamy and the practice of keeping many concubines on the part of the sovereign led to disputes of succession, “court intrigues, poisoning, and domestic anxiety and unhappiness”, but adds that in the case of this was not a potential danger because the ministers were “practically in full power” anyway. K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:23–24.

51Schwartz

Nayaks of Tanjavur

was patronized by Vijayaraghava, as the composer documented in one of his padams, “Vedukato”: “Getting over earlier misgivings, when Vijaya Raghava Nayak of Tanjavur,

In response to many an emissary, was

promptly visited by me,

In the cool garden retreat, straightaway

with a thousand lyrics,

When the Lord was brought into communion, he had me honored that day!” 52

Padams now were apparently a mainstay at court. Dr. Seetha calls padams sringara prabandhas, that is, prabandhas or compositions on the theme of love.53 She quotes a proverb of the time of Vijayaraghava, Nadu gajje katti padamu padani varidi papamu (one who did not wear the anklet and was ignorant of singing the padas, was considered a sinner). Dr. Seetha feels that padams became popular because of their “simplicity of expression, sweet style (lalitya and madhurya) and the erotic theme.”54 In her discussion, the yaksagana form from what is 52Excerpt

of a translation in B. Rajanikanta Rao, 1981:22. The song is set in Devagandhari ragam and adi talam. This same song also refers to the patronage which Tirumala Nayak of Madurai, and the Padsha (Sultan) Abdula Qutubsha of Golconda, extended to the composer. The Golconda Court will appear again in

Chapter 4 as a center of erotic poetry and padams in particular.

53“Prabandha (Sanskrit ‘tie, connection’; Tamil pirappantam ‘connected discourse; connected narrative).” S. Kersenboom-Story, 1987:33. Kersenboom-Story, following Zvelebil, characterizes prabandha as a ‘supergenre’ for which “no plausible inner logic of classification” has been found for its 96 (as of the 16th century)

constituent types of composition. She further notes, “The prabandhas have proven

to be of utmost importance for the formation of the devadasi repertoire; it shows

a similar mixture of archaic, classical Tamil compositions, folk specimens, Sanskrit

descriptive poems, praise poems, and mankalams (‘auspicious’ verses on gods and goddesses).” 1987:33–34. This helps us place the Tamil padam genre in context, as only one among many genres which the devadasi singers and dancers

performed in sacred or secular situations.

54All citations of this paragraph, S. Seetha, 1981:52. Anklets have been associated with dancers for millennia in South India.

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Kings, Devotion, Patronage, and Padams

now Karnataka state is also mentioned as having attained great popularity and patronage during the time of Vijayaraghava. Yaksagana (literally the art of the yaksas, divine females) is a dance-drama form (as are Bhagavata Mela, Kuchipudi, and Kuravanji), and contains different song genres including padams within it. For discussion of the relationships between these forms, see Mohan Khokar (1963) and Edwina Ranganathan (1982, 1984) for monographs on Bhagavata Mela and Kuchipudi in particular.

2.5.7 Denouement of the Telugu Nayak Line

With Vijayaraghava’s death in battle in 1673 came to an end the line of the Telugu Nayaks in Tanjavur. Venkatakrishna, the victorious general of Chokkanatha Nayak of Madurai, having defeated the forces “garrisoned the city and annexed the kingdom of Tanjore to that of Madura. Chokkanatha appointed his fosterbrother Alagiri Nayaka as his viceroy in Tanjore.”55 Alagiri ruled for only about one year before an internal intrigue resulted in his being overthrown. An ambitious rayasam (secretary) of Alagiri, Venkanna, discovered that one of the sons56 of Vijayaraghava had been spirited out of the palace before it was blown up and had survived. Now this boy of approximately seven years age, by name Sengamaladas, was put forward as the legitimate heir to the throne by Venkanna, who went to the Sultan of Bijapur (in west-central India) for assistance. “The Sultan, always anxious to muddy the ever disturbed politics of the Hindu States in the South entrusted Venkaji (or Ekoji) with the task of deposing Alagiri and enthroning Sengamaladas.”57 Ekoji was a half-brother of Sivaji, the great founder of the Maratha power in western India. Ekoji did assist in placing the hapless young Sengamaladas on the throne, but within a year or so, it was Ekoji himself who was the new Raja, beginning the line of Maratha rulers in either 1676 or 1678.58 55N.

Subrahmanian, 1988:47. Vijayaraghava’s advanced age of 80 at his death, more likely a grandson,

according to N. Subrahmanian (1988:84). 57N. Subrahmanian, 1988:48 (parentheses in original). 581676, according to N. Subrahmanian; 1678, according to K.R. Subramanian. 56Given

The Maratha Rajas of Tanjavur

2.6

The Maratha Rajas of Tanjavur

The new rulers of Tanjavur were natives of western India, from what is today the state of Maharashtra, and speakers of the Marathi language. Their ascendancy in South India was just one wing of the rise of the Maratha power; under their leader Sivaji the Marathas also challenged Aurangzeb in far off Delhi. The Marathas were Saivite devotees, and in their new home in the Kaveri delta became attached to Tyagaraja (literally “king of renunciation”), the form of Siva at the ancient temple of Tiruvarur about 25 miles east of Tanjavur. During the Maratha Rajas’ collective tenure of almost two centuries at Tanjavur lived the major musical figures of Karnataka music, the Trinity of composers Tyagaraja (1767–1847), Muttuswamy Dikshitar (1775–1835), and Syama Sastri (1762–1827). The famous Tanjavur Quartette59 of dance masters and musicians, four brothers Chinnayya, Ponnayya, Sivanandam, and Vadivelu, also lived during the latter part of Maratha rule (all were born in the first decade of the 19th century) and served not only the Rajas of Tanjavur, but also of Mysore and Tiruvanantapuram (also spelled Trivandrum). With the exception of Muttuttandavar, all the composers of Tamil padams who will be considered in this study lived during the era of the Maratha Rajas, although only one of them, Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, appears to have been directly patronized by the Tanjavur court (see Chapter 3). Part of the effect of Maratha hegemony on the arts and religion in the Kaveri delta was the introduction of Maratha musical and poetic forms which led to some hybrid creations such as Harikatha in Tanjavur in the 19th century.60 Maratha holy men migrated to the area and founded matams (monasteries) in the delta; settling alongside long-established Tamil Saiva matams such as Tiruvavatuturai and Dharmapuram. An extremely important point to be noted is that the Maratha Rajas continued the patronage of Telugu and Sanskrit as court languages, a practice established by the Nayaks. Works were 59The

spelling ‘Quartette’ is used by many musicologists in South India to refer to the four brothers. 60Harikatha (literally “storytelling on Vishnu”, and properly known as katha kalaksepam) flourished between the late 19th and early-to-mid 20th centuries.

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Kings, Devotion, Patronage, and Padams

composed in Marathi, and some eventually in Tamil, but it appears not at the expense of patronage of Telugu and Sanskrit which continued until the end of the Maratha line. Tamil padams do not seem to have been greatly patronized at court. As a political entity, Tanjavur saw its powers and borders steadily eaten away throughout the period. It became the practice of the British to impose new and more restrictive treaties on each successive Raja to ascend the throne, until by 1800 the Raja could claim to actually rule just Tanjavur town itself, and only then during “time of peace” as defined by the British; all his hinterlands had been taken away by the British and their proxies.61 Though Tanjavur’s existence as an independent kingdom is usually described as having lasted until Sivaji II died in 1855 without male issue (at which point the British decided the royal line was extinct, not allowing Sivaji’s daughter to assume the post), it is instructive to see how British administrators at the end of the 19th century viewed the chronology of the transfer of power, as expressed in the Manual of the Administration of the Madras Presidency: “Tanjore was governed by an independent Rajah until 1799, when the British caused him to resign the administration accepting a revenue of a lakh of pagodas, or 3 1/2 lakhs of rupees, with one-fifth of the net revenue of the country. He was also permitted, in time of peace only, to keep possession of the town and fortress of Tanjore.”62

We will outline the course of events during the time of the Maratha Rajas, especially as they relate to the patronage of the arts and give us further perspectives on the padam genre. Figure 2.2 traces the lineage of the Maratha Rajas of Tanjavur.

2.6.1 Venkoji/Ekoji I

In the view of K.R. Subramanian, in his short reign, Ekoji did all he could to “cut himself off from Sivaji [founder of the Maratha 61This

may have been an important factor in the later Maratha Rajas’ devotion to Siva in the form of Brhadisvara at Tanjavur. Whereas the early Maratha Rajas worshipped particularly Siva as Tyagaraja at Tiruvarur, Tiruvarur was outside the control of the later Rajas.

62C.D. Maclean, 1885/1987:I:21–22.

The Maratha Rajas of Tanjavur

power] and the greater Marathi plan” and “became content like his predecessors to live at ease in the pool of Tanjore rather than risk himself in the wide ocean of fame and splendor.”63 He was followed in office by three of his sons in turn.64

63K.R.

Figure 2.2 Maratha Rajas of Tanjavur.

Subramanian, 1928/1988:21,23. Subramanian cites “the Marathi inscription” as saying that the three sons ruled jointly and had great mutual attachment. 1928/1988:26.

64K.R.

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Kings, Devotion, Patronage, and Padams

2.6.2 Sahaji I Dr. Seetha describes Sahaji I in glowing superlatives as “The Royal Composer and Musicologist of Tanjore.”65 She bases this on both the breadth and quality of his own artistic accomplishments and on those of others during his reign. K.R. Subramanian agrees, saying that “from no other Maratha king have we such a rich crop of literature.”66 His strong patronage of Telugu and Sanskrit composition, of Brahmin communities throughout the district, of Bhagavata Mela and Bharata Natya, is attested to by Dr. Seetha.67 A set of raga laksana manuscripts68 dating from his reign are valuable resources for reconstructing musical theory and practice at the time.69 Patronage of Tamil by the Maratha court of Tanjavur is evaluated equivocally by different commentators; while B. Natarajan feels that Sahaji “knew no barriers of language where music was concerned,”70 K.R. Subramanian states “it is a sad contrast to find comparatively little of Tamil literature during the Maratha period.”71 Both feel that the Tamil Saiva matams continued to be major patrons of Tamil, moreso than the court. The poet Tayumanavar flourished approximately 1700; his 65S.

Seetha, 1981:64. Subramanian, 1928/1988:29. 67S. Seetha, 1981:65. The use of the term Bharata Natyam here should not lead

us to conclude that this term was in use at that time for the dance style now known by that name. This term was adopted in the 1930s by scholars and the dance community as part of the movement to ‘reform’ or ‘revive’ the dance (see Chapter 6). It is a term of greater antiquity, however. For example, it is found in a line of Matananukku, one of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s padams on Kacci Kalyanaranga, the Zamindar of Udaiyarpalaiyam: “parata nattiyan kokkokam patippal” (“she studies Bharata Natyam and the arts of love”). In U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:87. 68Laksana or lakshana: “Science or Grammar; used with reference to a raga, tala, or musical form. The lakshana of a raga means the various factors that go to determine its melodic individuality.” P. Sambamoorthy, 1971:2. 69“In order to record the different theories regarding the laksanas of the popular ragas of his time, he invited the musicologists and musicians, representatives of Hindustani and Carnatic music, to his court. Consequently, there came to be written eleven laksana manuscripts, each giving different views about the characteristics of the ragas.” S. Seetha, 1981:85. 70B. Natarajan, 1988:36. 71K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:34.

66K.R.

The Maratha Rajas of Tanjavur

Tamil compositions are sung and danced to abhinaya (mimetic gesture language) as viruttam72 in the family of Vina Dhanammal. Tamil kuttus (literally dances), “not of a high order either in plot, humor, or style, and contain(ing) a few vulgar passages” were also composed during his reign.73 Dr. Seetha states that sringara padams were composed in Tamil, Telugu, Sanskrit, and Marathi in great number; listing Rama Bharati and Vasudeva Kavi as composers of Tamil padas from this time.74 Sahaji himself composed 103 sringara padas on Siva as Tyagaraja of Tiruvarur, in Sanskrit, Telugu, and Marathi,75 and authored the Pallaki Seva Prabandham, a Telugu language opera76 also centered on Tyagaraja of Tiruvarur.77 Raja Sahaji’s great piety is illustrated by reference to the story: “It is said that he used to have his midday meals only after ascertaining that the mid-day worship of Sri Tyagaraja was completed at Tiruvarur, which fact was conveyed to him by a system of relay bells.”78

72Viruttam—a

type of verse, one of three subdivisions (viruttam, taricai, turai) of pavinam—Tamil Lexicon. Viruttams are rendered (as are Sanskrit slokas) in the family of Vina Dhanammal in free meter and in ragamalika, a garland of ragas. 73“The language is colloquial generally as spoken by a Maratha. The usual plot is that some princess falls in love with Shahji and secures him at last.” K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:29. 74S. Seetha 1981:85. An edition of Vasudeva Kavi’s songs has been published (texts only, Tamil) by the Saraswati Mahal Library in 1985. (#225 in their publication series.) The introduction says that he composed in four languages. Unfortunately, none of these songs has a known living musical tradition in the 20th century. 75Sahaji’s Marathi dance compositions have been the subject of attention recently; some have been set to Hindustani music and performed. 76“Opera is a special type of play with music. ‘Operas’ of South India are different from the Opera in Europe. In South India, Opera is a type of art form which has a story set with songs in a classical type of music with intermittent verses and prose passages in both conversational and indirect style.” S.A.K. Durga 1979:xi. According to Durga, it was Prof. P. Sambamurthy who began using the term ‘Opera’ in the South Indian context. The term “Dance drama” is also used to describe forms covered under this rubric such as Terukkuttu, Bhagavatha Mela, Kuchupudi, Yakshagana, and Kuravanji. 77S. Seetha 1981:68–70. Two recent editions of Pallaki Seva Prabandham are P. Sambamoorthy, ed., 1955, and G. Kuppuswamy, ed., 1977, both with introductory essays in English. 78S. Seetha, 1981:68.

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Kings, Devotion, Patronage, and Padams

And at least one source suggests that Sahaji followed the tradition of retiring from involvement in the world to become a sannyasin, a renunciate: “We may infer from Advaita Kirtana, a manuscript in Tamil, that Shahji became a yogi at the end of his life. The influence of the Maratha saints was not lost on the Bhonsle kings.” 79

2.6.3 The 18th Century: A Word about Padams

We find ourselves now at the beginning of the 18th century, when several of the Tamil padam composers considered in this study lived: Papavinasa Mudaliar, Marimutta Pillai, Arunacala Kavirayar, and Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar.80 Their padams, we will see, and those of Muttuttandavar from the 17th century, share some important characteristics with each other which are not found in padams of the 19th century. Indeed, the 18th-century compositions of this study, composed outside the sphere of patronage of the court, are held by some scholars and musicians to not be padams at all. As we will see, the 18th-century padams considered in this study are quite different from the standard sringara padam, as it was developed fully by Ksetrayya and then (according to one view of the transmission) copied both by later Telugu and Tamil padam composers. The thread of the composers of padams is picked up in the next Chapter.

2.6.4 Serfoji I

There do not appear to be unique developments during his reign in the field of arts. Historians stress the maintenance of the course set by his brother Sahaji: “Serfoji continued the illustrious cultural and the not-so-illustrious political traditions established by his brother.” 81 The major political event in 79K.R.

Subramanian, 1928/1988:33. “Bhonsle” is a family name of the Maratha Rajas. the 18th-century padam composers whose music is known today (and whose songs are therefore included in this study) were not court musicians at Tanjavur, though they all lived in the Kaveri delta, while compositions of the two Tamil padam composers of the court mentioned above (Rama Bharati and Vasudeva Kavi) are not available in a continuous musical tradition, and are therefore not covered by this study. 81N. Subrahmanian, 1988:93. 80Interestingly,

The Maratha Rajas of Tanjavur

which Serfoji was involved was the internal political situation of Ramanathapuram (often abbreviated as Ramnad), located southeast of Madurai, which ended in the creation of the zamindari (small kingdom or chief-dom) of Sivaganga out of part of Ramanathapuram’s territory.82 Lacking any sons by his wives, Serfoji had an illegitimate son83 who became known as Kattu Raja (King of the Forest) for hiding out in the wilds (variously called forests or jungles in contemporary accounts) of Udaiyarpalaiyam,84 slightly to the north of the Kaveri delta and outside of its main agricultural region, before briefly seizing power in Tanjavur in 1738.

2.6.5 Tulaja I

Tulaja was the youngest brother of Sahaji I, the final of the three sons of Venkoji (Ekoji) to rule Tanjavur. The two most-noted events of his reign in the arts are his composition of the music-theoretical treatise Sangita Saramrta and the increased presence of Hindusthani music in Tanjavur. An estimate of the Sangita Saramrta is given by Dr. Seetha: ”Sangita Saramrta of Tulaja represents an important landmark in the history of music, has popularised the theories of Venkatamakhi and is also unique in the treatment of raga and ragalaksana. A scientific codification of the

82These

two kingdoms or zamindaris supported many musicians and composers, among them Kavikunjara Bharati, one of the important 19th-century padam composers of this study, and his elder contemporary and teacher Madura Kavi Bharati, also a composer of padams. 83Or, in another version described by K.R. Subramanian, this “Kattu Raja” actually posed as the illegitimate son of Serfoji by a washerwoman Kuppi or Rupi, saying he had been raised in the forest, 1928/1988:40. 84Which we will see again as the temporary refuge of the Sankaracharya (Hindu Pontiff) of Kancipuram when that town came under Muslim influence. K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:48. Udaiyarpalaiyam is mentioned many times in the diaries (1736–1761) of Ananda Ranga Pillai of Pondicherry as a way station on the route between Pondicherry and Tanjavur, sometimes as a place where individuals fleeing the wrath of the Tanjavur Raja would find refuge. Udaiyarpalaiyam was the home of the last of the three major patrons of the 19th-century

padam composer Ghanam Krishna Ayyar and will be considered further when

we discuss this composer.

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Kings, Devotion, Patronage, and Padams

ragas in vogue is available for the first time in the Lakshana manuscripts of Sahaji and Sangita Saramrta.”85

The gradual migration of musicians and songs from Maharashtra appears to have been responsible for what was at this time (ca. 1730) noted as a strong presence of Hindusthani music at the Tanjavur court.86 Dr. Seetha reports that patronage and composition of padas continued, although she notes that “unfortunately we are not furnished with the names of the court musicians and composers who had sung padas in praise of the king” at this time.87 Politically, N. Subrahmanian reports that, like his immediate successor Serfoji, Tulaja continued to meddle in the affairs of Ramanathapuram and also of Pudukkottai, another small kingdom located between Tanjavur and Sivaganga: “Tanjore, thwarted in the north by the superior might of the Moghuls, in its turn became aggressive in the south and interfered in the politics of the Maravas [inhabitants of Ramanathapuram] and the Tondaiman [the ruler of Pudukkottai]. Tukkoji was neither competent nor peace loving; he was rashly aggressive and disgustingly cruel in his tactics.”88

The net result of affairs at the end of Tulaja’s reign was that the Madurai Nayak line was extinguished, with Trichy (the Madurai Nayak’s final capital) occupied by the Muslim General, Chanda Saheb:

85S.

“The extinction of the neighbouring Hindu dynasty of Madurai Nayaks was a great blow to the Marathas of Tanjore. One more Hindu state was absorbed by the Muslim, and hemmed in by Muslim states on either side, Tanjore had to eke out a miserable existence.”89

Seetha, 1981:94. is probable that with the advent of the Maharashtra bhajan and kirtan style of singing in Tanjore, Hindusthani music and musical forms became more popular in the South.” S. Seetha, 1981:88. 87S. Seetha, 1981:94. 88N. Subrahmanian, 1988:94. S. Seetha, 1981:94. 89K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:41–42. 86“It

The Period of Anarchy

2.7 The Period of Anarchy Ekoji II, a son of one of Tulaja’s five wives, ascended the throne on his father’s passing in 1736. Within a year of assuming office, he “succumbed to one of the conspiracies so rife during this period,”90 likely due to Saiyid,91 his Khilledar (official in control of the fort), at the age of 41. His queen Sujana Bai then held office for two years before being displaced by Kattu Raja who emerged from the forest and took control of Tanjavur. Saiyid befriended another of Tulaja’s sons, Saiyaji, ousted Kattu Raja, and installed Saiyaji in August 1738.92 Soon after, Chanda Saheb overthrew Saiyaji and installed Pratap Singh, “against his own will,” according to K.R. Subramanian, in 1739.93 Even in such a short reign, there is evidence of Ekoji’s catholicity as a ruler and talents as a composer, writing works on Rama as well as on the Maratha family deity Candramoulisvara (another name for Siva as Tyagaraja at Tiruvarur). His court was graced by the famous dancer Muddmanga: “For each of her fine performance of varieties of dances such as jakkini, padacali, tullal, abhinaya, Ekoji used to present her with a bunch of Muktyala or pearl necklace.”94 It is recorded that during her short tenure, Ekoji’s queen Sujana Bai gave generous amounts of land to support artists of the Bhagavata Mela tradition.95 90K.R.

Subramanian, 1928/1988:43. was a ruthless Mussulman, whimsical and self willed in the extreme. A great lover of power, he could set up and depose Kings at will on account of the army he had under his control. For four years he was the de facto ruler. As a Muslim, his sympathies were with the Nawab and his son in law Chanda Sahib. During the period of his dominance, charities were held in abeyance and temples and yajnas [sacrifices] neglected.” K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:49. 92N. Subrahmanian, 1988:97, who notes that some hold Kattu Raja and Saiyaji were the same person, or that there never was a Saiyaji. 93K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:44. 94S. Seetha, 1981:96. Seetha notes that tullal was a type of dance popular in Kerala. 95B. Natarajan, 1988:46,213. According to Natarajan Sujana Bai’s “gift deed” is dated December 1735, implying that this gift of lands may have taken place while her

husband Ekoji was still alive, perhaps even before he became the king.

91“He

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Kings, Devotion, Patronage, and Padams

2.7.1 Pratap Singh K.R. Subramanian calls Pratap Singh “the last of the great Rajas of Tanjore”, noting that “Clive and the young East India Company used to address Pratap as ‘His Majesty’ and treated him as an independent king.”96 He was a son of Tulaja by a sword wife, Annapurna.97 As were his predecessors, he was known for religious tolerance, having built a mosque at Nagore and endowing it with fifteen villages.98 During his reign, the British and French were at each other’s throats in South India as elsewhere, the French being decisively defeated at Pondicherry in 1761. Pratap Singh’s support for the British did not prevent them from attacking and taking (on the second attempt) Tanjavur’s seaside fort of Devikottai in 1748, and then making Pratap pay regular tribute. This incident is cited by K.R. Subramanian as the first successful military attempt of the British to take land from the Tanjavur kingdom.99 By the end of Pratap Singh’s reign the Nawab of Arcot, Muhammad Ali, an ally of the British, was applying great pressure to Tanjavur. In 1763 and 1765, he refused to allow the Raja of Tanjavur to repair the major Kaveri river anicut (dam) controlling the flow of water throughout the whole Kaveri delta area and therefore “on which depended the wealth of his kingdom.”100 The town of Udaiyarpalaiyam, where the infamous Kattu Raja is said to have earlier been raised and/or sought refuge, comes up in our story again during Pratap Singh’s reign. Pratap “welcomed to Kumbakonam the Sankaracharya of Kamakoti Pita from Udaiyarpalaiyam whither the latter had shifted from Kanchi [Kancipuram] on account of the increasing Muhammadan influences in that city.”101 The Sankaracharyas are Hindu religious pontiffs 96K.R.

Subramanian, 1928/1988:47. sword wife is one who is married to the heroism of a king and not his loyalty.” N. Subrahmanian, 1988:96. 98K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:46. 99K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:52. 100“The Nawob was the real lord of Tanjore, firmly and protected by the British Company and free from any rival.” K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:56. 101K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:48. The Kamakoti Pita, the headquarters of the Sankaracarya’s monastery, is located in Kancipuram. 97“A

The Period of Anarchy

of great importance; it is indicative of the political instability of the time that the Sankaracharya felt he had to leave Kancipuram. Activities at Pratap Singh’s court appear to be best known through details given in Radhika Santvanam (Appeasing Radhika), a poetic composition of a famous woman dancer and composer at court, Muddupalani.102 Muddupalani also composed Saptapadalu, a translation into Telugu of Andal’s 9th-century Tamil work Tiruppavai;103 she was highly honored at court both for her scholarship and her dance.

2.7.2 Tulaja II

It was during the reign of Tulaja II that all three of the “Trinity,” great composers in the music tradition, were born in Tiruvarur, 102Portions

of Radhika Santvanam have been recently translated and published in an anthology of women’s writing in India, edited by Susie Tharu and K. Lalita. In her review of this volume, Anita Desai reports that Bangalore Nagaratnammal (d. 1952), a famous woman vocalist, scholar, and social activist of the devadasi community, liked the Radhika Santvanam very much and decided to reprint it in 1910, “not only [because it was] written by a woman, but by one who was born into our community” (Desai, 1992:42). The basic premise of the work is an inversion … of the usual story in which Krishna pursues the… Gopis, … says Desai: “[S]he celebrated a young girl’s coming of age and her experience of sex with an unexpected and sophisticated twist. Erotic poetry in India is traditionally cast in the form of the Lord Krishna wooing the milkmaid Radha; but in Radhika Santwanam it is she who takes the initiative and it is her satisfaction that is central. One finds oneself amazed that such a radical interpretation was accepted in her day” (Desai, 1992:42). Desai reports that Bangalore Nagaratnammal found it extremely difficult to even procure a copy of the work, and once she had brought out the reprint, all copies were seized and it was banned until India’s independence in 1947. A new edition was only brought out in 1952, the year of Nagaratnammäl’s death. Both women, the 18th-century Muddupalani and the 20th-century Nagaratnammal, were accomplished artists and proud of their devadasi heritage, which by the early 20th century was under concerted attack from social reformers. (Among Nagaratnammal’s further achievements was the renovation of the composer Tyagaraja’s samadhi shrine at Tiruvaiyaru between 1921 and 1925, enabling women musicians to perform for the first time at Tyagaraja’s death anniversary celebrations. For more information on the life of Bangalore Nagaratnammal, see T. Sankaran, 1984a.) 103S. Seetha, 1981:97,98. On the subject of Andal, the only woman among the twelve Vaishnavite Alvar saint-poets, see V. Dehejia, 1990.

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the seat of the Maratha Raja’s devotion.104 The fathers of Tyagaraja and Muttuswamy Dikshitar, Sri Rama Brahman and Ramaswamy Dikshitar, respectively, were patronized by Tulaja at court.105 Bearing great import for the future of dance in the south of India, Tulaja is credited as well with patronizing great nattuvanars (teachers of dance). He brought the famous nattuvanar Mahadeva Annavi, from Tirunelveli in the deep south of Tamil country to his court for the purpose of systematizing the art of dance. Mahadeva Annavi was famous for his kirtanas, and varnas in Tamil and Telugu. The two dancing girls named Vanajakshi and Muttumannar, who had accompanied him to Tanjore, performed the dance in the court of Tulaja while Mahadeva Nattuvanar sang the varnam beginning with the sahitya [text] ‘Bhosala Tulajendra raja’ and did nattuvangam.106 In addition to Mahadeva Annavi, important dance teachers patronized by Tulaja included the grandfather and father of the Quartette, Gangaimuttu and Subbaraya Oduvar.107 As T. Sankaran tells the story: “Subbaroya Nattuvanar’s family had already acquired a sort of hereditary right in respect of temple and palace services, from …the day his voice had captivated King Tulaja when he heard him chant devotional hymns during his worship at Chenganarkoil.”108

Gangaimuttu was the father of Subbaraya,109 and Subbaraya the father of the Quartette of musicians and dance masters, Chinnayya, Ponnayya, Sivanandam, and Vadivelu, whose fame 104Syama

Sastri, 1762–1827; Muttuswamy Dikshitar, 1775–1835; and Tyagaraja, 1767–1847. B.M. Sundaram (ND, writing under the pen name ‘Gurukrupa’) argues that Tyagaraja, however, was born at Tiruvaiyaru and not Tiruvarur. 105S. Seetha, 1981:102. 106S. Seetha 1981:100. ‘Bhosala’ or ‘Bhonsle’ was a family title of the Tanjavur Maratha Rajas. 107The Oduvar community is the traditional community of singers of the Tevaram, Saivite bhakti devotional hymns composed between the 6th and 9th centuries A.D. The word oduvar literally means “s/he who sings or recites.” 108T. Sankaran, “Tanjore Quartette.” Hindu Composer Series #15, ca. 1971. 109T. Sankaran, 1971.

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was to spread throughout India in the 19th century, reaching as far north as Baroda.110 Politically, the tenure of Tulaja saw the power of the Raja dramatically curtailed due to a series of conflicts, ending with almost abject dependence on the British. The Nawab of the Carnatic, Muhammad Ali, backed by the British, wanted Tulaja to have his army ready to fight against Hyder Ali of Mysore, whose cavalry attacks on the Carnatic had just started at the beginning of Tulaja’s reign,111 while Tulaja’s natural inclination was to keep his forces in reserve or in case of hostilities with Tanjavur’s sometime foes of Ramanathapuram, Sivaganga, and Pudukkottai to the south. Applying additional pressure, in 1769 Hyder Ali for his part demanded Tulaja pay tribute to him for aiding the British, threatening if not satisfied to “not only burn the whole country, but cut off the whole body of the inhabitants and Brahmans.”112 Thus Tanjavur found itself squeezed from several directions. In a major defeat for Tulaja in 1771, the Nawab and the British successfully backed the Setupati of Ramanathapuram against Tanjavur. “The Nawab duly demanded 25 lakhs of rupees from the Raja who duly prevaricated. Then an army from Arcot jointly led by Umdat-ul-Umara, the son of Muhammad Ali and general Smith attacked and defeated the Tanjoreans in September 1771 and dictated peace.”113

By the terms imposed on Tulaja, Mayavaram and Kumbakonam, two of the oldest and richest towns in the Tanjavur district, were to be ceded to the Nawab for a period of two years, and Tulaja’s fort of Vallam (described as a beautiful garden and as the preferred residence for Europeans assigned to Tanjavur) was to be destroyed. “This humiliating treaty 110Gangaimuttu,

ca. 1760, was the author of Natana Vadya Ranjanam, a manual of dance practice. Chinnayya (Chinniah), born 1802 or 1803; Ponnayya (Ponniah), born 1804; Sivanandam, born 1808; Vadivelu, 1810–1845. Dates from T. Sankaran, 1971 and 1972. 111N. Subrahmanian, 1988:102. 112N. Subrahmanian, 1988:103. 113N. Subrahmanian, 1988:104.

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evidences neither diplomatic competence nor military ability on the part of Tuljaji. But he seems never to have intended to keep the treaty.” 114 The Nawab again invaded with British support in 1773, on several pretexts, this time overthrowing the Raja and occupying his territories for two and a half years (September 1773 to April 1776). He carried away immense quantities of property partly to satisfy his gambling debts to prominent citizens of Chennai such as Paul Benfield, so much property that when the Directors of the East India Company back in London became aware of these excesses, they had the British Governor in Madras, Wynch, dismissed and replaced: “The Court [of Directors of the East India Company] are of the opinion, that the Governor and Council of Madras were not justified, in 1771, in placing the Company’s troops at the disposal of the Nawab, leaving it to him to settle with the Raja as he pleased, and they were much less justified, in 1773, in dethroning the Raja, and putting the Nawab in possession of the Principality.” 115

Tulaja was restored to power by the British in April 1776. He signed a treaty with the British which stripped him of any army (beyond a small palace guard) and any rights to pursue a foreign policy. In case of attack, he was not to defend himself but to request the British troops garrisoned in Tanjavur at his (Tulaja’s) expense to do so. He proclaimed “Had I a thousand tongues, they could not express my gratitude to the Company. The Country is the Company’s”116 and in what was known as the Nagore settlement, gave 277 villages to the East India Company. “This was the second footing for the British in the fertile garden of the South.”117 114N.

Subrahmanian, 1988:104. in N. Subrahmanian, 1988:106. 116K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:62.

117K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:63. “Giving a village” in this context refers to

assignment of revenues from their agricultural production. The gift, however, did not rescind previous inams (grants) made by the Tanjavur Rajas to temples, choultries (rest houses for Hindu pilgrims), or Brahmins in these villages. 115Quoted

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One more major upheaval in Tanjavur and its surrounding hinterlands during Tulaja’s tenure was a series of attacks by Hyder Ali and his son Tipu Sultan from 1780 to 1784, especially the occupation of almost all the kingdom except Tanjavur town itself for six months in 1780–1781. The British commander cum-guardian in Tanjavur at the time, Col. Braithwaite, was forced to surrender to Tipu Sultan near Kumbakonam in 1781: “The only source of help failed.”118 In 1928, the historian K.R. Subramanian told a story passed down in his own family: “Stories are still current about Hyderkalabam. The author has heard them from his great-grandmother. At the approach of the plunderers who generally came on horseback, the houses were deserted after the valuables were hidden. Only old women were left in the houses. Girls of age were sometimes hidden in barns and the horses used to scent their presence!”119

2.7.3 Reverend Schwartz

The German missionary Christian Frederick Schwartz (also spelled ‘Swartz’), is a major figure in the politics of Tanjavur from the reign of Tulaja to that of Sarabhoji II.120 Schwartz, who became both the confidante of Tulaja (although he was never able to convert him, blaming this on the coterie of Brahmin ministers which constantly surrounded the Raja and kept Schwartz at a distance) and the tutor of his son the future Raja Sarabhoji II, wrote about the horrible state of affairs in during the time of Hyder and Tipu’s attacks, saying that thousands of children were carried off to be forcibly converted and impressed into ‘chela battalions’, and that there were heaps of dead in and around Tanjavur.121 Looking back on this time from 118K.R.

Subramanian, 1928/1988:64. Subramanian,1928/1988:65. 120Born in Sonnenburg, Newmark, Germany, in 1726 (Schwartz 1826:1). S. Seetha (1981:103) calls him “the Danish missionary,” reflecting his affiliation with the Danish Lutheran missionary organization in India, not his country of origin. 121See K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:64; N. Subrahmanian, 1988:107. 119K.R.

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a slightly more comfortable distance, in a 1794 letter to his religious supervisors Schwartz wrote: “I hope that the honourable Society will not look upon some observations which I am about to make as a vain and sinful boasting, but rather as a necessary self defence. Neither the missionaries, nor any of the Christians, have hurt the welfare of the country.

In the course of the late war [1780-81], the fort of Tanjore

was in a very critical condition. A powerful enemy was near,

the people in the fort numerous; and not provision even for the garrison. There was grain enough in the country, but we had no bullocks to bring it into the fort. When the country people formerly brought paddy [rice] into the fort, the rapacious dubashes [agents] deprived them of their due pay. Hence, all confidence was lost; so that the inhabitants drove away their cattle, refusing to assist the fort. The late Rajah [Tulaja] ordered, nay, entreated the people, by his managers, to come and help us; but all was in vain. At last, the Rajah said to one of our principal gentlemen, We all, you and I, have lost our credit; let us fry whether the inhabitants will trust Mr. Swartz. Accordingly he sent me a blank paper, empowering me to make a proper agreement with the people. There was no time for hesitation. The sepoys [soldiers] fell down as dead people, being emaciated with hunger. Our streets were lined with dead corpses every morning. Our condition was deplorable. I sent, therefore, letters, every where roundabout, promising to pay everyone with my own hands; and to indemnify them for the loss of every bullock which might be taken by the enemy. In one or two days, I got above a thousand oxen, and sent one of our catechists, and other Christians, out into the country. They went at the risk of their lives, made all possible haste, and brought into the fort, in a very short time, eighty thousand kalams [a measure of paddy, rice]. By this means, the fort was saved. When all was over, I paid the people, even with some money which belonged to others, made them a small present, and sent them home.

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The next year, when Colonel Braithwaite, with his whole detachment, was made prisoner, Major Alcock commanded the fort, and behaved very kindly to the poor starving people. We were then, a second time, in the same miserable condition. The enemy always invaded the country when the harvest was nigh at hand. I was again desired to my former expedient, and succeeded. The people knowing that they were not to be deprived of their pay, came with their cattle.”122

In addition to his sacred duties, Schwartz’s purely secular value was apparent to the British and he was therefore retained as interpreter to the East India Company at Tanjavur in 1786, on a salary of 100 British pounds per year, “with a monthly allowance of twenty pagodas for a palanquin.”123 As Tulaja’s death approached in 1787, he being without a male heir decided to adopt the 10-year-old son of a cousin to succeed him, and to place the child under the guardianship of his (Tulaja’s) brother Amar Singh, who would rule in the child’s minority as regent. This arrangement was reached, according to Schwartz (as narrated by Pearson) only after Tulaja first offered the child to Schwartz himself as guardian: “The Rajah sent for Mr. Swartz, and, on his arrival, addressed him in the following brief but emphatic manner. Pointing to his newly-adopted child, he said, This is not my son, but yours; into your hand I deliver him.’ The pious missionary replied, ‘May this child become a child of God!’... So, unexpected and flattering a charge might have proved a temptation to a man of greater ambition and less disinterestedness than Swartz; but he immediately replied, ‘You know, Rajah, that I have always been willing to serve you, as far as I could; but this, your last request, is beyond my power.

...You know there are competitors and parties in the palace,

who aspire to the government. Cabals and animosities

will ensue more than you may think of. These will endanger

122Schwartz 123Schwartz

in Person, 1835:II:278–79. in Pearson, 1835:11:82. A palanquin is a conveyance.

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the life of the boy, and involve the kingdom in confusion.... You will be pleased to adopt some other plan.’ The Rajah asked, What method do you propose?’ Swartz answered, ‘You have a brother, -deliver the child to him; charge him to educate and treat him as his own son, till he is grown up. Thus his health and life may be preserved, and the welfare of the country may be secured.’ To this suggestion, the Rajah at first objected, but afterwards said, ‘Well, I will consider all that you have urged.’ ‘And so,’ adds the missionary, ‘I left him.’”124

Schwartz further reports that Tulaja gave his agreement to the plan despite misgivings about his half-brother Amar Singh, to whom he had never been close, and requested Schwartz to be the boy’s tutor, a request accepted in turn by Schwartz.125

2.7.4 Amar Singh at Tiruvidaimarudur

Upon Tulaja’s death in 1787, the British confirmed Amar Singh as regent and took the opportunity to impose a new treaty on Tanjavur, by which: “Amar Singh should make an annual contribution of four lakhs of pagodas to the Company and that it should vary with the revenues of the state; that if punctual payment of the amount was not made, the Company would be at liberty to make its own arrangements to collect the amount; during wartime 4/5 of the state revenues should be paid into the English treasury but the usual tribute could be suspended; the Raja was also to pay an annual amount of three lakhs of pagodas to liquidate the arrears due to the Nawab; and that all the aforesaid amounts were to be remitted into the English treasury only. Even if Amar Singh had a will to pay, it looked as if he had not the means to honor the terms of this treaty.”126

124Schwartz

in Pearson, 1835:II:95–97. Subrahmanian, 1988:106; S. Seetha, 1981:103. 126N. Subrahmanian, 1988:108. 125N.

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To this description of the terms of the treaty, K.R. Subramanian adds: “two fifths of Tanjore revenues were to go to the military peace establishment, for which territorial security was to be given to the Company. In wartime the amount should be doubled.”127 In any event, all sources agree that the demands were impossible for Amar Singh to fulfill, and by 1790 the East India Company did proceed to collect the moneys directly through their own dubashes,128 an arrangement which the intrepid missionary Schwartz portrays himself as persuading Amar Singh to accept. In his account, Schwartz rails against Chennai dubashes who “are all well able to make supplements to Machiavel’s iniquitous scheme,” whose injustices have resulted in the ryots129 refusing to plant crops out of the knowledge that all their fruits will be plundered. He entreats the Government of Madras not to simply send their own dubashes to replace those of Amar Singh, a plea which was not heeded.130 From the beginning of the regency of Amar Singh, there appears to have been active hostility between him and his supporters on the one hand, and the child Sarabhoji and his supporters, notably Schwartz, on the other. Wanting more than anything to convert his ward and then place a Christian king on the throne, Schwartz “spared no pains to represent or misrepresent the defects in the Raja’s administration”131 to the British. For his part, Amar Singh early sought to convince the British that he (Amar Singh) and not the child Sarabhoji, was the legitimate heir to the throne: “The friends... of Ameer Sing, were by no means contented that he should retain merely the character of regent, and

127K.R.

Subramanian, 1928/1988:67. Company’s dubashes were not more scrupulous or sympathetic than the Raja’s servants and made as much money as they could in as short a time.” K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:68. The word dubash literally means “two languages,” i.e., someone who is able to interpret, especially to arrange business transactions, between different parties. Schwartz also uses the term “renters” to refer to dubashes, in Pearson, 1835:II:182–83. 129Ryot: “Ultimately of Arabic origin; an Indian peasant, husbandman, or cultivating tenant”, OED. 130Schwartz in Pearson, 1835:II:180–183. 131K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:69. 128“The

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guardian to the adopted son of the late Rajah, but appear to have made strong representations to Sir Archibald Campbell on the justice of excluding him from the immediate succession to the throne. It was also insinuated, that at the time of the adoption of Serfojee by the late Rajah, his mind was so much weakened by disease, and influenced by some of those around him, that he could scarcely be considered competent to the performance of so important an act.”132

The party of Amar Singh appealed to the Governor at Chennai, Campbell, to rule that Sarabhoji’s adoption had been invalid: “The gullible Madras Governor consulted a number of pandits in Tanjore on these points. The pandits had already been bought off by Amar Singh and they unanimously and emphatically asserted that Amar Singh was the rightful heir to the throne and dismissed the claims of Serfoji.”133

The Memoirs of Schwartz date this decision to 1789, although according to K.R. Subramanian it was not until 1793 that Campbell decided in favor of Amar Singh.134 Schwartz’s Memoirs state that from the beginning of his rule, Amar Singh kept Sarabhoji confined in a windowless room, in isolation from the outside world. “In addition to the knowledge Mr. Swartz and myself have of his situation, the widows of the late Rajah have stated the condition in which he is held. He remains still deprived not only of all education, but also of free air, exercise and attendance.”135 Schwartz himself wrote that upon going to the palace, he “found [Sarabhoji] in a dark room, a lamp burning at his side, and no fresh air could reach him. When I saw him thus, I felt a grief which I can hardly express.”136 132Schwartz

in Pearson, 1835:11:101–102. This is from Chapter XV, chronicling events of 1787, the first year of Amar Singh’s reign. 133N. Subrahmanian, 1988:109. 134K.R. Subramanian, 1928/1988:69; Schwartz in Pearson, 1835:II:102,150. 135Schwartz in Pearson, 1835:II:145. Excerpt from a letter from the Resident at Tanjavur to the government in Madras, 1789. 136Schwartz in Pearson, 1835:11:173.

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Amar Singh responded that “the boy had proper clothes, food and medical assistance, when he wanted it, and was better treated by his excellency than he himself [Amar Singh] had been by his brother, the late Rajah that the boy had a schoolmaster, but was of an obstinate disposition, and disinclined to learn.”137 The British then insisted that Sarabhoji be removed to different quarters, which was eventually accomplished “under the guard of twelve sepoys.”138 Life was not peaceful for Sarabhoji even in his new arrangements. In November 1792, when Amar Singh’s only son in law (therefore his only hope for eventual male grandchildren, as he had no sons) met an early death, he (Amar Singh) accused the wives of his deceased brother Tulaja (who were guardians of Sarabhoji) of the deed: “In the agony of his grief, as it may be charitably concluded, for a loss which deprived him of the hope of posterity, the Rajah strangely imputed this unhappy event to enchantments practised by the Baie Sahebs, (widows of Tuljajee,) by means of a Pusary (Magician). He even accused them of plotting, by the same abominable arts, against his own life; and, after condemning the Pusary to be hanged, for the alleged witchcraft, he caused a proclamation to be publicly read under the windows of the Baie Sahebs’ residence, accusing them of instigating the wretched man to this atrocious crime. While the Rajah thus unjustly accused the widows of his late brother, he himself was guilty of something more palpably injurious, by causing a quantity of chillies, (long pepper,) and other ingredients, to be burnt under the windows of Serfojee’s apartments; by which he and his attendants were nearly suffocated.” 139

The first chapter of Amar Singh’s history ends in 1798, when the British re-opened the case of Sarabhoji’s adoption, declared 137Schwartz

in Pearson, 1835:11:148. Year 1789. in Pearson, 1835:11:155. Year 1789. 139Schwartz in Pearson, 1835:11:237 (parentheses in original). Pearson glosses Pusary (Pujari) here as “Magician.” In normal parlance, it is a term for a Hindu ritual specialist, one who conducts pujas and religious offerings. 138Schwartz

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it valid after all, and forced Amar Singh off the throne in favor of Sarabhoji. K.R. Subramanian believes, based on Lord Valentia’s Travels, that the English Resident had wanted Amar Singh to resign the throne for a pension, ending the line. Amar Singh having refused (showing great dignity, according to Subramanian), only then did the British decide to reopen the question of the validity of Sarabhoji’s adoption, reversing their earlier decision toward the aim of having a pliant child Raja to deal with.140 The significance of Amar Singh ends for the dynastic historians, but continues for our study, as he leaves in June of 1798 for his miniature court at Tiruvidaimarudur, a few miles east of Kumbakonam, taking along a pension of 25,000 pagodas per year.141 Here he and later his son, named Pratap Singh after his (Amar Singh’s) father, a common Tamil Saiva practice, and were patrons of the Tamil padam composer Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, as also the composer of Nandanar Caritram, Gopalakrishna Bharati, and the Hindusthani musician Ramadoss.142 Calling Tiruvidaimarudur “the seat of Tamil devotional music,” Dr. Seetha characterizes it as a splendid center of patronage of dance and music, rivalling Tanjavur itself at the time.143 In a manner that seems unusual behavior on the part of the British, who did not often interfere in internal cultural matters of the Indian Rajas, the Company here discouraged courtly display by Amar Singh, perhaps because it might appear to rival that of the government in Tanjavur: “According to one State record the dancing girls were dissuaded from entertaining Amarasimha in his court at Tiruvidaimarudur and composing songs in praise of him. A particular devadasi was asked to pay a fine for doing so and Amarasimha’s minister was asked to give an explanation for holding such dance performances, in spite of the East India Company’s instructions not to do so.”144

140K.R.

Subramanian, 1928/1988:70. Subrahmanian, 1988:110. 142S. Seetha, 1981:106. 143S. Seetha, 1981:105. 144S. Seetha, 1981:105–106. The “State record” cited by Dr. Seetha is Modi mss. O.B.

52-2, in the Saraswati Mahal Library, Tanjavur. 141N.

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Discussion of the relationship between Amar Singh and the composer of Tamil padams Ghanam Krishna Ayyar is found in Chapter 3. Amar Singh passed away in 1803.

2.7.5 Serfoji II

The missionary C.F. Schwartz died on February 13, 1798,145 thereby just missing by a few months the opportunity to see his young protege take office on June 28th of the same year. Schwartz’s Memoirs report his dying charge to Sarabhoji, which “deeply affected the prince, for he reveres Mr. Swartz as a father”: ‘”After God has called me hence, I request you will be careful not to indulge a fondness for pomp and grandeur. You are convinced that my endeavours to serve you have been disinterested; what I now request of you is, that you would be kind to the Christians. It they behave ill, let them be punished; but if they do well, show yourself to them as their father and protector.

‘As the administration of justice is indispensably necessary to the prosperity and happiness of every state, I request you will’ establish regular courts, and be careful that impartial justice be administered. I heartily wish you would renounce your idolatry, and serve and honour the only true God. May he be merciful, and enable you to do it!’ Our venerable father then inquired whether he sometimes perused the Bible; and concluded with very affecting exhortations to be mindful of the concerns of his immortal soul.”146

The British submitted a treaty to the new Raja for his consideration and signature in 1799, by which he surrendered all his territory to the administration of the British, except for the town of Tanjavur (and nearby garden residence of Vallam), and then during the time of peace only. He received a pension of one lakh pagodas per year and one-fifth of the net revenues 145The

date is given on the inscription of a monument to Schwartz in Tanjavur. Pearson (Swartz), 1835:11:395. 146Pearson (Swartz), 1835:II:372.

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of the country.147 Sarabhoji went on to be a munificent patron of the arts and letters, not the least important result of which was the establishment of the Saraswati Mahal Library at Tanjavur, which remains a major research collection in India today.148 The Trinity of Karnataka composers and the Quartette of dance masters mentioned above, flourished during his reign. He is reported to have had a “fancy for curios like an electrical gadget, rare paintings, a printing press, astronomical instruments, an ivory skeleton and so on. He was a good shot and he even tried his hand at English poetry.”149 Dr. Seetha says that he was proficient in Sanskrit, Telugu, Marathi, English, German, and French, calling him “The Scholar Prince.”150 Dr. Seetha also notes that he organized a “Western” ensemble, the Tanjore Band, using “instruments like violin, clarinet, dulcimer, piano, German flute, tambourine and harpsichord,” he composed music for it and studied (with European musicians in residence and by correspondence) Western music himself, while his minister Varahappa Dikshita Pandita was apparently equally at home on vina, piano, and violin.151 In the realm of Indian music, Sarabhoji wrote the Devendra Kuravanji in Marathi; he had a strong liking for folk song forms such as the Marathi lavani and folk dance genres, as well as for “Bharata Natya in all its classic purity.”152 Siva in the form of Brihadisvara at the great temple was especially favored by Sarabhoji. “He [Sarabhoji] endowed the Brihadeesvara temple lavishly and added a few new 147N.

Subrahmanian, 1988:110. A lakh is 100,000. S. Seetha, who has herself conducted extensive research in the library, reports: “The nucleus of the library dates back to the period of Nayaks in the 16th century. It existed as a storehouse of learning (known as Saraswati Bhandaram) even during the time of Nayaks. The manuscripts that were copied during the Nayak period and belonging to the Nayak kings and their court poets are found in palm leaves. The credit of collecting paper manuscripts, goes to the Marathas. ... Sarabhoji’s pilgrimage to Banaras... resulted in additions to the collections of the library. The total number of manuscripts is over 40,000 of which the Sanskrit manuscripts alone number about 30,000, Telugu 2,000, Marathi 5,000, Tamil 2,000, other languages about 500.” 1981:110. 149N. Subrahmanian, 1988:111. 150S. Seetha, 1981:107. 151S. Seetha, 1981:111. 152S. Seetha, 1981:115. 148Dr.

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shrines thereto.”153 In one sense, Sarabhoji thus came back full circle from the time of Rajaraja Cola, who had had the monumental Brihadisvara temple constructed ca. 1000 A.D. This special attention to the Siva temple at Tanjavur itself by Sarabhoji may have been partly due to the loss of effective control of Tiruvarur, the home of Siva in the form of Tyagaraja, which had been the family deity of all the earlier Maratha Rajas of Tanjavur. The Tanjavur Quartette composed many songs on Lord Brihadisvara, as well as on Raja Sarabhoji.154 [A1] Collum vakai ellam (I will tell you how) For full translation and commentary, see the Appendix. (Key to numbering: [A1] means Group A, Song 1)

One of the songs of this study, Collum vakai ellam (I will tell you how) [A1] is from the Sarabendra Bhoopala Kuravanji of Kottaiyur Sivakoruntu Desikar, set to music by the Tanjavur Quartette. It is written on Sarabhoji as the nayaka (hero) and was “regularly enacted during the celebrations of [the] annual festival in the big temple at Tanjore”155 until approximately 1950. T. Balasaraswati also organized one production of this kuravanji in the early 1950s. It contains a vivid description of Raja Sarabhoji and life at his court, full of allusions to his great intelligence, grace, and power. We will leave Sarabhoji here, in the felicitous portrayal of his court poet. The nayaki speaking in the song is Mohanavalli, the heroine of the story; in the song, the nayaki advises her sakhi, friend, on when and how to approach Raja Sarabhoji on her (the nayika’s) behalf.

2.7.6 Sivaji II

Historical notes are a few for the reign of Sivaji II. N. Subrahmanian and K.R. Subramanian, both perhaps relying on the account of a 153N.

Subrahmanian, 1988:111. This is the very same temple that Rajaraja Cola built ca. 1000 A.D., referred to earlier in the text, and to which the inscription records he brought 400 dancers. 154S. Seetha, 1981:108. 155S. Seetha, 1981:108.

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certain Bishop Heber, paint him as a “pale and sickly lad”156 and “never... conspicuous for intelligence, dash or initiative. The harem was his normal residence where a multitude of wives shared his dyspeptic attentions.”157 Dr. Seetha notes that as did his father and predecessor Sarabhoji, Sivaji also had a passion for the lavani folk song form: “Lavani Venkata Rao was the prominent lavani singer of his court and was the composer of a lavani in praise of the king. Sivaji... acted as the final judge in lavani contests held in the court.”158

T. Sankaran notes that Sivaji was a great patron to the Tanjavur Quartette, until at one point there was a rift, which led the Quartette to leave Tanjavur for a period of time. Vadivelu of the Quartette was an extremely proud man: “Vadivelu had a genius for thrilling royalty with his skill and an equal capacity to incur royal displeasure. It was his dogged insistence on his own rights and privileges at the Thanjavur temple that sent the Quartette into exile from Thanjavur to Orthanad and which gave the Travancore prince an opportunity to invite them to his court. The Thanjavur palace was mulcted of its musical lustre but Vadivelu would not relent even though his brothers got reconciled to the renewed patronage of the Thanjavur palace to which they returned.”159

Sivaji, a great appreciator of dance, even built a special room inside the palace where men could learn dance, a kind of craze which had been inspired in Tanjavur by Chinniah of the Quartette.160 Of the four brothers Raja Sivaji was the closest, however, to Sivanandam: “Sivanandam, born 1808, the third brother, was a composer, a vainika and an expert in teaching abhinayam and was the favourite of Prince Sivaji for this reason... Sivanandam

156K.R.

Subramanian, 1928/1988:75.

Subrahmanian, 1988: 111. 158S. Seetha, 1981:117. 159T. Sankaran, 1972.

160T. Sankaran, 1971. 157N.

The Period of Anarchy

was not content with working out a repertoire for the concert. The great Siva bhakta that he was, he devoted his attention to building up a repertoire of dance for worship. These ritual dances found a place during shodasopacharam, deeparadanai, dwajarohanam, etc. Sivaji Maharaja and Sivanandam would always be seen together in the Sivagangai Garden during the evening hours. Tradition has it that when Sivanandam was absent one evening owing to indisposition, the Maharaja rushed to the natyacharya’s [dance master’s] residence.”161

When Sivaji II died in 1855 without male issue, the British Resident at Tanjavur, Forbes, recommended to his superiors in Madras that the daughter of Sivaji be placed on the throne to continue the line, but the Madras Governor’s Council decided that because there had been no son, the “doctrine of lapse” applied. “Lord Dalhousie naturally concurred,” which put an end to the Maratha line at Tanjavur. After initially confiscating even the personal property of the royal family, the British eventually restored some of it and granted pensions to nearly 5,000 family members.162 As late as 1885, the Manual of the Madras Presidency records continuing payments to members of the Maratha royal family.163

161T.

Sankaran, 1971. information this paragraph N. Subrahmanian, 1988: 112. 163Details of continuing “Madyarjoon Pensions” (Madyarjoon being another name for Tiruvidaimarudur) and the “Tanjore Raj Pensions” are given in C.D. Maclean, 1885/1987:I:49–50. 162All

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Chapter 3

Composers of Tamil Padams 3.1

To Compose

Now that we have given a historical sketch of the rulers of Tanjavur with attention to the development of the padam genre, we move to consider those who have composed the Tamil padams. The Tamil verb used for “to compose” is usually iyarru; and a composer is called iyarriyavar, he (avar) who creates.1 Sometimes patu, “to sing,” is used to indicate composition, as in the title of the book of Muttuttandavar’s compositions, Sri Capanatar Peril Muttuttandavar Patiyaruliya Kirttanam, Patam (kirttanams and padams blessingly sung by Muttuttandavar on the name of Sri Capanatar).2 Verbs are also sometimes used in combination to refer to composition, taking advantage of the Tamil language’s fluency at stringing together adverbial participles. For example, in his biography of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar refers to the composer’s composing using iyarru in combination with the verb ani (to be beautiful, to be an ornament, to adorn, to wear). The resulting construction, avarmitu cila patankalai iyarri anintar, has the sense of “on him [the patron], he [the composer] writing-adorned several padams.”3 1The

Tamil Lexicon gives as glosses for iyarru (in the following order): To do, make, perform, effect, execute; to cause to act, direct or control the movements of; to acquire, to create, to compose or write, as a book. 2Muttuttandavar, 1868/1874. 3U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:15. The Tamil Padam: A Dance Music Genre of South India Matthew Harp Allen

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In the culture of Karnataka classical music, the term vaggeyakkarar is the most respectful term used for the composer; the greatest composers (such as the famous Trinity) are referred to as vaggeyakkarars. The term itself (vak, speech; geya, singing; karar, maker or doer) implies that a composer is one who makes both text and tune, who brings text alive through music. Most of the composers treated in this study are believed to have created both the texts and the tunes of the padams attributed to them (Arunacala Kavirayar being the notable exception), although it is necessarily in doubt to what extent the musical settings of the padams today resemble their original musical setting by their iyarriyavar or vaggeyekkarar. Having said all this, Tamil padam composers seem to be most often referred to in the literature and in conversation by still another term, padakkarars, literally padam-makers. To me, this term has a more craftsperson-like feeling to it than the philosophical-sounding vaggeyekkarar, reflecting, I think, a general perception in the music community that Tamil padam composers are of somewhat middling stature when compared with composers such as the Trinity.4

3.1.1 Changes Over Time in Melody and Text

The padam composers of this study are mostly known to have composed their own melodies as well as texts. This does not imply, however, that the tune to which a song is rendered today (or has been preserved on recordings) is the same tune which was set by the composer. There is evidence throughout the history of Karnataka music of musicians changing, albeit perhaps 4This

is reminiscent of Daniel Neuman’s discussion of the terms Guru and Ustad in North India: “Guru and ustad, used interchangeably here, are in practice virtually synonymous, the former being used for Hindu and the latter for Muslim musicians. Etymologically, however, the terms have a different history of meanings and this difference encapsulates different social constructions of the musician’s role. Ustad, a Persian-derived Urdu word meaning ‘master’, is used as a term of reference and of address in occupational contexts. For example, a motorcycle repairman who is acknowledged as a master mechanic will be addressed as ustadji. ... Guru, derived from the Sanskrit, has traditionally been reserved for learned men who are teachers or, perhaps more exactly, preceptors, and who are thus usually Brahmin.” D. Neuman, 1980:44.

To Compose

in a subtle manner over long periods of time, the melodic rendition of compositions, whether via an accretion of sangatis (melodic variations on a line of text, as has occurred to many of Tyagaraja’s compositions), a change of style (the rendering in the 20th century of Muttuswamy Dikshitar’s composition Vatapi ganapatim in the manner of a Tyagaraja kriti is a commonly cited example), or a completely new casting of the tune (as in T.N. Swaminatha Pillai’s setting of Muttuttandavar’s kirttanas in the 1940s).5 That is, changes in melodic setting, ranging from what is merely on the surface to what is deeply structural, have occurred over time to many compositions, and we must expect that this has occurred also to a good number of the Tamil padams since the time of their composition. The issue of composition of the texts, in addition to the tunes, is also fraught with difficulties for the researcher of Tamil padams. There has not been the same kind of movement to create urtexts of padams, to etch in stone their exact words, as has occurred in; for example, the compositions of the composer Tyagaraja. We will see that words, phrases, or larger segments of text are taken by one composer from another’s songs or, put another way, seem to be a common property across (and even outside of) the whole repertoire. Certain phrases occur in padam after padam. At the micro extreme, there are many keywords that are found throughout the Tamil padam literature (such as moti, delaying, quarreling, putting on a show; uruku, melting; kalantu, mixing, joining, mingling; and anaintu, embracing. Phrases such as kanni vayatil, “in my virgin youth,” or pen piranten “to be thus 5This

is a good time to take brief note of the terms kriti and kirttana. Sometimes used interchangeably, they both refer to a form of musical composition which contains the same three structural components, pallavi, anupallavi, and caranam. The term kriti is usually used to refer to performance in an art or classical setting, where musical sophistication is most highly valued, while kirttana usually implies the predominance of devotional (specifically textual) elements in the performance experience. P. Sambamooorthy calls kriti “the most highly evolved among art musical forms” and compares the two terms as follows: “The term kriti refers to the composition whose claim to permanence lies principally in its music and not in its sahitya (text). But in kirttanas, the sahitya is of primary importance. A kriti is remembered and valued for its aesthetic content and a kirttana is valued for the devotional content of its sahitya.” P. Sambamoorthy, 1984:II:338.

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born a woman,” occur many times, often at the same point in the compositions they appear in. Toward the macro extreme, there are documented examples of whole caranams and even complete padam texts being found in more than one author’s collection of songs. For example, one caranam of a Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar padam closely matches one of the caranams from an Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar composition.6 Further, fully seven of the padams in the book of Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar compositions are found in the book containing the padams of Kavikunjara Bharati, Madura Kavi Bharati, and Srirama Kavi. Most of these seven texts are almost identically reproduced in the two sources, the only difference in several cases being the mudra, identifying signature, of the composer. The issue of who has composed a particular text can become a vexing one for the researcher.

3.2 Biographies of Composers

William Jackson, in his work on the composer Tyagaraja (1767–1847), describes a process he found in the course of research into the progressive accretions to the saint composer’s biography which occurred after his (Tyagaraja’s) death. Whereas the earliest biographers (a father and son, both disciples of Tyagaraja) had painted the picture of a simple man,7 late 19th and early 20th-century Harikatha performers added dramatic tales of travel, intrigue, and suspense to the story of his life. These later tales-cum-biographical details were both teased out from the texts of Tyagaraja’s songs by the Bhagavatars, performers of Harikatha, and used to introduce or contextualize the songs as rendered in the course of a Harikatha performance: 6The

“The rather low-key life of a Telugu musician in Tamil Nadu was fleshed out with more nourishing images of dramatic

compositions are Tane varukiraro by Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar and Alaipayute by Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar. I am grateful to Sri S.V. Seshadri for this reference. 7Venkataramana Bhagavatar and Krishnasvami Bhagavatar, a father and son who were both direct disciples of Tyagaraja, wrote biographies, probably not long after Tyagaraja’s death in 1847. W. Jackson, 1991:2.

Biographies of Composers

action and self-reliance-the saintly hero resuscitating a brahmin, winning thieves over, proving his mettle through confrontations—in an age when mendicancy and emotionalism were perceived as insufficient.

As performers well known for establishing a lively rapport with their audiences, these harikatha artists were aware of people’s modes of understanding and were familiar with the traditional stock of situations and responses which would convey the greatness of Tyagaraja. Also, the harikatha performers, in an efficient simplification, used Tyagaraja’s songs to reinforce the stories of his life. The accounts of the origins of certain songs prepare the mood and reinforce associated ideas and thus are helpful in the dramatizing process in which harikatha performers engage daily: namely, driving home bhakti teachings. Being dramatists, these performers have found ways to perform skits on the theme of Tyagaraja’s bhakti, so that the stories about Tyagaraja and the lines he himself uttered in exquisite masterpieces complemented and reified each other and became all the stronger in the folk memory.”8

In one logical step further, these oral performances of the life story of Tyagaraja were themselves eventually written down in prose form and so the biography continued (indeed continues) to live and grow.9 As we go through the lives of the Tamil padam composers, we will find essentially the same process in evidence. Verifiable, cross-checkable historical details are quite few, especially for composers who lived either (i) earlier chronologically, or (ii) were not connected with the major institutions of their time (i.e., the larger courts or temples) whose life stories would therefore have been less likely to be documented in the literate media of the day. What we then find 8W.

Jackson, 1991:9–10.

Sankaran says of the early years of Tyagaraja’s aradhana (death anniversary

celebrations) in Tiruvaiyaru, “At first, people would come, sing a song, and go home.” Gradually it has become a larger and larger festival until today one finds a weeklong celebration each winter attracting thousands of participants and onlookers, as well as Doordarshan (Indian national television) remote satellite broadcasts for the benefit of would-be pilgrims tied to their televisions in Chennai or further afield. T. Sankaran, personal communication, 1990.

9T.

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are biographies largely spun out of one or two anecdotes and/or from the song texts themselves. In the final analysis, the following biographies of Tamil padam composers may therefore give us more insights into the values—cultural, religious, musical, and artistic held by the participants, connoisseurs, and scholars of the tradition, than they do into specific details of composers’ lives.10

3.3 Composer: Muttuttandavar

It was likely in the 17th century that the first Tamil padams were composed, by a man named Muttuttandavar (literally precious dancer) who hailed from Sirgari (also spelled Sirgazhi) near Cidambaram.11 If this dating is accurate, Muttuttandavar was a contemporary of the great Telugu padam composer Ksetrayya, who as we have seen was patronized at the court of the rulers Raghunatha and Vijayaraghava in the mid-17th century.

3.3.1 Dating His Life

In 1904 Subbarama Dikshitar, a noted composer, pioneering musicologist and adopted grandson of the great composer Muttuswamy Dikshitar, wrote briefly that Muttuttandavar had lived prior to the composer Arunacala Kavirayar (who has been dated between 1711 and 1789 and is treated separately in this chapter). Dikshitar’s statement is echoed by Abraham Panditar in 1917, C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar in 1930, and K.R. Madhavi in 1960.12 The Tamil scholar M. Arunacalam in 1974 assigned 10This

situation is not so different from the traditions of hagiography, a biography of saint’s lives, in South India. For an excellent study of the process of generating a saint’s biography, in this case, the Saivite saint Cuntaramurtti Nayanar (Sundarar), who appears in songs [D4] and [El] of this study, see D. Shulman 1990, especially pp. xxvii–xlii. 11“Here [in Sirkari] Sambandar was fed with divine milk by Parasakthi in the local temple. The legends connected with the temple say that, once at the time of a great deluge, Siva kept the souls of created beings in a subtle form in a small boat which floated on the waters of the deluge. The temple is called Tonipuram (‘boat-city’) and the Swami here is called Toniappar.” M. Arunacalam, 1989:153.

12S. Dikshitar in A. Sundaram Ayyar, 1988:109; A. Panditar, 1917/1984: 198;

C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar, 1948: 114; K.R. Madhavi, 1960:148.

Muttuttandavar

Muttuttandavar to the 18th century, but in 1989 revised his estimate, placing him in the 16th century.13 S. V. Parthasarathy in his turn, writing in 1970 says that Muttuttandavar was born “some 350 years ago.”14 Most recently, V. Subramaniam in 1991 wrote, “We can broadly place him in the mid-17th century to the middle of the 18th century.”15 What are we to make of this? When asked about the difficulty of dating Muttuttandavar and the fact that he had placed the composer in widely differing periods of history, M. Arunacalam said simply “It’s quite difficult to date him.”16 About the dating of Muttuttandavar and the earliest publication of his song texts, Arunacalam has written: “The slender volume begins with a short biography of the musicians. All the editions repeat the same account. There is no variation. There is now no other book available for knowing anything about Muthu Tandavar, his life or his songs. The first edition printed in about 1860 A.D. says that Muthu Tandavar lived some 350 years [ago] and all subsequent editions mention the same 350. All the editions have this note at the end of the songs: ‘The first edition, first volume of songs containing 60 Kirttanams and 25 Padams.’ Probably the first publisher planned to collect more songs and issue a second volume. But this was never done. Other later publishers of the 19th century also simply copied this note.”17

While it is impossible to accurately date his life to the year or possibly even to the correct century, all sources agree that Muttuttandavar’s compositions are anterior to those of the 13M.

Arunacalam, 1974:42,346; 1989:137.

Parthasarathy, The Hindu, Madras, July 11, 1970 (reprinted in Kuppuswamy

& Hariharan, eds., 1982:101). 15V. Subramaniam, 1991:51. 16Personal communication, 1990, Madras. 17M. Arunacalam, 1989:180–181. The word “ago” is not in Arunacalam’s text. The brief biography of Muttuttandavar contained in the 1971 reprint by Irattina Nayakar and Sons does not contain a reference to 350 years, and the text I was able to consult and xerox with the courtesy of the U. V. Swaminatha Ayyar library (undated but likely from the 1860s or 1870s) does not contain any biographical materials, so I have been unable to verify Arunacalam’s statement about the first edition containing a reference to 350 years [ago]. 14S.V.

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Trinity. He is one of the most important early composers of kritis and padams of South India, and in the Tamil language, he is perhaps the earliest major composer of both.

3.3.2 His Life Story

There is a brief (4 pp.) Tamil biography of Muttuttandavar given in the 1971 publication of his songs by Irattina Nayakar and Sons, which, based on Arunacalam’s description of its publication history, I am assuming to be reprinted in its entirety from one of the late 19th-century editions.18 This biography appears to be the basis of all available accounts of Muttuttandavar’s life. It says that Tandavan,19 as he was originally known, was from a family famous for doing service to Siva (in his form as Toniappar) in the temple of Sirgari (toniyapparukkut tontu ceyyum). This reference provides at least circumstantial evidence to suggest that Muttuttandavar was from a hereditary family of nagaswaram (long double reed oboe-type instrument) musicians.20 The account goes on to state that Tandavan was unable to take up the work of his family (kulattukku uriyatakiya toril) due to 18The

following summary of the Tamil biography is based on my consultations with, and the translation of, T. Viswanathan. 19Tandavan, Tamil “dancer;” the word is especially associated with Nataraja’s male, vigorous dance, in contrast to the term lasya which is applied to a more graceful or feminine manner of dance. We note that in the Tamil text, the 3rd person singular -an ending is used, connoting familiarity and/or lack of respect, while the -ar ending by which he is universally called today is the plural, more formal, and respectful ending. 20M. Arunacalam and V. Subramaniam both come to this conclusion. Arunacalam (1989:153) says “Muthu Thandavar belonged to the family of musicians who had been performing musical and Natya services in the temple several times in the day. “V. Subramaniam (1991:51) says “He was born in a musical chinna melam family (traditional nagaswara players or dance accompanists) attached to the Sirgazhi temple” (parentheses in original). While Arunacalam suggests Muttuttandavar’s family were practitioners of both music and dance, Subramaniam stresses the music (nagaswaram) but here incorrectly calls this chinna melam instead of periya melam. T. Viswanathan (personal communication) feels that although it is not explicitly stated in the Tamil text that Muttuttandavar was from a chinna melam (dance) or periya melam (nagaswaram) family, the use of the verb tontu usually refers to service by these hereditary groups, as distinct from the service of Brahmin priests, for example.

Muttuttandavar

disease, which scholars have variously concluded might have been leprosy, cancer, or asthma. Unable to learn the trade of his family, the account reports that the young Tandavan would go daily to the temple to worship. He would also go to the house of a certain devadasi (taci in the text) who sang beautiful Sivanama kirttanas (songs in praise of Siva.) This earned him the ire of his parents, because their two families did not get along. One day afflicted by hunger, the pain of his disease, and his family’s rebuke, he went into the vahana room of the temple (the room in which processional vahanas, vehicles, would be kept, a quiet and relatively deserted area of the temple) and fell asleep. Muttuttandavar was accidentally locked in the temple when the authorities closed it for the night: “[w]ith gnawing hunger on one side and the growing disease on the other... The goddess of the temple it is said, in the guise of the ten-year old daughter of the temple priest with a food bowl in her hand, appearing before him, asked him why he looked despondent. He told her of his relatives’ neglect, his own affliction and his hunger. She served him food from the bowl, and emboldened, he asked the girl what could cure his disease. Her directive to go to Thillayampathi [Cidambaram] and worship the Cosmic Dancer through music, raised doubts in him about his capacity to sing or compose. But he was assured that Sri Nataraja would bless him if he started singing with the first word that he heard from those worshipping the Lord and the girl disappeared. He then realised that the girl he had spoken to was none other than the Divine Mother. Since that day he came to be called Muttuttandavar.”21

After this experience, he stayed awake the rest of the night praising the Lord, and then in the morning the temple staff came, unlocked the doors, and found Tandavan inside. Upon hearing his story, seeing his radiant face, and seeing also the bowl which had contained the temple prasadam (food offerings to the deity) and which is usually kept in the chief priest’s house, 21S.V.

Parthasarathy, 1982:101–102. The Tamil text further says that the goddess fed him the temple prasadam (food offerings) from the previous day.

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they realized that a miracle had happened. From that time, they did not have the heart to continue calling him Tandavan as they formerly had (anru mutal munpol ‘Tandavandavan’ enru araikka manam ovvamal). From then onwards, they called him affectionately “Muttuttandavan”.22 In the morning, he went straight to Cidambaram where, the account reports, he prostrated on first seeing the outskirts of the city (tillai ellai). He then proceeded around the main streets (vitipiratakshanam) in praise (tottiram), and coming to the houses of the Dikshitars (temple priests of Cidambaram known as “the 3000”, muvayirar) worshipped them also. Finally, he went into the temple, bathed in the tank, and worshipped at the main shrine (cannitanam). Standing and worshipping, his mind and heart23 melting (manam uruki) in bliss, he heard the word of those who came to worship. He took it as his pallavi (first section of a song) and, singing a kirttanam, he praised God. Siva blessed his devotee Muttuttandavar by curing him of his disease on the spot. He also placed five cold coins on the five steps leading up to the Siva lingam and asked Muttuttandavar to take them. The trembling devotee took the coins and went home. As the story goes, he came daily to Cidambaram to worship from then on. His method of composition was to respond to the first words he heard fellow devotees utter, or to some exigency of the moment—such as the bite of a snake, or the need to cross a flooded river—and a song would grow from that. Several of Muttuttandavar’s songs are mentioned in the Tamil account as having been composed in this manner, strung together in a way such as to suggest a loose chronological sequence.24 22The

respectful spelling “Muttuttandavar” is universally used today. According to T. Viswanathan (personal communication), the sense of the use of muttu as a prefix here is one of endearments, affection; muttu can mean kiss or pearl. The musician and musicologist Chinna Nookala Satyanarayana has argued that muttu should really be rendered muddu, which in Telugu means dear or soft. (Personal communication, 1989). 23Following both common usage and the definition as given in the Tamil Lexicon, throughout this study, I will translate the Tamil word manam as both mind and heart. 24A device picked up by Muttuttandavar’s later biographers and used in a much more extensive fashion in B. Rajanikanta Rao, 1981.

Muttuttandavar

The end of Muttuttandavar’s life is associated with the song beginning Manikkavacagar per enakku taravallayo ariyen (Won’t you give me the name of Manikkavacakar?), in which the composer asks if he will be granted the same grace as the great Manikkavacakar (he whose words are rubies), one of the Saivite saints known as Nayanars or Nayanmars and author of the famous Tiruvacakam.25 It is said to be Muttuttandavar’s last composition. Madhavi reports that when he was singing this song, he breathed his last. It is said that there passed a luster or spark in the sirsabhai [citsabha] at that time, and his soul or atma was mixed with that of the Lord.26 Arunacalam gives a radiantly ambient description of the event: “The huge quantities of pure camphor that are lighted on the Arudra day on the occasion of the Dance festival of Nataraja all burn themselves out without leaving any trace, without leaving any residue. Thandavar also desired to melt away even with the physical body in the Lord’s grace symbolized by the Hall. Legends say that the desire was fulfilled. On the particular day, an effulgence lit up the Hall and dissolved him in that light. Thus Thandavar is said to have attained the same Mukti, salvation, that Manikkavacakar attained on the same anniversary day, indeed a fitting end to a glorious career of Bhakthi and song.”27

3.3.3 Transmission of Muttuttandavar’s Songs

After Muttuttandavar had “merged into an advaita union” with Nataraja at the end of his life, says Arunacalam, there was no circle of disciples to propagate his music. He attributes 25The

last line of the last (4th) caranam of this song of Muttuttandavar contains the wish that the Lord take his body into the Golden Hall, just as the Lord accepts the flame of arati (tiruva tirai nalil karpura dipam pol enran udalaik kanaka capaiyil kalantu kolvaye). Muttuttandavar, 1966:293. I am indebted to T. Viswanathan for this observation. 26Madhavi, 1960:150. The citsabha or sirsabhai is the Nataraja shrine within the Cidambaram temple. B. Natarajan, 1974:65. 27M. Arunacalam, 1989:169. Here the accounts establish a link between Muttuttandavar and his great predecessor Manikkavacakar; just below we will see another link made, to another of the Nayanmars, Tirujnana Sambandar.

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Muttuttandavar’s lack of disciples to several possible factors, one being that the “lavish grants” decreed by the Cola Emperors centuries earlier were still sufficient to support Melakkarar families and other temple servants, “so he did not have to go about with a tambura in hand begging alms.”28 Arunacalam also states that Muttuttandavar was a life-long bachelor, another factor which would eliminate the financial need to take students. There was according to Arunacalam one man, a relation of Muttuttandavar named Kuppiah Pillai, who had taken to following Muttuttandavar around in his later years and “collecting as many of his songs as he could,” recording them on palm leaf manuscripts. Arunacalam says that these are the same 85 songs, 60 kritis, and 25 padams, the texts of which were first published in book form in the 1860s. The descendants of Kuppiah Pillai settled in Tiruppambaram and “in this line came Seshu Pillai, his son Kulandaivel Pillai, Swaminatha Pillai, and then Natarajasundaram Pillai,” according to Arunacalam. Continuing, Arunacalam says that it is this Natarajasundaram Pillai’s grandson, also named Natarajasundaram, who first published the kritis of Muttuswamy Dikshitar in notation, and his (Natarajasundaram’s) son T.N. Swaminatha Pillai who published the kritis of Muttuttandavar with musical notation in 1946.29 Arunacalam’s account, insofar as it traces the family lineage of Tiruppambaram S. Natarajasundaram Pillai, is substantially in agreement with the family lineage as written by Natarajasundaram’s third son T.N. Sivasubramania Pillai,30 but there are a few points to be noted. First of all, T. Viswanathan, the student of Natarajasundaram Pillai’s son T.N. Swaminatha Pillai, had not previously heard of any such guru-sisya parampara (discipular link) connecting Muttuttandavar via Kuppiah Pillai with his guru’s family. Secondly, in Sivasubramania Pillai’s account, Sesha Pillai is the first ancestor mentioned, followed by his son Kurandaivel Pillai, whose son Swaminatha Pillai was born in 1840, and whose son S. Natarajasundaram Pillai was born in 1869. According to the family, it was this Natarajasundaram (not a 28Quotes

this paragraph M. Arunacalam, 1989:181. This is apparently a characterization of a musician who, for financial reasons, is forced to teach! 29Quotes this paragraph M. Arunacalam 1989: 182,183. 30T.N. Sivasubramania Pillai, 1978.

Muttuttandavar

grandson by the same name) who indeed kept notebooks with the music to Muttuswamy Dikshitar kritis carefully recorded in svara (solfege) notation, this being an extremely early occurrence of the use of musical notation for Karnataka music. It was this same Natarajasundaram Pillai who, with his brother, were well known for their innovative practice of performing Dikshitar kritis in nagaswaram duet (the main components of the traditional nagaswaram performance repertoire usually being raga alapana and the ragam-tanam-pallavi form). And T.N. Swaminatha Pillai (the son of S. Natarajasundaram Pillai and the teacher of T. Viswanathan) did set the kritis of Muttuttandavar to music and publish them in notation in 1946.31

3.3.4 Publication of Muttuttandavar’s Songs

The texts to 85 of Muttuttandavar’s songs were published first as a slim book under the title Sri Capanatar Peril Muttuttandavar Patiyaruliya Kirttanam, Patam, that is, kirttanams (or kritis, depending on the performance situation) and padams sung on Sri Capanatar (capa natar, literally “Lord of the Sabha”, is another name for Nataraja). This was sometime in the 1860s.32 Arunacalam provides important commentary on the early history of publishing for this kind of book in South India (the word Gujilikkadai used in the following passage means literally “evening bazaar”):33 “There was a continuous popular demand for the songs [of Muttuttandavar] and inferior printers continued to print the songs in a single volume and supply them at cheap prices.

31Muttuttandavar,

1966/1967. From personal communication, T. Viswanathan notes that his teacher T.N. Swaminatha Pillai did not use traditional melodic settings for Muttuttandavar’s kritis; to his knowledge only a few traditional settings were available. He instead created new ones, sometimes choosing rare ragas from among his personal favorites. Viswanathan also notes that Swaminatha Pillai set music only to Muttuttandavar’s kritis, not his padams. 32M. Arunacalam, 1989:180. Arunacalam’s bibliography (1989:329) gives the date 1868. Of two editions available in the U. V. Swaminatha Ayyar Library, Chennai, one was undated and the other one was dated 1874. The book also contains compositions of Marimutta Pillai and other composers on Nataraja. 33Kujilikkatai, from the Urdu guzri, “evening”, plus katai, shop, Lexicon.

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They were not critical editions. Generally these printers did not even correct the proofs. Such editions were called the ‘Gujilikkadai’ editions. Only because of them, the books were always available for sale in the market. But for these editions, not only Tandavar’s poems but even many books of classical poetry would have passed into oblivion. Again, when the Tamil Isai [“Tamil Music”] movement started, the Gujili editions were the only Tamil Kirttana musical books available. These editions are the only source for the later good Annamalai University editions, accompanied by notation.”34

As seen above, Arunacalam notes that the brief biographical preface about Muttuttandavar was passed exactly the same from each edition to the next of this type of book. In the early publications, just as in the 1971 reprint edition published by Irattina Nayakar and Sons, the compositions are divided into two groups: first 60 kirttanas, then 25 padams. Let us note the fact that the earliest publishers conceived of and articulated Muttuttandavar’s repertoire in this way separating kirttanas from padams and carefully labeling the two distinctly. By comparison, over 50 years later when U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar published the texts of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s compositions, he did not separate kritis from padams, instead grouping them by subject, that is, on which deity or patron they were composed. We will see that U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar often refers to Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s padams as kirttanas; kirttanas which “contain much sringara rasa,” or kirttanas which are “appropriate for dance.”

3.3.5 Early Tamil Kritis and Padams

In Muttuttandavar’s compositions, we see for perhaps the first time in a Tamil song a clear division into the constituent parts (pallavi, anupallavi, and caranam) of the modern kriti and padam forms.35 Scholars such as V. Subramaniam and M. Arunacalam 34M.

Arunacalam, 1989:180. another early instance, M. Arunacalam (1989:65–66) mentions a kirttanam written by Venrimalai Kavirayar in approximately 1654 A.D.

35In

Muttuttandavar

regard Muttuttandavar’s songs as a strong link between earlier forms of Tamil devotional song (such as the Tevaram of the 6–9th centuries and the Tiruppugazh of Arunagiri Natar)36, and the later Tamil padam genre: “Muthutandavar really set the model for subsequent Tamil composers from Marimutha Pillai to Arunachala Kavi, to Gopalakrishna Bharati, Ghanam Krishna lyer, Kavikunjara Bharati down to Neelakantha Sivan. He was the last towering figure in the Tamil melam caste tradition before Venkatamakhi’s scientization of the raga system divided the musical community into supporters and critics of that system, the latter drawn largely from melam castes. ... Muthutandavar was... the great link with the nayika bhava devotional poetry in Tamil. He took it over smoothly into his pada-s, and provided the model for Ghanam Krishna lyer and other 19th century composers.”37

To what extent in his compositions Muttuttandavar partook of earlier Tamil poetic genres, and/or of the Telugu traditions being patronized at the court at that time (perhaps specifically Ksetrayya’s padams) is a question answered differently by different scholars. So is the question of to what extent the later (19th century) Tamil padam composers partook of the heritage of Muttuttandavar (and by extension, early Tamil poetic genres), relative to influences from the Telugu padam composers. At one pole of the scholarly discourse, Arunacalam’s recent dating of Muttutandavar to the 16th century allows him to claim Muttuttandavar unequivocally to be “the Prapitamahar [great grandfather] of Tamilnad Kirtana music”38 in general. At the other pole, some scholars make the blanket statement that Tamil padams are modeled on (and derivative of) Telugu padams, seeing no or little continuous Tamil heritage. In between these extremes would lie an acknowledgment that Muttuttandavar 36Arunagiri

Natar is dated to either the 14th or early 15th century by Fred Clothey, 1984:4. 37V. Subramaniam, 1991:52. In this context, “nayika bhava devotional poetry” would refer to medieval poetry such as the Tevaram and Tiruppugazh. 38M. Arunacalam, 1989:152.

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is indeed a very important early composer in Karnataka music, one of the first to develop and employ the 3-part compositional structure (pallavi, anupallavi, caranam) which is current to this day.

3.3.6 Rhythmic Aspects of His Kirttanams

The compositions in the kirttanam portion of the book of Muttuttandavar’s compositions are notable for their use of rhythmic syllables, sabdams39 or jatis. This is perhaps partly what has led Arunacalam to conclude that Muttuttandavar must have come from the Melakkarar community, the fact of his intimate knowledge of the type of specific, complex rhythmic patterns used by dancers and nagaswaram players in temple service. Arunacalam here also draws a comparison between Muttuttandavar and Tirujnana Sambandar, who centuries earlier wrote a composition, Tirut talac cati, a “song for Talas [talas] on the shrine of his birthplace Sirgari.” Further, Arunacalam notes that certain of Muttuttandavar’s songs that employ rhythmic jatis are “printed in the oldest editions as the Tala­ kirtanams.”40

Ecal or Ninda Stuti “Praise-Blame” Compositions

One of Muttuttandavar’s padams not included in this study is labeled ecal patam. As noted by Arunacalam this appears to be an extremely early example of the type of song also called ninda stuti or “praise-blame”, in which the lord is indirectly praised through sometimes biting wit, with puranic stories and legends as the grist for the mill of the composer’s talents in gentle sarcasm and taunting.41 We will look at several examples of 39They

are called “group sounds” by C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar, 1948:114 and Madhavi, 1960:148. 40M. Arunacalam, 1989:170. I have not seen this title in the editions that have been available to me. The song Natanam adinar (He danced) [G1] by Gopalakrishna Bharati is considered in this study as an example of this type of composition, mixing rhythmic syllables into text. In Chapter 4, we will see that such compositions are peripheral and not central examples of the padam repertoire. 41The padam Tirumuttup pantalinkir. M. Arunacalam, 1989:176. Examples of ninda stuti padams are found in groups [D] and [E] (see Chapter 4).

Muttuttandavar

this type of composition from the 18th-century composers of this study.

3.3.7 Without Understanding

Two of Muttuttandavar’s padams are included in this study: Manatariyamal (without understanding) [A8], and Teruvil varano (won’t he come?) [A13]. While the first is relatively little-known today, the second became one of the most well-known padams of the 20th century. They both involve the nayaki, heroine, speaking to her sakhi, friend or confidante, of her love for the nayaka, her Lord, in the case Nataraja. Compared to the 19th-century padams which form the bulk of this study, we may find Muttuttandavar’s language less overtly erotic, more “chaste” or dignified. One of the most characteristic linguistic markers of the 19th-century Tamil padams, the suffix -ati or -ti (having the sense of “hey, girl!”, “oh, friend!”, or “listen to me, woman!”) is not found in the two padams of Muttuttandavar considered here, and occurs only rarely in the 23 other padams in the book of Muttuttandavar’s compositions. [A8] Manatariyamal (Without understanding) For full translation and commentary, see the Appendix.

Manatariyamal was sung for me by Smt. K.R. Madhavi Rajagopalan, the author of an M.Litt. thesis on the subject of Tamil padams and their composers. She has collected many rare Tamil padams, some of which I have found in no one else’s repertoire; Manatariyamal is one of these. She learned the song from Smt. Lakshmi, a woman who was a music student of Alathur Sivasubramania Ayyar, one of the Alathur Brothers, well-known vocalists from the 1930s through the 1980s.42 The fact that T.K. Cidambaranatha Mudaliar included the song in his 42The Alathur “Brothers” (not actually brothers), Srinivasa Ayyar and Sivasubramania

Ayyar, were born in 1912 and 1916, respectively. Pudukkottai Dakshinamurthi Pillai was “their friend, philosopher, and guide.” They were the fourth-generation disciples of Sri Tyagaraja through Manambuchavadi Venkatasubba Ayyar. N. Rajagopalan, 1990:312.

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1943 book suggested that Manatariyamal might have been better known a generation or two ago than it is today.43 [A13] Teruvil varano (Won’t he come?) For full translation and commentary, see the Appendix.

The second song considered of Muttuttandavar, Teruvil varano (won’t he come?) [A13] is one of the best-known padams in the repertoire of the late T. Balasaraswati. She performed this padam beginning as a very young girl, and it continued to be one of her favorite compositions throughout her career.44 I found documentation of eight performances of Teruvil by other dancers between 1935 and 1954. It was recorded on 78 RPM by “Dhanam’s Daughters” (Rajalakshmi and Lakshmiratnam, the two elder daughters of Vina Dhanammal) before 1930, and by Smt. T. Jayammal, the mother of Balasaraswati (date uncertain). T. Sankaran remembers Teruvil as performed by Kancipuram Dhanakoti Ammal (d. 1920, the maternal aunt of Kancipuram Nayana Pillai), who was known for her extensive repertoire of Tamil compositions and the expressiveness of her renditions: “Among the Muthuthandavar pada-s, Teruvil Vaarano made its appearance briefly in Bharatanatyam recitals and seems to have disappeared after Dhanakoti Ammal. She would actually turn around and look at all sections of the audience while singing the words—ennai tirumbi parano, Won’t he turn and look at me?—in the song Teruvil Vaaraano. What strength and enthusiasm she displayed in handling rare kritis!”45

The young Balasaraswati may have first heard Teruvil from her own mother or grandmother, or from Kancipuram 43Cidambaranatha

Mudaliar, T.K. 1943: 11, 90–91. Balasaraswati’s brother T. Ranganathan once told me that Bala especially loved the tisra gati adi tala, the 8-beat cycle where each beat is subdivided into three, mentioning this song in particular. Balasaraswati performed Teruvil varano over a span of at least 37 years, from 1936 to 1973 (See Repertoire Histories for documentation of dance performances and recordings of all the padams in this study). 45T. Sankaran, 1984b:31. Sankaran’s own abhinaya while describing Dhanakoti Ammal singing and turning to face the audience is unforgettable. 44T.

Muttuttandavar

Dhanakoti Ammal who was a close family friend 46 or perhaps she learned this song from the dancing of Mylapore Gowri Ammal, another close family friend who was a great inspiration to in her youth and who is known to have performed Teruvil in 1935.47 In one testimonial, M. Arunacalam says that Teruvil was “the rage in the middle of the thirties in Madras as a Bharata Natyam piece of Balasaraswati. Her mother used to sing this with the Tambura for her Abhinaya portrayal in a slow tempo.”48

3.3.8 God Coming in Procession

As a textual composition clear links can be seen between Teruvil varano and the ula genre of Tamil prabandha, in which women from all the seven stages of life,49 swoon with love as the deity comes in procession through the streets around the temple.50 U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar in his autobiography reports that an ula composition of his teacher Minakshisundaram Pillai (of Trichy, mid to late 19th century) on the deity of Tiruvidaimarudur, Siva as Mahalinga Swami, encountered resistance from two local Pandaram priests: “At the time when my master had the first public reading of the Tiruvitaimarutur Ula which he had composed, these two were responsible for quite a few obstructions and objections. There is, of course, a portion in the ula which deals with the women of ‘seven different stages of life’ beginning with petai—the small girls and ending with perilampen—ripe

46Balasaraswati’s

cousins, T. Brinda and T. Muktha, studied music from Dhanakoti Ammal’s nephew Kancipuram Nayana Pillai. The two families’ close connections have been documented by T. Sankaran (in Sankaran, 1984b). 47Smt. Gowri performed Teruvil varano on December 23, 1935.

48M. Arunacalam, 1989:137.

49Dr. V. Raghavan reports the seven stages according to Poihaiyar: Petai (5–7 or

5–8 years), Pedumbai (9–10 or 8–11), Mankai (11–14 or 12–13), and Matantai (15–18 or 14–19). 50As reported by Kersenboom, Kamil Zvelebil (1974:197) attributes the first ula composition to Ceraman Perumal, a Saiva poet of the 8th century. It became an important genre during the Cola period, the main ula poet according to Zvelebil being Ottakuttar, “the court poet of the three Cholas. “ Kersenboom further states: “The procession that is described in the genre ula is of utmost importance for the devadasi tradition; ula can be compared to the ritual procession called utsava in which devadasis participated. “ Kersenboom, 1987:74.

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grown-up women—who fall in love with the Lord Siva as he is taken in procession through the streets. The two unfortunate fellows went to a few Maharashtrian noblemen of royal blood who were settled in Tiruvitaimarudur and said to them: ‘The author of this ula describes the women of this town blabbering senselessly as they had fallen in love with the deity taken in procession through the streets. It is you and your womenfolk who live in these streets. Isn’t this in fact in poor taste, giving bad reputation to the ladies of your community?’ This has caused quite a stir. Sri Pillai had indeed quite some trouble because of this.” 51

In Teruvil varano, the hero indeed comes through the streets of Cidambaram in procession, and the heroine laments “Won’t he come into my street?” This song is not “in” one of the three ragas chosen for this study; it was included however because of its importance as perhaps the oldest Tamil padam to survive into the 20th-century repertoire, and in order to have more than one Muttuttandavar composition represented in the study.

3.4 Composer: Papavinasa Mudaliar

There is no more definite information for placing Papavinasa (alternate spelling Papanasa) Mudaliar historically than there is for Muttuttandavar, although the number of references to his life is greater and the living tradition of his compositions is more 51U.V.

Swaminatha Ayyar in Zvelebil 1990:225–26. In composing an Ula prabandha, Minakshisundaram Pillai was carrying on a millennium-old tradition, which we can see was coming under fire from some sectors of society by the late 19th century. This foreshadows, perhaps, the kind of moralizing trends that are seen strongly a half-century later in the ‘reform’ and ‘revival’ movements in dance of the early 20th century. Also, as we have seen, Tiruvidaimarudur was the seat of the “miniature” court of Amar Singh after he was deposed in 1798. The “Maharashtrian noblemen of noble blood” mentioned here would certainly refer to some of his descendants continuing to live in the same community, perhaps the immediate family of Pratap Singh (son of Amar Singh, mentioned by Subbarama Dikshitar as a composer and mridangam vidwan, in A. Sundaram Iyer, 1988:91), the nayaka (hero) of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s padam Ella arumai (All precious things) [A2], included in this study.

Papavinasa Mudaliar

extensive. The son of the Tamil scholar U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, S. Kalyanasundara Ayyar, wrote in 1944 that Papavinasa Mudaliar had lived in the first half of the 18th century, basing his conclusion on documents which indicated that he occupied a particular house in the town of Kumbakonam at this time.52 Apparently following the account of S. Kalyanasundara Ayyar, M. Arunacalam and K.R. Madhavi speak of him as an elder and an inspiration to several composers of the later 18th and 19th century;53 an average of the chronological estimates of his life places him here in our account, between Muttuttandavar and Marimutta Pillai in the lineage of Tamil padam composers.

3.4.1 His Life

He is dated 1675–1725 by M. Arunacalam, in the first half of the 18th century by K.C. Thiagarajan,54 and during the time of Tulaja Maharajah by Subbarama Dikshitar, Abraham Panditar, and C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar.55 Suddhananda Bharati states that Gopalakrishna Bharati (1810–1896) studied music with Papavinasa Mudaliar, which would place the composer in the 52In

that city he seems to have lived on North Vanaturai Street in (what later was) Sriman Tiruvenkatam Pillai’s house, according to some documents. The term translated as “documents” is pattiram, a palm leaf, written document, bond, or deed. S. Kalyanasundara Ayyar, 1944:vii (translation by T. Viswanathan and M. Allen.) 53K.R. Madhavi, 1960: 158; M. Arunacalam, 1989:191. S. Kalyanasundara Ayyar reports that Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, Madura Kavi, Ananta Bharati, and Gopalakrishna Bharati derived pleasure by rendering Mudaliar’s pieces (Kalyanasundara Ayyar, 1944:vii). M. Arunacalam adds that among this list, Ananta Bharati (1785–1846), a composer of kirttanas and musical dramas, “used to enjoy singing his songs in private whenever he was alone. He even mentions Papanasam’s Kuravanji in his book” (M. Arunacalam, 1989: 191). Arunacalam does not give a citation for the book. 54Thiagarajan reports that Subbarama Dikshitar had written that Papavinasa Mudaliar was “patronized by Tulaja Il (1765–1787) who came immediately after Bhava Saheb” (K.C. Thiagarajan 1982:132). The Tamil translation of S. Dikshitar’s note (A. Sundaram lyer 1988:109) does not specify Tulaja Il, saying only that Papavinasa Mudaliar lived during “Tulaja’s time.” This account also omits the rule of Pratap Singh, 1739–1763. 55M. Arunacalam, 1989:151; K.C. Thiagarajan in Kuppuswamy & Hariharan, 1982:35; S. Dikshitar in A. Sundaram lyer, 1988: 109; A. Panditar, 1917/1984: 193; C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar, 1948: 114.

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19th century.56 Adding to this rich stew, K.R. Madhavi assigns him in three statements to some time between the late 17th and late 18th centuries.57 The possibility for confusion is compounded by the fact that both Rajas with which his name has been associated, Ekoji and Tulaja, were each twinned during the Maratha period, that is, there were two Maratha Rajas named Ekoji and two named Tulaja. They were Ekoji I, the founder of the Maratha line at Tanjavur (1676–1684) and Ekoji 11 (1736–1738); also, Tulaja 1 (1728–1736) and Tulaja 11 (1763–1787). Thus, when in his Kumpecar Kuravanji Natakam reference is made to Ekoji,58 this could lead a scholar to claim either the late 17th or mid-18th century; and the reference to his being alive during Tulaja’s time could suggest either the early or late 18th century. M. Arunacalam says Papavinasa Mudaliar was born at Tiruvarur “of an educated and cultured family and had developed early in life into a well-recognised man of letters.” K.R. Madhavi says that he was a native either of Tiruvarur or Tirunelveli, “on account of his name Papanasam which is the name of a place near Tirukkutralam.” Citing Somasundara Desikar of Tiruvarur, K.C. Thiagarajan says “according to him, there was evidence to show that the composer belonged to Tiruvarur and to the Tondamandalam Tulu Vellalar community and was a Sanskrit scholar.”59 Papavinasa Mudaliar’s biography seems to be known mainly if not exclusively through the writings of U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar or his son S. Kalyanasundara Ayyar.60 Writing in approximately 56Suddhananda

Bharati, 1980 (unnumbered). gives “early 18th century,” also “during his time the Maharashtrian dynasty was formed,” and “seems to have lived during the reign of King Thulajaji of Tanjore (1763–1789)” in 1960:156,157. 58M. Arunacalam (1989:187) quotes the line “Kumbhesa worshipped by Ekoji of Tanjavur who is like the Kalpaka Vruksha for the poor and the needy” from the Kumbecar Kuravanji, and concludes that it is Ekoji I (1676–1684) who is being sung. In S. Kalyanasundara Ayyar (1944:5), is found one reference to Ekoji. A second reference is indicated at 1944:vi but I have not been able to find it in the body of the Kuravanji. 59M. Arunacalam, 1989: 185; K.R. Madhavi, 1960:156–157; K.C. Thiagarajan, 1982:132–133. 60M. Arunacalam says that the writing of U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar is the only source (1989:184). The introduction to Kumbecar Kuravanji, written by his son 57Madhavi

Papavinasa Mudaliar

1930, C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar laments that despite having heard of Papavinasa Mudaliar: “I have not been able to come across even one specimen of the handwork of this composer. Mr. Subramanya [Subbarama­ ed.] Dikshitar seems to have been more fortunate and it has not even 30 years since he left us. But just what one would expect from the tender mercies of time, that seems to do its work more quickly among us and with a more unsparing hand than in the past. A short three decades and not even a vestige of the composition of the padakara.”61

3.4.2 Transmission of His Compositions

Several sources indicate, however, that at least some of the compositions of Papavinasa Mudaliar have remained in circulation. K.C. Thiagarajan cites information he received from Dr. V. Raghavan that Somasundara Desikar of Tiruvarur had published both an article on, and several songs of, Papavinasa Mudaliar in the magazine Silpasri.62 In Chennai today, Dr. M.B. Vedavalli (b. 1935) is known as a repository of the compositions of Papavinasa Mudaliar; her guru Mudicondan Venkatarama Ayyar (1897–1975) published two kritis of Papavinasa Mudaliar with music notation in 1952.63 [D4] Natamadi tirinda (You used to get about) For full translation and commentary see the Appendix.

There is a famous story regarding the ninda stuti composition of Papavinasa Mudaliar, Natamadi tirinda (You used to get about) [D4], one of the songs included in this study. As related by K.C. S. Kalyanasundara Ayyar is the only reference I have been able to find to date regarding the life of Papavinasa Mudaliar. I have found no writings of U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar directly. 61C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar, 1948: 114–115. 62K.C. Thiagarajan (1982:132) gives the reference to Silpasri Vol. I, pp. 585–587 for the article; Vol. I, pp. 265–267 and 462–464 for the songs. I have not been able to locate and review these sources. 63Mudicondan Venkatarama Ayyar in Journal of the Music Academy of Madras (JMAM), Madras, 1952, vol. xxiii.

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Thiagarajan and M. Arunacalam, when the violinist Tirukodikaval Krishna Ayyar played the song for Setupati Raja Rajeswara of Ramanathapuram64 the Setupati not only gave the performer a gift of 500 rupees and requested Krishna Ayyar to teach him the song, but also ordered a thousand copies to be printed and distributed to musicians when they visited his court.65

3.4.3 Papavinasa Mudaliar and Tiruvarur

T. Sankaran, a grandson of Vina Dhanammal and longtime chronicler of music and dance traditions, told me that Papavinasa Mudaliar’s repertoire remains very much alive at Tiruvarur, likely reflecting a continuous tradition of performance at least at this one place. Sankaran has documented several of Papavinasa Mudaliar’s compositions as known by nagaswaram vidwan66 T.S. Letchappa Pillai, a native of Tiruvarur.67 In writing about the organization (by Ramaswami Dikshitar, the father of Muttuswamy Dikshitar) of the nagaswaram repertoire at Tiruvarur for temple worship, Sankaran says “kritis of Ramaswami Dikshitar, Vasi Vasi, and Muthuswami Dikshitar ranging from the ubiquitous Vatapi Ganapatim and those of Subbaroya Sastri and Papavinasa Mudaliar and Tillanas are there in plenty.”68 Specifically with reference to Tamil padams in this repertoire, Sankaran further states: “The major part of this nagaswaram repertoire consists of nearly 40 padams which should intrigue the research scholar...

64Raja

Rajesvara alias Muthuramalinga Setupati, was born ca. 1890, and was the ruler of Ramanathapuram from 1910–1929 (N. Subrahmanian, 1989:70). 65K.C. Thiagarajan, 1982:132; M. Arunacalam, 1989:191–192. Tirukodikaval Krishna Ayyar being a violinist, one wonders if the melody alone was what captivated the Setupati, or if Krishna Ayyar also sang the text. The accounts do not address this, nor do they mention if only the text was printed by the Setupati, or the musical notation as well. 66Vidwan is a respectful term for a senior musician. 67T. Sankaran, personal communication. Itupol niraicelva Tiruvarur is one song collected by Sankaran from Sri Letchappa. The text is handwritten in his copy of Madhavi, 1960:156. According to Sankaran, there are several songs (among them padams) for which Tiruvarur nagaswara vidwans know the melody but not the text, making identification of particular compositions difficult. 68T. Sankaran, 1975:18.

Papavinasa Mudaliar

Most of them are compositions in Tamil propitiating deities in the Eagle Mount (Tirukkarukkunram) and Princes like Kumara Ettendra of the Royal House of Ettayapuram which patronised the Dikshitar family... The variety of the ragas clothing the padams... is a contribution of several composers mostly unknown but some of the names are well known eg. Papavinasa Mudaliar (18th Century), Vaideeswaran Kovil Subbaramier (19th Century), Kavikunjara Bharati (19th Century) and Mathura Kavi (18th Century).”69

The Journal of the Music Academy of Madras records a performance of “Rare Padavarnas and Padas from Tiruvarur Temple” in 1963, by T.N. Chinnathambi Pillai of Tiruvarur. This citation gives us further information about the compositions of Papavinasa Mudaliar known in the Tiruvarur sampradaya (tradition): “[The demonstration contained] three rare Padavarnas and Tamil Padas on Tyagaraja of Tiruvarur. Vidwan Papanasa Mudaliar had composed a number of Tamil Padas on God Tyagaraja some of which were in Ninda Stuti style. A few of these had been known, but there were some which were sung on the days of the different festivals of the temple, e.g. ‘Mettavum nalla’ in Todi, sung on Tiruvatirai and Patanjali Vyaghra pada darsanam. Vidwan Chinnathambi Pillai then sang the above mentioned Pada and others, ‘Perum nalla’, in Pantuvarali, ‘Idupol’, in Kalyani, ‘Vasi vasi,’ in Sahana. His demonstration ended with the Sankarabharanam nottu-sahitya of Dikshitar on Tyagaraja beginning ‘Parvati’. Papa Venkatarama Ayyar referred to the pure traditional form of the ragas presented in the renderings and also the value of such rare old sahityas and the efforts of the Academy to find them and bring them to light. Mudikondan Venkatarama Ayyar said that ‘Perum nalla’ was also known in Purvikalyani.”70

M. Arunacalam asserts that Papavinasa Mudaliar must have, though not himself from the Melakkarar community, taken a 69T.

Sankaran, 1975:20. Chinnathambi Pillai, 1963:42–43.

70T.N.

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strong interest in how the devadasis of Tiruvarur interpreted his songs in dance: “Papanasam (Papavinasa Mudaliar), not a Nattuvanar himself, directed the Tala, Jati, and generally Abhinayam too… In this way he was intimately associated with some dancer families in Tiru Arur (Tiruvarur). His compositions were thus the privileged possession of the dancer community there who were all his disciples in music and dance… Tiru Arur Gnanam and Tiru Arur Kamalam of recent Bharata Natyam fame were all descendants of such disciples. They were a hundred years after Papanasam. After his demise and after the passing away of his own direct disciples, scores of his Padams were forgotten because they were continued only in an oral tradition and were not written down. Thus we are left barely with a very few songs of his, the vast volume of his songs having perished.”71

3.4.4 His Oeuvre

Papavinasa Mudaliar composed at least one and perhaps two kuravanjis (“operas” or dance dramas) in Tamil. His Kumbecar Kuravanji Natakam was edited and published by S. Kalyanasundara Ayyar in 1944. A second possible composition was the Tiruvarur Kuravanji, of which Arunacalam says that, except for a few verses, the entire poem is now lost.72 Some authors seem to conflate the two, saying that the Kumbesar Kuravanji is in praise of Lord Tyagaraja of Tiruvarur.73 K.R. Madhavi wrote that there are approximately fifteen unpublished padams of Papavinasa Mudaliar in the collection of the U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar Library. It would appear that hardly any of these songs are performed today:

71M.

“His padas are in praise of numerous deities, like, Lord Muruga of Kandapuri, Vaidyanatha of Karunakara, Velur, and other deities known as ‘Tirumullai Vanecar’, ‘Kiranur Velar’,

Arunacalam, 1989:190.

Arunacalam, 1989:187.

73K.R. Madhavi, 1960:157; S. Seetha, 1981:187.

72M.

Papavinasa Mudaliar

‘Tatavir Konrai Caminata’, ‘Muttu Velar’, ‘Tarmapuricvarar’, ‘Tirumuttappadi Arakar’, etc.”74

3.4.5 Flowering of Ninda Stuti

After Muttuttandavar’s ecal padam, which may be the first ninda stuti padam in Tamil, we see ninda stuti compositions both in the work of Papavinasa Mudaliar and in the songs of Marimutta Pillai (to be considered next). The two songs of Papavinasa Mudaliar included in this study are on Siva, as Tyagaraja of Tiruvarur, and as Nataraja of Cidambaram. In addition to being a pioneer of kuravanji composition (whether or not one concludes that he wrote the first kuravanji in Tamil), Papavinasa Mudaliar used the technique of ninda stuti, where “the Lord is held up to blame and ridicule; but it is all praise and prayer to the Lord if we penetrate through the surface to the depth beneath.”75 This technique gives the composer the opportunity to bring stories about the god’s life and adventures into the song, “harnessing all Saiva tradition and Purana legends to his musical requirements.”76 Ninda stuti songs, as mentioned earlier, may or may not be considered padams, depending both on the textual content of a song and on the quite subjective realm of individual perception and interpretation of that textual content. Dancers I have spoken with feel that ninda stuti compositions most often do not have the nayaka-nayaki bhava, the sringara love sentiment, or feeling so central to the 19th-century padams. However, ninda stuti compositions like Peyandi [El], where the sakhi (friend) chides the love-stricken nayaki (heroine) for having fallen head over heels for the crazy Siva who dances with demons, are felt to contain nayaka-nayaki bhava by most dancers because the element of romantic love is co-present along with the “praise-blame” aspects of ninda stuti.77 [D3] Mukattai katti (Only your face shows) For full translation and commentary, see the Appendix.

74K.R.

Madhavi, 1960:157; S. Seetha, 1981:187.

Madhavi, 1960:157.

76M. Arunacalam, 1989:185.

77Peyandi [E1] is discussed further on in this chapter.

75K.R.

93

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The two compositions of Papavinasa Mudaliar contained in this study are probably his best-known songs. Three recordings of Mukattai katti (Only your face shows) [D3] are listed in the Performance Histories in the Appendix. One is a 78 RPM recording of Smt. Madurai Shanmuga Vadivoo, the mother of Smt. M.S. Subbulakshmi, playing vina and singing (late 1930s). The second and third are cassette recordings by Smt. T. Muktha and Sri T. Viswanathan. The contrast between the brief rendition required for the 78 RPM format and the open-ended possibilities of the cassette format is nowhere more evident than here; the tempo of Smt. Shanmuga Vadivoo is quite a bit faster than the tempo taken by T. Muktha or T. Viswanathan, and Muktha takes the time to sing all three caranams.78 Another striking feature to me in the vina recording was to hear the raga Bhairavi rendered with relatively little ornamentation (especially in the descending sa ni da pa range); this may be explained partly by the tempo at which the piece is taken, which would limit the player’s ability to ornament, and partly by inherent properties of the vina.79 The text of Mukattai katti is in a way itself a brief tour of the modes of worship of Siva as Tyagaraja at Tiruvarur. The image of Tyagaraja in the Tiruvarur temple is covered completely except for his face, a situation which gives us the ninda stuti premise (here relatively mild, in comparison to Nadamadi tirinda [D4], the next song to be taken up for consideration) contained in the pallavi of the composition: “What is the secret of your being covered, Lord? Could there be any defect in such a perfect, healthy body?” References are made in the three successive caranams to the late afternoon puja (worship), to the god when he is taken dancing in procession, and finally, when he is bathed. The first caranam refers to the cayaratcai or dusk puja (from 78In

my experience, this was, in fact, quite unusual. Of the fifteen songs Smt. Muktha taught me, this was the only one for which she sang three caranams. In dance performances today, it is also rare for the dancer to interpret more than one caranams of any particular padam. 79Upon hearing this recording, T. Viswanathan remarked that from what he had heard as a boy, most vina artists of the early 20th century played in this way, where the affinity of svaras to particular scale tones is stressed, instead of using the wide shakes and oscillations, which are a hallmark of the gamaka (ornamentation) in his family tradition.

Papavinasa Mudaliar

4:00 to 6:00 P.M. or later), the most popular puja of the day, attracting the most devotees, according to Saskia KersenboomStory. Based on interviews with dancers and musicians from hereditary families of Tiruvarur, Kersenboom-Story writes: “According to Smt. P. Ranganayaki devadasis would fan the god with flywhisk tails (camara) during this worship; in fact, the right to do so belonged to her family. ... Both in Pudukkottai and in Tiruvarur devadasis used to imitate the ritual actions of the priest during diparadhana for the benefit of the devotees who can never enter the sanctum. ... In Tiruvarur, the Cayaratcai puja did involve the participaüon of several groups of devadasis and their complementary cooperation. Sri V. Natesa described the puja as follows: During the daily Cayaratcai puja a devadasi, belonging to the periyamurai (major group) stands in front of the shrine of Sri Tyagarajaswami and imitates the ritual actions that are performed by the priest during the offering of diparadhana. She is clad in a white pyjama over which she wears a long upper-cloth. Her hair is tied in a knot, like Siva’s hairdo, and she wears a rudraksa (Saivite rosary.)”80

One aspect of the worship possibly unique to Tiruvarur is the dance of Tyagaraja when he is taken in procession, mentioned in the second caranam of Mukattai katti. This was explained to me by Smt. G. Sulochana, who comes from a traditional family of dancers and musicians of Tiruvarur: “Once a year during the car festival, when the polebearers carry Tyagaraja in procession on a palanquin, they manipulate the palanquin in such a way as to make Tyagaraja dance. They move the palanquin up and down at all different angles, each man lifting and lowering his end of the pole at different times. It’s quite a vigorous motion.”81

80Kersenboom-Story,

1987:113–114, 167. She reports that in 1977 when the interview was conducted, Sri Natesa was the eldest among nagaswaram musicians attached to the Tyagaraja temple, approximately 83 years old. 81G. Sulochana, personal communication, Middletown, 1991.

95

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Composers of Tamil Padams

This particular dance is described in the song as kuttatu, a combination of two ancient Tamil terms for dance, kuttu and atu, and the alliteration of the passage, kutittu kutittu, suggests the swinging and swaying of Tyagaraja as the pole-bearers make him dip and turn.82 In the final caranam, we find the mudra, the signature, of the composer. Fortuitously, the proper name Papavinasa also means “without sin”, so there is a double meaning, both to the work of the composer and the blemishless character of the deity he writes in praise of.

“You Used to Get About!”

The regard in which the Setupati of Ramanathapuram, Raja Rajeswara, held Nadamadi tirinda (You used to get about!) [D4] has already been referred to above. Only one caranam of the song seems to be available. In this song, several puranic stories are referred to as incidents in the life of Siva or, we might say, of the “Siva-complex”. I say this because while the pallavi and anupallavi suggest that Siva specifically as Nataraja of Cidambaram is the subject of the composition, the reference in the caranam to Paravai’s doorstep is to a story that is associated specifically with Saivite traditions at Tiruvarur, not with Nataraja or Cidambaram. It could be that the composer intended to associate traditions with greater Saivite traditions via the device of assimilating Siva’s stubbing of his toe on a nighttime mission to the raised (and therefore lame, it is always insinuated throughout these ninda stuti compositions!) leg of Nataraja. It would also be tantalizing to think that this crossreference within the greater world of Saiva life-legends could have something to do with the fact that the actual image of Cidambaram was brought to Tiruvarur for safekeeping for some time in the middle to late 18th century. B. Natarajan, in his book on the traditions of Nataraja and Cidambaram, speaks of a Tiruvarur Interregnum: 82Kamil

Zvelebil (1991:33) states: “The motif of dancing on the chest of deity is of course best known from the famous dance of Tyagaraja (a composite image of Siva, Uma and Subrahmanya) dancing on Visnu’s chest.”

Papavinasa Mudaliar

“During the latter half of the eighteenth century (A.D. 1749–84), the Nataraja temple at Chidambaram was used as a fort for nearly thirty-five years. During the Anglo—French wars of the eighteenth century, the Chidambaram temple was the scene of some fighting. In 1753, the French and the Marathas captured it from an English detachment which was stationed there and held the area till 1760. The French garrison which occupied Chidambaram surrendered to Major Manson in April 1760. ... It is believed that during this disturbed period the idols of Nataraja and Sivakami were moved from their sanctum sanctorurn at Chidambaram to the present Sabhapati mandapam at Tiruvarur (in Tanjavur district) for safety. An inscription in Grantha character found in the thousand pillared mandapam at Chidambaram refers to the return of these idols to Chidambaram and their reinstallation in the Chit Sabha in Saka 1695, Kali 4871, A.D. 1773.”83

Tiruvarur was the native place of Sundarar (also called Cuntaramurtti), one of the Nayanmars, the 6–9th-century Saivite composers of the Tevaram hymns. S. V. Seshadri gives one interpretation of the story of Siva, Sundarar, and Paravai:

83B.

“Sundaramurti was one of the four great Nayanmars. He had a very funny relationship with Siva; he was almost a comrade, a friend of Siva. And Siva liked him so much that he would do anything that Sundaramurti asked. When Sundaramurti was in Tiruvarur, he had a liason with a ... woman of easy virtue there, called Paravai. They were both wrapped up in each other, they loved each other so greatly. But all the time Sundaramurti was loving Paravai, he was forgetting Siva. So Siva was jealous, and he caused all kinds of problems to Sundaramurti, so that he could wean this fellow away from Paravai. Because Sundaramurti was not able to give sufficient attention to Paravai due to his troubles caused by Siva, he wanted to send Siva himself as his messenger to Paravai. Paravai had become it is what is called udal—became angry with the lover. So in order to pacify

Natarajan, 1974:63. Natarajan also refers to the occupation of Cidambaram town and temple by the troops of Hyder Ali from 1780 to1784.

97

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Composers of Tamil Padams

her, Sundaramurti sent Siva as his messenger to the house of Paravai, and Siva had to go as a messenger, a dhuta. So, ‘When you went, probably your leg hit upon the steps of Paravai’s house. Is it because you have got a wound there that your leg has become lame?” 84

It is a quite famous story; one of its delicious ironies is that the great god Siva is reduced, by the bonds of love and obligation he feels for his devotee Sundarar, to the position of going as a messenger for Sundarar to his love Paravai, and to patch up a quarrel he was at least partly responsible for creating in the first place, out of his jealousy that Sundarar was forgetting him in his passion for Paravai. 85 Again, we see the mudra (though abbreviated) of the composer in En papamo, in the last line of the composition.

3.5

Composer: Marimutta Pillai

P. Balakrishnan and M. Arunacalam say that Marimutta Pillai died in 1787; additionally, Arunacalam says that he was aged 75 when he passed away, which if accurate would place his year of birth in 1712.86 Both scholars state that Marimutta Pillai was born in Tillai Vidangam (or Tillaividangan), a village 4 miles east of Cidambaram.87 His father was Theivangal Perumal Pillai (or Devapperumal Pillai), a Saiva Vellalar (generally prosperous non-Brahmin landholding group). Arunacalam reports that the young Marimutta studied Tamil poetry and also took Siva diksha (Saivite religious instruction) from Sivaganganatha Desikar of Cidambaram. He wrote many poems at this early stage of his life. Arunacalam says that Marimutta Pillai was exposed as a young 84S.V.

Seshadri, personal communication, Chennai, 1990. D. Shulman, 1990, for commentary and complete English translations of Cuntaramurtti Nayanar’s Tevaram poems. 86P. Balakrishnan, 1982:72; M. Arunacalam, 1989:208. Neither scholar gives their sources for biographical information on Marimutta Pillai; perhaps information is contained in one of the 19th-century editions of the book of Muttuttandavar’s and Marimutta Pillai’s compositions, where, as M. Arunacalam wrote, “biographies of the musicians are given.” 87“On the Kille road, on the way to Pichavaram.” M. Arunacalam, 1989:206. 85See

Marimutta Pillai

man to Arunacala Kavirayar, composer of the Ramanataka Kirttanas, as well as to the descendants of Kuppiah Pillai, a disciple of Muttuttandavar, and that this was largely responsible for developing his taste for music.88

3.5.1 The Central Narrative

Marimutta Pillai’s development as a composer is attributed by both biographical sources to an incident involving his eldest son. According to P. Balakrishnan, this son, Theivangal Perumal Pillai (named for Marimutta Pillai’s father)89 had at the age of 19 begun composing songs; he “was so deeply immersed in bhakti that he stood aloof from all worldly pleasures. In due course, he left his house.” Marimutta Pillai, gravely worried about his son’s behavior, prayed to Lord Nataraja, and during a nap after evening prayers on the verandah of the temple, Nataraja appeared to him and “said that his son would come to his senses if he would compose a prabandha in praise of Thillaimpathi [Nataraja].” Upon doing this, his son “was miraculously cured of his aberration.”90 This account leaves us somewhat in doubt as to the exact nature of the son’s problem. Arunacalam reports the story a bit differently. He says that the son was born in 1756, when Marimutta Pillai was 44 years old; the son “developed into a mentally retarded child.” The story from here is the same, involving the vision in the nap, the composition of songs in praise of the Lord, and the miraculous cure. To Arunacalam, the incident marked the point at which Marimutta Pillai, “a good poet by then”, now became a writer of specifically “musical songs.”91 Aberration or mental retardation, the lesson is the same; as a result of the crisis involving his son, the poet Marimutta Pillai became the composer Marimutta Pillai, establishing his name in the world of Karnataka music and dance. 88Citations

this paragraph M. Arunacalam, 1989:207–208.

reports that it was common practice in Saiva families to name one’s

first son after one’s father, i.e., the baby boy would be given his grandfather’s (father’s father) name. M. Arunacalam, 1989:28. 90Citations this paragraph P. Balakrishnan in 1982:71. 91M. Arunacalam, 1989:208. 89Arunacalam

99

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Composers of Tamil Padams

3.5.2 His Work The texts of twenty-five songs of Marimutta Pillai were first published along with the kritis and padams of Muttuttandavar in the 1860s. These songs are all on Nataraja except one which is written in praise of Nataraja’s consort Sivakami. Of the 25 songs, in the edition (ca. 1868/1874) which I consulted in the U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar library, 23 songs are listed under the heading kirttanam, one song as ninta stuti kirttanam, and one song as ninta stuti patam.92 In the 1971 reprint edition by Irattina Nayakar and Sons, the title ninta stuti occurs over the same two songs, but none of the 25 songs have the title of kirttanam or patam. Neither of the two songs considered in this study is one of the two labeled as ninda stuti in the book, although one, Enneramum (Why is your leg raised?) [D1] is a fine example of this type of composition. According to M. Arunacalam, the texts of several other works of Marimutta Pillai, besides this collection of 25 single compositions, are available. One is Puliyur Venpa:93 “Written in his early days, [it] is full of literary concepts which were then held to be the mark of great poetry and scholarship. It is a poem in Venba metre, in 100 verses. The last two lines are so couched as to admit of two different

92The

ninta stuti patam in this book, the 24th song Enna kariyattukku inta peyanti mel iccai konday makale (Daughter, for what reason did you fall in love with this disheveled demon-dancer?), shares many text phrases with the song Peyandi [El] considered later in this study, the authorship of which is somewhat in doubt. The same words and phrases occur in the popular Kalyani raga padam Ettai kantu ni, not included in this study. Ettai kandu ni, interestingly, is another song whose authorship is in doubt. While included in the publication of Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar’s padams, it has been variously attributed to Marimutta Pillai (by Kuppuswamy & Hariharan, 1983:87 and N. Rajagopalan, 1990:155), and to Papavinasa Mudaliar as well (by Nirmala Ramachandran, at the “National Seminar on Bharatanatyam Traditions” organized by the Sruti Foundation, Chennai, December 1989). We may conclude that the idea of the Peyanti and the characteristic descriptive phrases associated with the young girl (usually the daughter) who falls in love with him, is a popular theme in the padam literature. See Peyanti [El] for further discussion. 93Puliyur, “lion city” refers to Cidambaram. See the songs below for references to Takka and Puli. Venpa is “the commonest, the most difficult in its construction, and the most esteemed kind of stanzaic structure of Tamil classical poetry.” K. Zvelebil quoted in Kersenboom-Story, 1987: 175, note 177.

Marimutta Pillai

meanings and hence they are difficult verse. On this account the poem was prescribed as a text book for the B.A. degree examination of the Madras University at the end of the last century, for many years.”94

P. Balakrishnan cites a verse of Marimutta Pillai which states that the Puliyur Venpa is the prabandha (composition) which he composed during the crisis with his son. He says it was this Venpa that was responsible for the son’s cure.95 Arunacalam mentions two further compositions of Marimutta Pillai for which texts were available to him. One is the Aiyanar Nondi Natakam.96 “A dramatic monologue where a rake, who had lost all his wealth on a courtesan, who mercilessly threw him out, got reformed, and is all devotion to Aiyanar. Here he tells his own story, which narrates his thieving and amputation of a leg in punishment, hopping and singing on the stage and how he was saved by Aiyanar.”97

The other available work is Varunapuri Kuravan, a kuravanji dance drama of 170 verses, including 55 musical pieces.98 Following these, Arunacalam mentions three poems whose texts were 94M.

Arunacalam, 1989:208. M.S. Purnalingam Pillai (1929/1985:318), in a short entry on Marimutta Pillai, mentions only two of his compositions, this Puliyur Venpa and Chidambara Isvrar Virali Vidu Thuthu (mentioned just below in the text.) 95P. Balakrishnan, 1982:71. 96“The Nondi Natakam, [also] of about the same period as kuravanji and pallu natakam, is a sort of monologue, where a lame man (nondi), the hero of the play, appears on the stage and enacts his own story. He is a wastrel whose escapades of amour and villainy have caused him loss of the leg and left him lame. The amorous stories in the narration were perhaps intended to appeal to the sensuous character of the petty chieftains of the 18th century to capture whose attention they were written.” The French garrison which occupied Chidambaram surrendered to Major Manson in April 1760. It is believed that during this disturbed period the idols of Nataraja and Sivakami were moved from their sanctum sanctorum at Chidambaram to the present Sabhapati mandapam at Tiruvarur. M. Arunacalam, 1974:51. 97M. Arunacalam, 1989:209. 98Varunapuri is another name for Tillaividangan, the birthplace of Marimutta Pillai.

101

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Composers of Tamil Padams

not available to him and appear to be lost. The first of these is Tillai pallur: “The pallu natakam came into prominence by about the same time [as kuravanji—end of the 16th or beginning of the 17th century]. While the kuravanji dealt with the hill life, the pallu dealt with the pastoral life. The theme is still more simple here. A palla labourer is a farm servant in a temple farm. The natural jealousy between his two wives causes the palla himself to be placed in fetters. The farm work is paralysed. They then come to their senses and cause the palla to be released and to complete the farm work. This is principally a dance drama, and fully a folk play of the masses, much more than the kuravanji. The pomp and glitter of that is absent here.”99

The second and third of these are Cidambaresar Virali Vidu Dutu100 and Anithi Natakam.101 Marimutta Pillai then, has several types of nataka (drama) compositions to his credit, not only the individual songs such as the two considered in this study. It is Arunacalam’s opinion that Marimutta Pillai’s larger compositional forms must have been better known in the composer’s day than his kirttanams or padams: “Those were days when pedantic and difficult poetry was considered classical and held in high esteem. They were merely intellectual, while the Kirtanams were lyrical and emotional. They were a new genre and did not conform to any older system of prosody.”102

While we are unable to affirm or deny which compositions of Marimutta Pillai were more or less popular in his day, it is clear that Marimutta Pillai composed in a wide range of genres, 99M.

Arunacalam, 1974:50–51. a lovesick maiden sends the Virali, a woman of the Panar (singer) clan as her messenger of love to Lord Nataraja.” M. Arunacalam, 1989:209. 101“...probably on the model of Rama Natakam, depicting some court practices which were slowly indulged in the law courts of the day.” M. Arunacalam, 1989:209. 102M. Arunacalam, 1989:210. 100“Where

Marimutta Pillai

moreso than it seems either Muttuttandavar or Papavinasa Mudaliar.

3.5.3 Ninda Stuti

As did Muttuttandavar and Papavinasa Mudaliar, Marimutta Pillai composed songs in, and is considered a master of, ninda stuti. According to M. Arunacalam, in his ninda stuti compositions the use of double entendre (slesha or ciletai) is a common device. As an example, Arunacalam cites the double use of annam (swan or food) and atu (dance or goat) in the song Enna piraippu: “The poet plays on this pun in the two words. l. Without tasting any food, your appearance is totally changed (emaciated.) And you boldly appeared in public carrying a goat. This is in the sense of ridicule. The real significance is: 2. You changed your form (when you appeared as a column of Light at Tiru Annamalai) so that the swan (i.e., Brahma) could not know you (reach your crown), however high he might fly. You boldly took up the Cosmic Dance and performed it in the Dance Hall [of] Chidambaram.”103

[D1] Enneramum (Why is your leg always raised?) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

We shall see that Enneramum [DI], the first song below, is a good example of ninda stuti, full of puranic references as well, while the second of Marimutta Pillai’s songs to be considered, Kalaittukki (O Lord standing there!) [D2], lacks the sarcastic humor of the first though they both address Nataraja as the god whose (left) leg is raised. Enneramum [D1] appears to be quite rarely performed today; I found no evidence of its having been sung or danced more recently than 1940.104 In the family of Vina Dhanammal, T. Sankaran reports, the song was taught to his mother Lakshmiratnam by Namakkal Sesha Ayyangar. It is 103M.

Arunacalam, 1989:211. Repertoire Histories. The only dance performance I found was of Smt. Swarnasaraswati, December 22, 1936. Enneramum was sung by the Palayur Brothers in 1935, and by Ariyakudi Ramanuja Ayyangar in 1940.

104See

103

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listed in the repertoire of T. Balasaraswati but I did not find any performances documented in concert programs.105 T. Sankaran said that Enneramum is not widely known even in the Dhanammal family now; he remembers the tune of part of the song, and his cousin Smt. T. Brinda knows the whole song.106 Smt. Meera Seshadri of Chennai reported that she had learned the song from Sri Kancipuram Ellappa, who performed nattuvangam (the function of dance master) for Balasaraswati for several years. 107 All sources acknowledge Marimutta Pillai as the composer of the song except R. Rangaramanuja Ayyangar, who attributes it to Muttuttandavar.108 [D2] Kalaittukki (O Lord standing there) For full translation and commentary, see the Appendix.

Kalaittukki (Oh Lord standing there!) [D2] is the second song we have seen (in addition to Teruvil varano [A13]) which is not set in one of the three ragas chosen for this study, but which has been included due to its prominence in the 20th-century repertoire, as well as to give us a second composition of Marimutta Pillai. Valliyur V. Krishna Bhagavatar (also known as Mayavaram Krishna Ayyar) recorded the song on 78 RPM in the 1930s, and the young M.S. Subbulakshmi made a now-famous 78 RPM recording in the 1940s (both songs are documented in the Performance History (See Appendix). M. Arunacalam writes regarding the performance history of Kalaittukki: 105But

it was evidently danced by T. Balasaraswati. T. Viswanathan remembers that they used to call a friend of the family “Enneramum” because he always used to request Bala to perform this piece. (The reader familiar with Karnataka music should not confuse this song with the popular song Enneramum untan canniti in Devagandhari raga, a composition of Gopalakrishna Bharati.) 106T. Sankaran taught the song to Smt. Usha Sivakumar, a talented vocalist who also studied with T. Viswanathan and sings for the Bharata Natyam ensemble of Aniruddha Knight. 107Personal communication, Chennai, 1990. Smt. Seshadri, a student with Smt. T. Muktha in Chennai, also learned many padams from the dancer Swarnasaraswati when they both lived in Delhi in the 1960s. 108Rangaramanuja Ayyangar, 1953:VI:359.

Marimutta Pillai

“His [Marimutta Pillai’s] songs in carnatic Ragas were very popular in the period 1930 to 1940. One song in particular [Kalaittukki], rendered by Srimati M.S. Subbulakshmi both vocally on the concert dais and through the gramophone records of those days was a great favourite... This song was one of the greatest hits in Tamilnadu at the time. This song also owes its popularity to the dance of Balasaraswati, then a young girl, when her mother Jayammal sang it in a slow, very slow moving music, Chowkka Kala, enabling her daughter to bring out all the expressions, through hand, body and eye movements, from her store-house of imaginative creation. The song lingered in the minds and the dance lingered in the eyes of the audience and every one went on humming the tune after once seeing the dance, for months on end.”109

The one documented performance of Kalaittukki by Balasaraswati I found was in 1935; her student Smt. Nandini Ramani told me that Bala had danced this song only relatively early in her career.110 Kalaittukki was danced by several artists between the mid-1940s and mid-1950s, notably Kamala, who danced it at least five times at the Music Academy alone between 1948 and 1957.111 According to T. Sankaran, Kalaittukki was introduced into the family repertoire of Kancipuram Nayana Pillai by Ettayapuram Ramachandra Bhagavatar.112 Sankaran does not suggest, however, that it was necessarily through this route that Smt. Jayammal or Balasaraswati learned the song. 109M.

Arunacalam, 1989:206–207. communication, Chennai, 1990. Nandini felt this may have been one of the songs, which Balasaraswati performed early in her career at the request of others, but which dropped out of her repertoire over time as she concentrated on compositions she felt more attracted to. 111See Performance Histories in the Appendix. 112Ettayapuram Ramachandra Bhagavatar (1846–1915) taught, besides Kancipuram Nayana Pillai, Puducheri Rangaswami Ayyar, and Madurai Pushpavanam Ayyar (N. Rajagopalan 1990:228). R. Rangaramanuja Ayyangar calls him “one of the greatest teachers of his time” and states that one student of Ramachandra Bhagavatar had taught him several padams: “The Vishnu Temple at Mannargudi fostered Bharata Natyam through liberal grants. Govindasami, a disciple of Ettaiyapuram Ramachandra Bhagavatar, was a repository of the Padams of Ksetrayya, Sarangapani, and Sabhapati Sivan. He and his brother, a musician of rare talents, did Nattuvangam in the temple. The author learned a number of padams through this source.” R. Rangaramanuja Ayyangar, 1972:319, 341–342. 110Personal

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3.6 Composer: Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar113 While all sources agree that Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar is a composer of the 18th century, we find some latitude in the dates given by different sources. N. Rajagopalan dates him between 1700 and 1765; B. Natarajan between 1700 and 1762; and M. Arunacalam dates him between 1715 and 1794, calling him a “senior contemporary of Arunacala Kavi and Marimutta Pillai.”114 In the most extensive account available in English of the life and work of Venkatasubba Ayyar, K.R. Rajagopalan says “he is said to have been born around the beginning of the 18th century,” and “he appears to have lived for about 60 years and disappeared while crossing the Narmada; but according to another tradition he lived for 80 or 90 years.”115 According to K.R. Rajagopalan, Venkatasubba Ayyar’s elder brother “Kattu” Krishnaier was a court musician in the court of King Pratapa Simha of Tanjavur,116 which would place Kattu Krishnaier as a grown man during the period 1739–1763.

3.6.1 The Village of Uttukkadu

According to K.R. Rajagopalan, Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar was born at Mannargudi, which as we have seen was the site of the (Vishnu as Krishna Rajagopala Swami) temple especially sacred to the Telugu Nayak Kings of Tanjavur.117 His father was named Ramachandra Vathoolar and his mother Kamalanayani Ammal. Though born in Mannargudi, Rajagopalan says that Venkatasubba Ayyar spent most of his life in Uttukkadu. 113In

the last several years the compositions of Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar (who is also known by the name Uthukkadu Venkata Kavi) have received considerable new interest thanks to the work of Chitravina artist N. Ravikiran who has performed many of his compositions in his concerts and in general raised awareness about the composer. 114N. Rajagopalan, 1990:420–422; B. Nataräjan, 1988:231; M. Arunacalam 1989:139. 115These two citations, K.R. Rajagopalan 1979:24,28. Rajagopalan in a footnote thanks Brahma Sri Needamangalam Krishnamurthy Bhagavathar, a 6th-generation descendant of the composer, for many details mentioned in this article. He further mentions that a summary of this published paper was presented during the Music Academy Conference, 1978. 116K.R. Rajagopalan, 1979:25. 117Mannargudi is also known as Dakshina Dwaraka (Southern Dwaraka). Dwaraka is in North India, where Krishna is supposed to have lived.

Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar

In the catalytic incident in the young man’s life, Venkatasubba Ayyar had not been able to find an appropriate guru to teach him music, and was quite upset. His mother “asked him to accept Lord Krishna Nartana [dancing] Krishna himself as Guru and to seek His blessings. This formed the turning point in the Saint’s life and he began singing only in the presence of the Lord.” 118 All sources agree that through adulthood he remained a recluse, a lifelong celibate and bachelor, not interested in teaching his music to others, and “is said to have composed and sung his pieces only during the night so as not to be heard or seen by crowds of people.”119 Rangaramanuja Ayyangar describes the composer as follows: “He was a poet, a musician and a mystic. He sang and danced in ecstasy before his favourite deity. He practiced yoga and meditated upon the Divine Mother. He attained cosmic consciousness and was frequently in trance. He composed 1000s of songs in Tamil and Sanskrit. Many of them are of great rhythmic value besides Puranic and mystic import. He was a life long celibate.”120

The following passage from K.R. Rajagopalan’s article introduces us to some of the traditions associated with Krishna in Tamil Nadu, something we will see otherwise very little of in this study, centered as most all the Tamil language padams are on either Murugan or Siva as Nataraja or Tyagaraja. It describes the tradition of Krishna as a dancer at Uttukkadu,121 and gives some details of the temple’s iconography and rituals: 118K.R.

Rajagopalan, 1979:25. Rajagopalan, 1979:28. As we will see just below, the story of the passing on of his songs is based on two musicians stealthily listening while out of the composer’s sight. 120Rangaramanuja Ayyangar, 1972:215. 121On the subject of Krishna as a dancer, K.R. Madhavi (1960:81) says: “The best literature of Krishna as a dancing God can be had from Bengal. Krishna Lila’s conception sprang from this province. The Vaishnavas of Bengal make Krishna and Radha dance and they themselves also dance when singing kirtan or melodious love songs of Krishna and Radha.” As an example of Vaishnavite poetry in Tamil Nadu during the time of Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar she gives that of Muddupalani, the dancer and composer of “Radhika Swantanamu” at Pratap Singh’s court, ca. 1739–1963 (mentioned in Chapter 2 of this study). K.R. Madhavi, 1960:78. 119K.R.

107

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“Even though Venkatasubbier was born in Mannargudi (another well-known pilgrimage center in Tanjavur district famous for the shrine to Krishna as Rajagopala) he lived most of his life in the village of Oothukkadu also in the same district. This village was known as Dhenuswasapuram, as the celestial calves Nandini and Patti found sanctuary here after being protected by Lord Krishna. Is it a coincidence that all nearby places bear names connected with cows?— Govandakudi, Aavoor, Kovoor, Patteeswaram and so on? The Swayambhu (self-created) moorthi of Lord Nartana Krishna is installed in the temple at Oothukkadu. The utsavar (the deity taken out for processions and the like) is also in the form of Krishna dancing on the fivehooded kaliya— with His right-foot lifted up, left-foot on the hoods; one hand in the abhaya pose and the other stretched fully to hold the tail of the serpent. It is said that the workmanship of this metal icon is so fine that it is possible to pass a string between the left-foot of the Lord and the serpent-hoods; the weight of the icon being balanced on the tail of the snake alone! Recently, this temple has been renovated and rebuilt. The place was also famous for the Bhagavatha Mela tradition of dance-drama which used to be staged up to 30 or 40 years ago, annually in the months May-June during the festivals connected with the temple.”122

The village of Uttukkadu is one of the six villages which became associated with the growth of the Bhagavata Mela dance-drama tradition as early as the time of Achyutappa Nayak of Tanjavur (ca. 1560–1600).123 Today, among those six, Melattur alone actively continues this performance tradition. Several sources associate Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar directly with the Bhagavata Mela tradition. B. Natarajan, in his book on the Sri Krishna Lila Tarangini, a Vaisnavite dance drama written by Narayana Tirtha (sometime between 1580 and 1745)124 and performed within the same broad Kuchipudi/Bhagavata Mela sampradaya (tradition), called Venkatasubba Ayyar a “great 122K.R.

Rajagopalan, 1979:25 (parentheses in original text).

Natarajan, 1988:62.

124B. Natarajan, 1988:231.

123B.

Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar

exponent of Bhagavata Mela” who “made rich additions to our Bhajana [devotional song] repertoire.”125 And T.S. Parthasarathy feels that, based on the fact that so many of Venkatasubba Ayyar’s compositions contain solkattu passages (recitation of vocalized rhythmic syllables), they must have been danced in Bhagavata Mela.126 There are also traditions of Venkatasubba Ayyar having spent time at Mannargudi not only as a small child, but during his adulthood. Dr. S. Seetha writes, “He stayed in Mannargudi at the request of the King of Tanjore and composed beautiful kirtanas in Tamil and Sanskrit in praise of Lord Krishna and Radha. They are collectively called ‘rasa sabda’ and have attained popularity in the bhajana, dance, and art concerts.”127 And Rangaramanuja Ayyangar wrote that as Krishna as Muvvagopala in the temple of Muvvapuri was the inspiration for the Telugu padam composer Ksetrayya, “similarly, Rajagopala, the one at Mannargudi, famous for its beauty of form, charmed Venkatasubbier of Oottukadu.”128

3.6.2 Transmission of His Songs

A few of Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar’s songs were learned “on the sly, without the knowledge of the Saint” by a nagaswaram vidwan of Tanjavur, Rudra Pasupathi Pillai, according to K.R. Rajagopalan, whose text also appears to suggest that these songs are Taye Yasoda (O mother Yasoda) [E2], also Kayambu Vannane, Idouoru Tiramamo (in raga Begada, adi tala), and Rasavilasa.129 N. Rajagopalan identifies this musician (Rudra Pasupathi Pillai) as the “elder of the Nidamangalam Nagaswaram Duo,” saying that he took “mental notes” when Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar sang.130 The main route of transmission reported by K.R. Rajagopalan is, however, based on the tradition current in the composer’s 125B.

Natarajan, 1988:231.

Parthasarathy, personal communication, 1990.

127S. Seetha, 1981:182.

128Rangaramanuja Ayyangar, 1972:215.

129K.R. Rajagopalan, 1979:26. The spellings are his.

130N. Rajagopalan, 1990:422.

126T.S.

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family that Venkatasubba Ayyar’s elder brother Kattu Krishnaier wrote down many of the songs. He had three daughters; a sixthgeneration descendant of one of these women is Nidamangalam Krishnamurthy Bhagavatar, who spearheaded something of a revival of Venkatasubba Ayyar’s compositions in the 1950s and 1960s. K.R. Rajagopalan writes: “How has this musical heritage travelled during these 250 years or more? Perhaps the authentic details are being published for the first time now thanks to the cooperation from the Bhagavathar [Nidamangalam Krishnamurthy Bhagavathar-ed.], who possesses the largest collection of the composer’s songs and also the copies of songs handed down from generation to generation. Kattu Krishnaier’s grandaughter’s husband, Krishna Sastriar had a number of disciples and two of them were Kuttikavi... and Ganapati Muni. A leading Upanyasakara, Raju Sastrigal, heard some of these songs sung in prayers, was captivated by their excellence and musical content and so had them copied. Unfortunately, none of his disciples knew music and the manuscripts were handed down practically unused from one generation to the other. [Nidamangalam Krishnamurthy] Bhagavathar’s aunt’s (father’s sister’s) husband, Srinivasa Sastriar was a Samasthana Vidwan of Baroda and he studied the manuscripts and the legacy was passed on to the Bhagavathar who has dutifully preserved them...”131

This telling of the story strongly suggests a break in the performance tradition of the songs, that is, that the original settings of the melodies were probably lost. Doubtless anticipating this very question, K.R. Rajagopalan asks in his next paragraph “Have the musical settings come down through the ages in their pristine original settings?” He answers that Nidamangalam Krishnamurthy Bhagavatar himself agrees that “a number of mistakes” must have crept in over a period of more than two centuries, but does not directly address the effect of several generations during which no one apparently sang the songs. In another view of the transmission of the composer’s songs, Rangaramanuja Ayyangar wrote in 1972: 131K.R.

Rajagopalan, 1979:72.

Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar

“His songs were preserved in huge bundles of palm leaves lodged in earthen pots. The pots passed on in seven generations among his brothers’ families. All the time, for two centuries, there was no male heir to propagate the music languishing in cudgeon. At the dawn of this (20th) century there were two boys. With extraordinary pluck, they clothed the words with appropriate music culled from other classical compositions. Labeled Krishna Ganam, a few hundreds of them have become very popular in the last decade.”132

Here, the implication is also that the musical settings of the songs were forgotten and, additionally, that tunes from other songs were set to Venkatasubba Ayyar’s texts around the beginning of the 20th century. Whether the “two boys” referred to by Rangaramanuja Ayyangar here could be the same two “Kuttikavi” and “Ganapati Muni” referred to by K.R. Rajagopalan (in the citation before last, above) is unclear.

3.6.3 Revival of His Compositions

In 1955, 1960, and 1963, demonstrations of the compositions of Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar were given during the yearly Conferences of the Music Academy by descendants of the composer. The main figure behind this surge of interest was Nidamangalam Krishnamurthy Bhagavathar, who presented the performers in 1955 and 1963.133 During the same time period, in her Bharata Natyam recitals at the Music Academy, the dancer Kamala introduced a different song of Venkatasubba Ayyar in each year from 1957 to 1960.134 T.S. Parthasarathy, Secretary of the Music Academy, said that following his 1955 presentation, Krishnamurthy Bhagavathar published a book of the compositions 132Rangaramanuja

Ayyangar, 1972:215–216. demonstration of 1960 was by Uttukkadu Rajagopalan Muthurishnan, accompanied by Uttukkadu Kalyanasundaram and Coimbatore Srinivasan. (JMAM XXXI 1960:44.) According to K.R. Rajagopalan (1979:27), these three musicians are nephews of Nidamangalam Krishnamurthy Bhagavatar and had their initial musical training under him. Also, see JMAM Vol. XXXIV, 1963, and JMAM Vol. XLIX, 1978. 134See Repertoire Histories. 133The

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and taught them to many women in Chennai, with the result that they became quite popular for dance.135 In addition to this activity, and more importantly for the propagation of the composer’s songs, says K.R. Rajagopalan, Krishnamurthy Bhagavathar performed the compositions in his Harikatha discourses “throughout Tamil Nadu and in other parts of India where Tamilians live in large numbers… he has also given three demonstrations under the Fine Arts Society, Chennai. But the actual popularization has been achieved through his discourses.”136 K.R. Rajagopalan is convinced that this is what really made the popularity of Venkatasubba Ayyar’s compositions grow. S. Seetha stresses first their popularity in bhajanas (congregational devotional singing): They… “have attained popularity in the bhajana, dance, and art concerts… as they contain a sublime sahitya saturated with devotional fervor, they have become indispensable in the bhajans also.”137

3.6.4 The Dancing Krishna

As mentioned above, one unique aspect of Venkatasubba Ayyar’s compositions in the context of this study is his focus on Krishna, especially in a nartana (dancing) form. In his texts, we see a different side of the relationship between the great gods Vishnu and Siva as it is usually seen from the Saivite point of view. Here the tables are turned, so to speak: “For this poet, Krishna is the Supreme Dancer and to see him performing, even the Nataraja of Chidambaram stopped his dancing and came to Gokula; the 12-armed Shanmukha (Murugan) has also come on his peacock-mount and the peacock tries to keep consonance with the dance by spreading his virgin plume in full splendor.”138

135Personal

communication, 1990.

Rajagopalan, 1979:26–27.

137S. Seetha, 1981:182.

138K.R. Rajagopalan, 1979:31. Elsewhere, Rajagopalan states rather contemplatively:

“Perhaps, the earliest dance forms were conceived because of the leelas of Krishna and it was later that the concept of Lord Siva as Nataraja arose. This is a point on which there are bound to be differences of opinion and only after further research would it be possible to reach a definite conclusion” (1979:24). 136K.R.

Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar

Related to the inclusion of solkattu rhythmic passages in many of Venkatasubba Ayyar’s compositions, his songs are usually performed in relatively brisk madhyamakala (medium tempo). This has been perhaps a double-edged sword, as their speed has made them more attractive to some amongst the listening and performing public, and less so to others. After hearing the 1960 demonstration of Venkatasubba Ayyar’s songs at the Music Academy the eminent vocalist Madurai Mani Ayyar, the President that year, said (as reported in the official summary of the proceedings) “that these compositions furnished with svara, sahitya, jati, etc. and set to Madhyamakala (medium tempo) were striking and gripping. But he would suggest to the singers to vary the pace instead of singing in the same madhyamakala, which paled after a time. It was necessary to set some of these pieces to Choukakala (slow tempo) when alone they could clearly follow the excellent sahitya (text) in these pieces.”139 [E2] Taye Yasoda (Oh Mother Yasoda) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

Comparing the pace of Taye Yasoda [E2] by T. Viswanathan to the 78 RPM recordings, one has the opportunity to hear a Venkatasubba Ayyar composition rendered in both Madhyama kala, medium tempo, and chowka or vilamba kala, slow tempo. In the recording of Viswanathan, the listener will receive a clear illustration of the Dhanammal family’s association with the vilamba kala. This family feels that vilamba kala is the tempo appropriate to abhinaya (mimetic gestural expression) in dance, as well as an excellent tempo in which to bring out the gamakas (graces or ornaments), bhava (feeling), and swarupa (form) of a raga in musical performance. Taye Yasoda is the sole composition of Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar included in the study. No others of his compositions are known in the family repertoire of Vina Dhanammal, or seem to have been performed in the 20th century before the “revival” in the 1950s. It is indicative of the state of affairs to note that when T.K. Cidambaranatha Mudaliar 139JMAM,

XXXI:44, 1960.

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published his collection of Tamil padams and kritis in 1943, he listed Taye Yasoda as being of unknown authorship. However, if musicians and dancers did not know the author of the song, this does not seem to have inhibited its popularity. N. Rajagopalan reports that it was “constantly sung” by Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavatar (born 1896).140 The collection of V.A.K. Ranga Rao of Chennai contains 78 RPM recordings of at least half a dozen vocalists, made between the 1930s and 1950s; I have documented four of these in the Performance History (see Appendix).141 Taye Yasoda appears to have enjoyed its greatest popularity in dance during the period between 1939 and 1949. Over that time, five performances are documented, beginning with “Miss Kalanidhi” (Kalanidhi Narayanan, a highly regarded teacher of abhinaya in Chennai) in 1939, and ending with a performance by T. Balasaraswati in 1949. M. Arunacalam reports that “this song was very popular in the 1930s due to the Bharata Natya abhinaya performance of Balasaraswati, accompanied by her mother T. Jayammal vocally.”142 I found no documentation of dance performances of the song after 1949, suggesting that it had at least somewhat gone out of favor with dancers, though it continues to be sung periodically in kacceris (concerts of Karnatak music) by eminent vidwans such as K.V. Narayanaswamy.143 In the song, the dance of Krishna is described, as are several of his pranks. The narration is from the point of view of a woman, possibly a Gopi,144 (sometimes the aggrieved party herself, and sometimes reporting incidents that happened to others) protesting to the mother of Krishna about her son’s behavior. K.R. Rajagopalan reports that another song of Venkatasubba Ayyar, Illai-Illai (“no, no”) is set as a reply to this complaint.145 In addition to the printed text of the song, an additional caranam (placed at the end of the translation) was 140N.

Rajagopalan, 1990:391.

have not included the 78 RPM recording of “Kumari Kamala”, which is in

Sri Ranga Rao’s collection but which I did not dub onto cassette. 142M. Arunacalam, 1989:141. 143Performance in Chennai, December 1989. This is intended as simply a suggestive, not exhaustive, accounting of the song’s performance history. 144When the speaker uses the first-person plural, such as “What will we do?”, it could be implying the Gopis as a group. 145K.R. Rajagopalan, 1979:31. 141I

Arunacala Kavirayar, Sirgari

rendered by two of the vocalists. At the end of this caranam Krishna opens his mouth to reveal something quite different from the mud which the scolding woman expects to find. This story (set for the dance in the famous song Krishna Ni Begane Baro) has formed the basis for astoundingly beautiful interpretation in dance by Balasaraswati, her daughter Lakshmi Shanmukham Knight, and grandson Aniruddha Knight, in Bharata Natyam performances.

3.7 Composer: Arunacala Kavirayar, Sirgari

All sources I have found except one agree that Arunacala Kavirayar was born in 1711 or 1712, and all but two agree that he passed away in either 1778 or 1779. The earliest reference which I found to his life was by Subbarama Dikshitar in 1904 who (as does N. Rajagopalan in 1990) gives the dates 1711–1778.146 The dates 1712–1779 are given by S.V. Krishnamurthy and B. Natarajan.147 Other dates are given by M. Arunacalam (1711– 1789), P. Sambamurthy (1711–1778), and Rangaramanuja Ayyangar (1731–1778).148 Subbarama Dikshitar’s short biographical note written in 1904 mentions the tradition that the composition of the Ramanataka Kirttanas, the famous setting of the Ramayana in kirttana form by Arunacala Kavirayar, was finished in the composer’s 60th year. The Tamil edition of the Ramanataka Kirttanas brought out in 1930 contains a 12-page biography (probably the same account contained in the 1914 publication)149 which seems to be the source for much of the material reported later in English accounts. It states that Kavirayar’s father was living about 225 years previously in the village of 146Subbarama

Dikshitar (1904) in A. Sundaram Ayyar, 1988:114; N. Rajagopalan 1990:15–17. 147S.V. Krishnamurthy, 1972:7; B. Natarajan, 1988:45. 148M. Arunacalam, 1989:151; P. Sambamurthy, 1984:I:28; Rangaramanuja Ayyangar, 1972:218. 149“A handsome edition of the book was made by Bhavanandam Pillai in 1914 with pictures.” M. Arunacalam, 1989:197,328. The 1930 edition was published by Irattina Nayakar and Sons, who have brought out many reprints of early music books; I would guess that their 1930 edition was a simple reprint of Bhavanandam Pillai, 1914, not a new volume.

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Tillaiyadi. It also gives the story that he finished composing the Ramanataka Kirttanas at the age of 60, and says that he passed away at the age of 67 in the Vikari year, Ani month.150

3.7.1 Story of His Life

From the Tamil account of 1930 and the English summaries by S.V. Krishnamurthy and M. Arunacalam, we can construct a tentative chronology of some of the major activities of Arunacala Kavirayar’s life. He was born to Nallatambi Pillai and his wife Valliammal, probably in 1711 or 1712 in the village of Tillaiyadi, a few miles west of Tarangambadi (also spelled Tranquebar), a coastal town of Tanjavur district. According to S.V. Krishnamurthy, his father “was a Jain by birth but had later embraced Saivism.151 He began his education in his fifth year, fifth month, fifth day.152 When he was the age of 12, his parents passed away. At that time with the assistance of his brothers, young Arunacalam went to study at the Dharmapuram (Tamil “Tarumapuram”) matam (monastery), one of two famous Saiva monasteries of Tanjavur district (the other being located in Tiruvavaduturai). There, he studied Tamil language and literature and Sanskrit for six years with “the Head Pontiff, his disciples, and the poet laureate of the monastery known as Ambalavana Kavirayar.153 The head of the monastery (pantarac canniti) asked him if he would be interested in becoming the head himself one day. Arunacala Kavirayar replied that he desired to live the life of a householder first before becoming an ascetic, as that was the “classical Tamil cultural tradition” according to great Tamil literary figures of the past such as Kamban, author of the Ramayana in Tamil, and Tiruvalluvar, author of the Tirukkural.154 He, however, did not marry immediately, but spent several more years absorbed in study. M. Arunacalam says that after his six years of study at the monastery, Kavirayar continued studying Tamil for 12 more years, while the Tamil text of 1930 150Arunacala

Kavirayar, 1930:3.

Krishnamurthy, 1982:7.

152Arunacala Kavirayar, 1930:3.

153M. Arunacalam, 1989:192.

154Arunacala Kavirayar, 1989:192.

151S.V.

Arunacala Kavirayar, Sirgari

says that “for some more time he continued to study Tamil.”155 Then in his thirtieth year, he married a woman of the village of Karuppur, settled down in his native place of Tillaiyadi and opened a shop (kacukkatai, literally “cash store”, a jewelry shop or pawn shop). When he had been there for 12 years, one time he went on a trip to Pondicherry to buy gold and, on the way, stopped to visit an old school friend named Cidambaram Pillai, then the chief representative of the Dharmapuram Matam at its branch in Sirgari. One thing led to another and Cidambaram Pillai persuaded Arunacala Kavirayar to move with his family to Sirgari. This was then in his 42nd year (about the year 1753 or 1754). From this time on, he stayed in Sirgari for the remaining 25 years of his life.

3.7.2 The Poet and the Musicians

In Sirgari, Kavirayar soon made the acquaintance of two musicians from Cattanatapuram,156 Venkatarama Ayyar and Kodandarama Ayyar. These two were then living in Sirgari and started studying Kamban’s Ramayana from him. They suggested to Arunacala Kavirayar: “that, with his scholarship, he should compose an opera for which they would help him in setting the tunes, raga and tala. Kavirayar thought deeply on the choice of a subject for an opera. It was not surprising that the life of Sri Rama came to his mind as the only fitting theme for his opera. The reason for composing an opera was that Kamban had handled it in the form of poetic stanzas and one Bala Bharati had also dealt with the life of Rama in Chanda viruttam. But those art forms appealed only to erudite scholars and were beyond the capacity of ordinary men and women. An opera would easily gain the hearts of the lay people and that would serve his purpose fully.”157

155Atalai

melum cilakalam teninum iniya tamil moriaik kurai pokak karrut tamil pulamai nirappikkontar. Arunacala, 1930:4. 156Either a village near Sirgari or a neighborhood within Sirgari town. P. Sambamurthy says “Both the disciples hailed from Chattanathapuram in Shiyali,” 1984:28. 157S.V. Krishnamurthy, 1982:8.

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Arunacala Kavirayar thought to himself: “What these men say is correct!” (ivarkal colvatu unmaiye), and he began to compose the poetry of his Ramanataka kirttanas. When he had finished the first phase of the work, and his two students had set the music, the two went off and sang the songs for various patrons in the Chennai area, receiving encouraging praise and gifts. Upon their return and hearing of their success, Kavirayar was induced (again, the story goes that his students prevailed upon him) to complete the rendering of the Ramayana in song form. He finished the work in his 60th year, 1771, according to most all the sources.

3.7.3 Arankerram (Premiere)

As Kamban many centuries earlier had had the arankerram (first performance, premiere, or debut)158 of his Ramayana at the famous Vishnu temple (where Vishnu takes the form of Ranganatha) at Srirangam just outside of Trichy, Arunacala Kavirayar decided that his Ramanataka kirttanas should also have their arankerram at the same place sacred to Vishnu. As the story goes, he approached the Vaishnava priests there, who said in order for this to occur there would have to be some kind of sign from the Lord. On this occasion, Arunacala Kavirayar sang the now-famous kirttana, En palli kondir ayya? (Why are you lying there as if asleep, lord?). That night, Vishnu appeared to both Kavirayar and the Vaishnava head priest of the temple, in each of their dreams: “The Lord, pleased with the song, appeared that night in Kavirayar’s dream and told him, ‘Sing also the glory of our followers; the publication can then go on satisfactorily.’ He also appeared in the dream of the Vaishnava chief priest there and similarly instructed him to celebrate the publication, after getting a song from Kavirayar on His own attendants. Naturally everyone was wonder struck. Kavirayar accordingly sang the song called today a Todayan on the attendants of the Lord… Everyone was pleased and the function passed off happily without any further hitch.

158Tamil

aranku, assembly, plus erram, presentation.

Arunacala Kavirayar, Sirgari

Kambar published his Ramayana on the Astami day in the month of Panguni (March-April, 885 A.D.); Kavirayar desired to have his publication on the same day and this was also accomplished (1772 A.D.) Due honours were showered on him by the temple authorities.”159

According to the Tamil account of 1930, Kavirayar wanted to approach Tulaja, the then-ruler at Tanjavur, and have another arankerram of the work under his patronage.160 At this time (1772 or 1773), Tanjavur was under attack from the Nawab of Arcot (as earlier discussed in Chapter 2) and it was impossible for Kavirayar to reach Tanjavur. He then approached Ananda Ranga Pillai of Pondicherry, a famous Dubash and Diwan in service of the French administration there.161 Ananda Ranga Pillai politely declined Kavirayar’s request for patronage, feeling it proper that his friend Tulaja Maharaja should be the first to hear the work. Instead, he gave Kavirayar a letter of introduction to another friend of his, Manali Muttukrishna Mudaliar, a very successful businessman living near Chennai.162 Upon reaching Chennai, Arunacala Kavirayar sent Manali Muttukrishna Mudaliar the letter (along with a laudatory verse composed on Muttukrishna Mudaliar), and was soon invited into his presence. As they talked, it came out that among the people who had heard the first songs of the Ramanataka kirttanas when Kavirayar’s two disciples performed them in Chennai, Muttukrishna Mudaliar was one, and had been captivated by them. Many gifts (including a kanaka abhishekam, “shower of gold”) and much praise for Kavirayar resulted from this contact, as well 159M.

Arunacalam, 1989:196. Kavirayar, 1930:11–12. This text uses the word arankerram in a sense which would imply that work could be “premiered” several times; each time Kavirayar wanted to perform a work in a new place, it is called arankerram. 161His diaries from the years 1736–1761 were translated and published in English at the beginning of the 20th century and have recently been reprinted. See Ananda Ranga Pillai, 1985. 162This family has a long history of patronage of Tamil and music, reaching as far back as Arunagiri Nadar, author of the Tiruppukal. The family maintained a house in Georgetown, Chennai, where many musicians performed throughout the years. (Reference T. Viswanathan, personal communication, 1992). 160Arunacala

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as references to other potential patrons.163 After some time, the Nawab of Arcot and Raja Tulaja of Tanjavur made peace and Kavirayar was finally able to premiere his Ramanataka kirttanas at the court of Tanjavur as well, following which Ananda Ranga Pillai of Pondicherry also patronized the work. Arunacala Kavirayar passed away fulfilled in his life’s desire, at the age of 67.

3.7.4 Caveat

The only problem in this story above is that Ananda Ranga Pillai died in 1762, according to biographical sources contained in the first volume of his Diaries. This was at least a year before Tulaja II succeeded Pratap Singh as Raja of Tanjavur, so we must question whether (as the story has come down) it could have been possible that Ananda Ranga Pillai said that Raja Tulaja II would have first heard the work upon its completion in the year 1771. The sequence of the story may be off by approximately 10 years, either suggesting that the Ramanataka kirttanas were written in Kavirayar’s life, that Ananda Ranga Pillai did not actually play a part in this story, or that Arunacala Kavirayar might have taken the work to Ananda Ranga Pillai for his appraisal at an earlier stage, before it was complete.

3.7.5 His Work and Its Popularity

The publication Oriental Music in European Notation by A.M. Chinnaswami Mudaliar (brought out serially between 1893 and 1896) contains hundreds of Karnataka compositions popular at that time, given in European staff notation (with special symbols for Karnataka ornamentation devised by Mudaliar, later modified and used by Subbarama Dikshitar in his Sangita Sampradaya Pradarsini). Among the Tamil composers represented in the book, the most compositions by far are by the 19th­ century composer Gopalakrishna Bharati, followed secondly by 163One

of whom was the Zamindar of Udaiyarpalaiyam, Yuvaranga Bhupati, whose family as we will see became the favored patrons of the Tamil composer Ghanam Krishna Ayyar.

Arunacala Kavirayar, Sirgari

Arunacala Kavirayar.164 Chinnaswami Mudaliar lists Arunacala Kavirayar compositions under the heading Ramayana Padams, saying, “The music of these pieces is simple and charming and exceedingly popular.”165 This is just one indication of the great and enduring popularity of Arunacala Kavirayar’s songs, popularity doubtless partly due to the unified package they formed as the Ramanataka Kirttanas, retelling Kamban’s Ramayana in song form. U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar has written in his autobiography that a Ramayana presentation using the Ramanataka Kirttanas was one of the most important items in the repertoire of the Harikatha Bhagavatars of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.166 A typical testimonial to the appeal of this work comes from Rangaramanuja Ayyangar: “The simple, homely diction and unsophisticated narrative in Tamil had an instant appeal. The choice of theme, in particular, gave it the flavor of a pastoral ballad. The impressive vocal duet (of his two students) was very popular. Rama Natakam became the rage all over Tamil Nadu.”167

One very popular song from the Ramanataka Kirttanas, Yaro ivar yaro (Who is she?) [F1] is included a bit further in this chapter. A second song in the Ramanataka Kirttanas, En palli kondir ayya (set in Mohana or Madhyamavati raga), has been popular in dance recitals and widely recorded on 78 RPM. And according to M. Arunacalam, a third song from the Ramanataka Kirttanas which was very popular as a Mangalam (benediction at the end of concerts) for many years was the last song of the payiram (preface) section, Sri Ramachandranukku jayamangalam, in Asaveri ragam: 164In

“This song was one of the most popular songs in Tamilnadu discharging the function of a Mangalam (final benediction)

terms of numbers, after Arunacala Kavirayar, there are three compositions of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, and none by the other padam composers of this study. Chinnaswami Mudaliar, 1893. 165Chinnaswami Mudaliar, 1893:33. 166U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar (1990:31), who also notes that his own father “knew completely by heart” all the Ramanataka Kirttanas of Arunacala Kavirayar. 167Rangaramanuja Ayyangar, 1972:218.

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not only in musical concerts but also in all public functions and also in almost all domestic functions. This was the position up to the end of the First World War… The once famous Ramachandra Mangalam… was being sung as a Mangalam for perhaps more than 150 years (1772 to 1920).”168

Besides the Ramanataka Kirttanas, Arunacala Kavirayar is said to have composed several other works. Subbarama Dikshitar gives these as: Sirkari Kovai, Sirkari Stala Puranam, Hanuman Pillait Tamil, and Ayomuki Natakam.169 As we will see represented below by the song Taranam unmel (This is the time), [B3], the composer also wrote padams in the sringara tradition.

3.7.6 The Musical Settings of His Songs

As we have seen, Arunacala Kavirayar did not set the music to his compositions, depending on his two disciples, Cattanatapuram Venkatarama Ayyar and Kodandarama Ayyar, who were accomplished musicians (Rangaramanuja Ayyangar states cryptically “the author was no adept in singing”).170 I have not seen any discussion regarding whether the original musical settings of his disciples are thought to have survived over the years. It is known that in the third and fourth decades of the 20th century, the musicians T. Brinda and Ariyakkudi Ramanuja Ayyangar reset the varnamettus (tunes) to many Arunacala Kavirayar compositions.171 168This

is from M. Arunacalam, who adds: “The Tamilian, as that famous savant TKC (T.K. Cidambaranatha Mudaliar) used to say, was always fond of something he does not understand, in preference to what he understands, and so in course of time, Thyagarajar’s Ni-naama rupamulaku nitya jaya Mangalam displaced Sri Ramachandranukku Jayamangalam from the concert platform.” Arunacalam argues that Arunacala Kavirayar’s Mangalam was replaced by the now ubiquitous Mangalam of Tyagaraja in Saurashtram raga early in this century “not because of any inherent musical flaw but only because of the whims of the later day Kacheri Vidwans [concert artists]. They did not want a Tamil Mangalam but wanted only a Telugu song.” M. Arunacalam, 1989:201. 169Subbarama Dikshitar in A. Sundaram Iyer, 1988:114–115.

170Rangaramanuja Ayyangar, 1972:218.

171For T. Brinda, this information comes from her sister T. Muktha. Smt. Muktha said

that their father loved the Ramanataka Kirttanas and would always ask Brinda

Arunacala Kavirayar, Sirgari

3.7.7 Discovery of Five Additional Songs According to T. Sankaran, it was due to the efforts of Kottaiswamy Tevar of the Ramanathapuram royal family,172 that a choultry (free lodging for pilgrims) was constructed in the mid-19th century in North Mada Street, Mylapore, one of the four streets which go around the precincts of the great Kapalisvara Mylapore Siva temple. It is called Bommai Chatram and is still standing as of 2021. Sankaran says: “The greatness of this choultry is extolled in several songs.

It was there I found three Tamil padams of Arunacala Kavi.

I knew there was a book about that choultry, kept in the

library of the Tamil Isai Sangam in Chennai (Sankaran was at

the time the director of the Tamil Isai School). Then I came up

to this choultry and checked up on all the inscriptions there.

I cleaned the slabs, read the inscriptions, then read that

book. The treasure unearthed here is the three padams

of Arunacala Kavi.”173

[B3] Tarunam unmel (This is the Time) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

T. Sankaran was responsible for publishing the texts of the three padams in 1973; they were subsequently set to music

to sing them for him; because the existing tunes were so ‘folky’ Brinda would re-clothe the tunes in more ‘classical’ settings (sometimes using tunes from Tyagaraja kritis) and thereby delight her father. Smt. Muktha also said that Smt. Mylapore Gowri Ammal, the dancer who in the 1930s was a major inspiration to the young Balasaraswati, used to perform abhinaya to many of the Ramanataka Kirttanas (T. Muktha, personal communication, 1990). 172The Rajas of Ramanathapuram were called Setupatis. Kottaiswamy Tevar was the elder brother of Parvata Vardhini, the Rani (Queen) of Ramanathapuram who served as Regent after her husband Ramaswamy Tevar Setupati died in 1830, until 1862 when Mutturamalinga Setupati II assumed the Zamin. Kottaiswamy Tevar was his sister’s advisor while she was Regent. (Information from N. Subrahmanian, 1988:65–71 and T. Sankaran, 1977:49–52.) 173T. Sankaran, personal communication 1990. The title of the article published by Sankaran containing the three song texts is Srimat iramayanak kirttanan ceyta cirkari Arunacalak Kavirayarvarkal patiyavai patam, i.e., “Padams sung by Arunacala Kavirayar of Sirgari who wrote the Ramayana Kirttanas.” T. Sankaran, 1973:30.

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and performed by the noted musician and artist S. Rajam of Mylapore.174 Among these three, Tarunam unmel (This is the time) [B3] is one of the padams considered in this study. In addition to the three songs Sankaran identified as padams, two other compositions whose authorship is attributed to Arunacala Kavirayar were found. M. Arunacalam also describes this group of compositions; we note that he has a slightly different description of the choultry’s location and its builder, worth citing here: “Some other songs of his (Kavirayar) are available and they depict his great devotion to Siva… He has sung four songs on Singara Velar (Muruha) in the Shrine of modern Mylapore… The fifth kirttanam is… composed on Karpakavalli Ambal of Mylapore. Probably, no book of Kirttanams in the period could have been held to be of value unless it had songs from Arunacala Kavirayar.”175

Arunacalam’s account here is interesting in that it suggests a possible motive for someone to claim their own composition to be one of Arunacala Kavirayar’s (or any other famous composer, an occurrence not unknown in musical transmission generally). The question of authorship (of texts, in addition to responsibility for musical setting) rises with several of the Tamil padams included in this study, and cannot always be easily resolved. Unlike the songs of the Ramanataka Kirttanas, Tarunam unmel is very unambiguously a padam in the sringara mould. It has been included in this study for this reason, in spite of the fact that it does not have a documentable continuous performance tradition, having been set to music only in the 1970s by Sri S. Rajam. [F1] Yaro Ivar Yaro (Who is She?) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

The second song of Arunacala Kavirayar to be considered is Yaro ivar yaro [F1] of which M. Arunacalam says: “Then there is the very famous song in Bhairavi which was reverberating through the whole of Tamil Nadu echoing

174Published 175M.

in T. Sankaran, 1973:30–32. Arunacalam, 1989:204–205.

Arunacala Kavirayar, Sirgari

the singing of Smt. M.S. Subbulakshmi and Smt. D.K. Pattammal in the period 1965–1975. Kambar allows Rama a vision of Sita on her balcony when he is following Visvamitra to the palace of Janaka her father, along the streets of Mithila… He sees her and falls in love with her… People young and old were quite enamoured of this song at the period mentioned.”176

I did not find documentation of any dance performances of this composition but the dancer and dance teacher Smt. Nandini Ramani told me that she had seen it taught in the school of Dandayudapani Pillai, and performed by the dancer Srividya.177 While many of the padams set in Bhairavi raga in this study are very similar to each other in their varnamettu (tune), two Bhairavi padams, Yaro ivar yaro and Velavare (Holder of the lance!) are not. The phenomenon of varnamettu and the implications of the relationship between raga and tala will be discussed in Chapter 5. Yaro Ivar Yaro is the only composition considered in this study in which the man is portrayed as speaking. He (Rama) describes seeing her (Sita) while he is going by her palace in procession, an interesting twist, perhaps, on the ula prabandha genre whereas we have seen the nayaki speaks about seeing the nayaka come in procession. Here in Yaro ivar yaro, it is the man who has fallen head over heels, something very rarely portrayed in Tamil padams.

3.7.8 Padams and the 19th Century

As we move now into the 19th century, we will see that Tamil padams of this era included in the study are strictly sringara compositions, compositions on the theme of love. The characters are cast in the tripartite mold first set by classical Tamil poetry; she, her female friend, and the male protagonist (nayaki, sakhi, 176M.

Arunacalam, 1989:199. Nandini Ramani, personal communication, Chennai, 1990. The dancer Srividya is the daughter of Smt. M.L. Vasanthakumari. Smt. Vasanthakumari, an eminent vocalist who sang padams for her daughter’s recitals, was herself the daughter of Smt. Lalitangi, whose 78 RPM recordings of Velavare [B4] and Taya Yasoda [E2] are documented in the Performance History (see Appendix).

177Smt.

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and nayaka).178 The nayaka (hero) of the 19th-century Tamil padams if the divine is almost always Murugan, in contrast to the emphasis on Siva as Nataraja that we have seen in the 17thand 18th-century compositions.

3.8 Composer: Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar is unique among the composers in this study in several respects: firstly, he was a Tanjavur court musician, although we might qualify this because firstly, if he indeed spent time at the court of Raja Sarabhoji,179 it was apparently as a young student. And secondly, when he served Amara Simha it was apparently after that Raja had been dethroned in 1798 and pensioned off to his miniature court at Tiruvidaimarudur, located six miles east-northeast of Kumbakonam.180 The song in this study, Ella arumai (All precious things) [A2] is written on Pratapa Simha, the son of Amara Simha; this would suggest a later rather than earlier dating (leaning toward the 19th rather than the 18th century) of the relationship between the composer and this court.181 Ghanam Krishna Ayyar is also unique among composers in this study because he was equally well known as a performer and as a composer. His “first name” Ghanam was actually an honorific epithet conferred upon him by one of his patrons due 178See

discussion of the dramatis personae in Chapter 4. Additional terms for the sakhi are duti, one who carries the tudu (message), or tori, maid. As we will see, the lovelorn nayaki applies a host of names to her sakhi. The sakhi, in addition to being the friend, is very occasionally portrayed (as in classical Tamil poetry) as the mother of the nayaki. 179As is suggested in U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:7 (see below). 180Kumbakonam itself is 20 miles northeast of Tanjavur. (Geographical references from Maclean, 1893/1981:206,898.) In U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar’s account, Ghanam Krishna Ayyar is patronized by Amara Simha after he (Amara Simha) had come to live at Tiruvidaimarudur, although Swaminatha Ayyar does say that prior to this, the two had known (of) each other while Amara Simha was still at Tanjavur. U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:15. 181Amara Simha’s father, also named Pratapa Simha, was the ruler of Tanjavur between 1739 and 1763; see below for song and biographical notes on the 19th century Pratapa Simha.

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

to his mastery of the difficult ghanam style of singing, which will be described below. Thirdly, due to the extensive documentation by the Tamil scholar U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar of both Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s life and of the general conditions by which musicians lived in the 19th century, Ghanam Krishna Ayyar is simply more visible to us than other composers; we are able for the first time to have a feeling for the life of a composer of padams. Swaminatha Ayyar’s documentation enables us to follow the tracks of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar as he moved from court to court, a glimpse of lifeways available to us for no other composer of this study. Fourthly, and arguably flowing from the consequences of being a court musician, we find many of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s padams are cast in nara stuti, that is, praise of mortals. The padams I found in the three ragas chosen for this study are equally divided, three on deities (two on Murugan, one on Vishnu as Ranganatha of Srirangam), and one each on the three most important individuals (or more properly, families, we might say) who patronized him. Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar and Kavikunjara Bharati, the two other major 19th-century composers of Tamil padams, are not known to have addressed human patrons in their padams.

3.8.1 Kumbakonam and its Surroundings

The major events of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s life took place in an area whose geographical center is the Tanjavur District town of Kumbakonam. His three major patron families lived in Kapistalam, Tiruvidaimarudur, and Udaiyarpalaiyam; for all of these, the nearby large market town and commercial center was Kumbakonam. Kumbakonam has long been a major town in Tanjavur district and a center of commercial, religious, scholarly, and artistic activity. In the late 19th Manual of the Administration of the Madras Presidency, C.D. Maclean described the town (spelling it Combaconam) as follows: “Population 54,307… Large and populous town in a low level tract between two considerable branches over the Cauvery, over which is a handsome bridge. Though only with a slight

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elevation above the sea, it is remarkably healthy. One of the most ancient towns in the Presidency. It is the centre of the Braminical religion and literature, and was once the capital of the Chola kingdom… A branch mutt of Shuncaracharry (Sankaracharya), founder of the Adweitam philosophy, is presided over by a chief gooroo of Smarta bramins. There are sixteen temples, twelve dedicated to Siva and four to Vishnu… Situated in the most fertile and most thickly populated part of the delta, Combaconam has always been a great centre of trade and manufactures; the latter consisting chiefly of silk (puttoo), and cotton cloths and metal (loham) ware. From the Government provincial college at this town come many of the best educated natives of the south.”182

A look at Kumbakonam during this time period can give us an idea of how smaller centers of patronage were emerging in the region as the royal center of Tanjavur went into eclipse. In addition to its commercial importance and its reputation as a seat of learning, several sources indicate Kumbakonam’s importance specifically as a center for the arts in the 19th and early 20th centuries. U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar says that Ghanam Krishna Ayyar would go to Kumbakonam periodically in order to visit temples, compose songs on the deities, and enjoy sallapam (conversation)183 with fellow musicians, who apparently inhabited that town in good number. This would have been in the first half of the 19th century.184 Looking another halfcentury ahead, around 1914, T.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar as a young man moved from Kumbakonam to Chennai. He says in his “Reflections”: “In those days Kumbakonam was the centre of all activities in all the THREE ARTS—Music, Drama, and Dance. I was a student there and very few would have enjoyed

182Maclean,

1983/1982:206 (parentheses in original). pleasant conversation, dialogue, amorous talk, catechism, discourse in the form of questions and answers, Tamil Lexicon. This word appears practically whenever U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar speaks of pleasant times enjoyed between musicians, or between musicians and their patrons. 184U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:21. 183Sallapam,

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

performances in all the above Arts as I have done. There were famous dramatic troupes headed by Balamani, Sundar Rao, Rangaswami Iyengar and Parameswaran. These were household words. Special trains called Balamani special used to be run from Trichy and Mayavaram… The excellence of the dramatic talents displayed in those days was beyond comparison. Such talents are not to be witnessed in these days. Bharata Natyam performances also were then of outstanding merit. In those days this art was confined to the Dancing girls’ caste. The most famous dancers were, as they were popularly known, Kalyani’s daughters. In the sphere of Music, Kumbakonam was, in those days, the center of Carnatic Music, as Madras is to-day.”185

T.S. Parthasarathy, former Secretary of the Madras Music Academy, spent his college days in Kumbakonam in the 1930s. He told me that Kumbakonam at that time “was the musical capital of Tanjavur district.” As he explained it, its importance as a center of patronage for the arts was largely because it was at the center of an area of rich agricultural villages where Brahmins were landlords. In the summer there would be many weddings, each lasting four days and requiring music and dance performances throughout, “with harikatha performances at night.” Sri Parthasarathy, implying an itinerant and seasonal work cycle for performing musicians at that time, said that the musicians made enough money in this summer “marriage season” to support them for the rest of the year. Musicians would come from all over Tanjavur district and further, from all parts of the current Tamil Nadu state to Kumbakonam during this season.186 A view of a slightly more extended geographic area, including Kumbakonam, comes from T. Sankaran, who in one of his careers was an administrator at the Trichy station of All India 185T.R.

Srinivasa Ayyangar (spelled Iyengar), 1970:17–21.

Parthasarathy, personal communication, 1990. Parthasarathy described a

cycle, first the rainy season, with very little music-making, then the agricultural season, again very little music-making, followed by the harvest, and finally the summer wedding season, when people would have the most money to spend during the year.

186T.S.

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Radio from the time it began in 1939 through most of World War II.187 When I expressed skepticism that the radio would have been able to entice musicians from Chennai just to play a radio program (thinking with a Chennai-centric bias that all the great musicians must have lived in Chennai from time immemorial). Sri Sankaran said that, quite to the contrary, there were excellent musicians available to perform for the radio at Trichy at that time. This was partly due to the wartime evacuation of Chennai, which did send a fair number of musicians to live in places such as Trichy or nearby Tanjavur district, where many of them had family roots: “[MA: From what you say, it sounds like when you were in Trichy, a lot of the great musicians then still lived in Tanjavur district. They had not yet moved to Madras…] TS: I mean, it is not always stationary. Papa (Venkatarama Ayyar), violinist, was living there for some time in Trichy. Because it was war time, everyone had evacuated Madras and come away to Tanjavur. And there were no musicians at all in Madras. [MA: Really?] Because Madras had completely evacuated, only one of two people were here. So the Madras radio station had to manage with gramophone records, or with the staff artists who did not leave the station, or get somebody outside, at their risk. [MA: Oh. So you had most of the great musicians at the Trichy station?] At Trichy station: Ariyakudi Ramanuja Ayyangar, Musiri Subramania Ayyar, Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavatar, Semmangudi Srinivasa Ayyar, Maharajapuram Viswanatha Ayyar. And Brinda and Muktha were in Kumbakonam at that time. Because their sister Abhiramasundari was learning violin from Rajamanickam Pillai. Papa was in Tanjavur; Chowdiah used to come from Mysore. [MA: Ah, so Trichy was thought…] Yes. That was the cream of Karnataka music.”188

187The

Madras station opened in 1938, and the Trichy station the following year. Trichy is approximately 30 miles west of Tanjavur. 188Sankaran’s list is a virtual who’s-who of the renowned musicians of the day. Smt. Brinda, Muktha, and Abhiramasundari, three sisters who performed together for many years, were cousins of Sankaran and grandchildren of Vina Dhanammal. T. Sankaran interview, January 11, 1988, Chennai.

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

3.8.2 A Mid-Point Between Worlds We might view, then, the life of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar (or the lives of the composers of the Trinity as well) as occupying a psychological, chronological, and geographical mid-point in the history of modern Karnataka music, between the fabled royal patronage of an independent kingdom centered at Tanjavur, able even to gift entire villages to artists, and the present day where we find the city of Chennai the residence of the great majority of professional musicians, with the notable exception of the nagaswaram community, which has maintained its professional livelihood at monasteries, temples, and colleges throughout Tamil Nadu. What did this mid-point mean in South Indian history? The British East India Company imposed an incremental series of increasingly punitive, destabilizing, controlling measures on the Tanjavur Court throughout the 18th century. By the terms of the Treaty of 1799, forced upon the newly enthroned 22-year-old Maharaja Serfoji (Sarabhoji) II, Tanjavur effectively ceased to be an autonomous political entity. And then midway through the 19th century, the British declared the Tanjavur royal line extinct in 1855 via the “Doctrine of Lapse” when the last Maharaja Shivaji died without male issue. We will see how the musician Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s life took place within the context of an emerging colonial hegemony, how he was patronized by a dethroned member of the Tanjavur royal family, and also supported by lesser lords known as Zamindars who lived in the area surrounding Kumbakonam. We see through U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar’s narrative a tension in the lives of musicians of the day as to whether they should—or financially could afford to—stay with one patron, or go on the road as it were, to seek greater fame and fortune. Ghanam Krishna Ayyar traveled on horseback throughout the region until advanced in age, thanks to the generosity of his patrons. This half-way or middle point in South Indian history appears to have been a time of decentralization in patronage, with great musicians scattered throughout small villages and Zamins, moving about the Tanjavur district (and sometimes a much wider area) in their search for

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wages and honors.189 At the beginning of the 19th century, patronage appears to have been shifting from larger royal networks toward smaller commercial or landowner networks. Ghanam Krishna Ayyar as an example of his time may also be seen as standing between two relatively centralized periods; on the one hand, the past golden age of the Tanjavur court, which in its prime held sway over the whole of what is now the Tanjavur district, and on the other hand, the present day, which sees Chennai, which grew during the British period into a commercial and administrative hub, as the epicenter of Karnataka music and Bharata Natyam dance culture.

3.8.3 His Youth

Most sources I have found date Ghanam Krishna Ayyar between 1790 and 1854. M. Arunacalam, however, places him between 1825 and 1880.190 The life story of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar is known thanks to the great Tamil scholar U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar (1855–1942), who among many other pioneering literary achievements chronicled the lives of major musicians and composers active in his youth. U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar wrote about Ghanam Krishna Ayyar in two places; briefly in his autobiographical En Carittiram (My Story)191 and in a separate biographical essay, Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, first published in 1936, running to almost 40 pages and also including the texts of 57 of the composer’s songs.192 Swaminatha Ayyar’s father studied music for 12 years with Ghanam Krishna Ayyar,193 189Terms

we see again and again in U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar’s writing are the takka (appropriate) paricu (presents), mariyatai (courtesy or reverence), and pattankal (titles), which discriminating but generous patrons present to worthy musicians. 190N. Rajagopalan, 1990:115–116; M. Arunacalam, 1989:191. 191En Carittiram was originally published serially in the popular Madras weekly Ananta Vikatan between 1940 and 1942; an English translation by Kamil Zvelebil was published in 1990. 192This has been reprinted as U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987, incorporating his three biographical studies (and editions of song texts) of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, Gopalakrishna Bharati, and Maha Vaidyanatha Ayyar. 193U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1990:21.

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

who was a family relation. The relationship as described by Swaminatha Ayyar is illustrated in Fig. 3.1.

Figure 3.1 Relationship between Ghanam Krishna Ayyar and U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar.194

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar was the brother of U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar’s great-grandmother. U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar was in the position of hearing about Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s life, then, from his father who was a direct disciple of the composer. Ghanam Krishna Ayyar was born in Periya Tirukkunram, a small town in the vicinity of Udaiyarpalaiyam and Ariyalur in present-day Trichy district. He was the youngest son of Ramaswami Ayyar, who was a composer of kirttanas and was patronized by Kapistalam Muttaiya Moopanar (whose son Ramabhadra Moopanar would later patronize Ghanam Krishna Ayyar).195 The family were Tamil speaking Brahmins of the Ashta sahasram sect.196 Ghanam Krishna Ayyar had four older brothers and one sister.197 As a young man he showed musical promise and studied with his father. At one point, Krishna Ayyar and two of his brothers, Subbarama Ayyar and Sundaram Ayyar, went to Tanjavur where, U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar states, they all gained employ as musicians in the samasthanam (court) of Raja Sarabhoji.198 Ghanam Krishna Ayyar there studied music 194Information

given in U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1990:9.

Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:7.

196P. Sambamurthy, 1984:333.

197The brothers were Subbaramayyar, Venkuvaiyar, Suntaramaiyar, and

Kasturirankaiyar; the sister’s name was Subbulakshmi Ammal. U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:7. 198U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:7. The text specifically says Sarabhoji Maharaja was the aracar, ruler, at that time, which would date Ghanam Krishna Ayyar coming to his court at Tanjavur in 1798 (the year Amara Simha was dethroned in favor of Sarabhoji by the British) or later. 195U.V.

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with Paccimiriam Adiyappayya (Tamil Paccaimiriyan Atippaiyar), the chief court vidwan of Tanjavur.

3.8.4 The Ghanam Style

About this time, Bobbili Kesavayya (Tamil Poppili Kecavaiya), a musician from the court of Bobbili (in what is today the state of Andhra Pradesh) came to Tanjavur. He was a famous master of an extremely difficult style of music called ghanam (Tamil kanam).199 Regarding this style a few comments are in order. U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar has written about the first meeting of his father with Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, when Krishna Ayyar asked the young boy to sing. Krishna Ayyar’s reaction was that the boy (Swaminatha Ayyar’s father) might not be strong enough: “Everything is all right,” declared Kirusnaier [Krishna Ayyar], “the only thing which he lacks is good physique. He must eat well. He should work hard too.” “We are of one kith and kin,” thought father, “that is why he is so worried about the state of health of my body.” But the truth was different. Not everyone is able to learn and master the Kanam way of singing. To really go all the way one needs the strength of an elephant and the voice of a lion. Kanam Kirusnaiyer possessed both in plenty—a strong, heavy body as well as a tremendous voice; therefore he attained great success as a musician in that particular style.”200

Because of the importance of the concept of ghanam to a discussion of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, and because of the light the following story will shed on the life of musicians in the 19th century, I would like to pursue the subject of ghanam a bit further citing excerpts from the “Musical Reminiscences” of Sri. T. Lakshmana Pillai (1864–1950), in which he draws a 199“A

branch of manodharma sangita or creative music. Herein a raga is expounded in the style of tanam but the tempo of singing is very fast.” P. Sambamoorthy, 1984:II:188. “Music is divided into ghana, naya, and desiya. The ragas too are classified that way. A master singer is one who commands the three styles with equal facility. Krishna Iyer has specialized in the first and most difficult of the three.” T. Viswanathan, 1982:29.

200U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1990:20.

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

comparison between the ghanam and nayam styles of music. Lakshmana Pillai was born into a Tamil family living in Trivandrum (in contemporary Kerala state). Like his father, he entered the service of the raja there: “Lakshmana Pillai was born in 1864 in Trivandrum, the city which has been the place of activity of several other Tamil scholars and writers… although the principal language there is Malayalam. Lakshmana Pillai’s father was Thiraviyam Pillai who served as the Chief Accounts Officer of Travancore and was a scholar in Tamil. His mother was Balaramavalli, of Mavelikkara. Lakshmana Pillai passed his B.A. from the Maharajah’s College, Trivandrum, in 1884 and was recruited to Government service, from which he retired as Major Treasury Officer. Till his death in 1950 he had always been physically active and mentally very alert.”201

Himself a reputed composer of songs in Tamil, Lakshmana Pillai was an articulate writer and observer of musical life in his day. His “Musical Reminiscences” were published 1930–1931 in three parts, in almost the very first issues of the Journal of the new Music Academy of Madras (the Academy was founded in the aftermath of a music festival held in Chennai in honor of the 5th-anniversary meetings of the Indian Congress Party, in 1927). In this excerpt, Lakshmana Pillai contrasts the ghanam with the nayam styles in the context of a famous musical duel at the Travancore (Trivandrum) court of His Highness Rama Varma Ayillium TIrunal. This contest was between two titans of the mid to late 19th century, the visiting Maha Vaidyanatha Ayyar of Tanjavur district and the locally based singer Coimbatore Raghava Ayyar. Raghava Ayyar was a Travancore palace musician, although at the time of Maha Vaidyanatha’s visit Raghava Ayyar was in exile from the Court, having fallen out of the royal favor for having sung outside the palace without the Maharaja’s approval (the Maharaja’s hasty recall of Raghava Ayyar is itself a riveting story, but beyond our purview here): 201S.

“1873 was the year… [Coimbatore] Raghava Ayyar was recalled from exile at Haripad to face Maha Vaidyanatha

Venkatasubramonia Iyer, 198:63.

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Ayyar at Trivandrum.. It must be remembered that Maha Vaidyanatha Ayyar was no easy opponent to deal with, being the master of many ragas which were yet unknown in Travancore… But Raghava Ayyar had originality, manly vigour and ready resourcefulness. His voice, though somewhat gruff, was yet strong and seemed to suit the boldness and majesty of his style. His method was Ghanam, and Maha Vaidyanatha Ayyar’s was Nayam. Ghanam means gravity and Nayam means persuasiveness; the one forces admiration, the other lures it; the one may be characterized as a tower of strength, the other as a well laid out garden; the one a mighty river, the other a fresh water lagoon; the one was imposing and sublime, the other mellifluous and dazzling.”202

The competition was a draw. In the appropriate outcome for such a contest between two matchless musicians, “[B]oth of the musicians were treated with equal courtesy and equally honoured by his Highness, who gave them pairs of bangles, laced shawls and other valuable presents, besides a monetary reward of 1500 rupees each.”203

In the court of Tanjavur ca. 1800, Bobbili Kesavayya’s music was so powerful and impressive that it moved the Raja to ask the assembled vidwans after one performance, kanamarkkattil ivaraippol patak kutiyavarkal yaravatu inke unta? (Is there no one here who could succeed in singing the ghanam margam like this man?)204 Of all the great musicians assembled there none came forward; they thought to themselves how difficult this music was. Soon the young (not-yet-Ghanam) Krishna Ayyar volunteered, and became the student of Bobbili Kesavayya for some time, eventually equaling and some say surpassing his teacher. While he was 202T.

Lakshmana Pillai, 1931:85. Lakshmana Pillai further states (1931:85) that Kalyanakrishna Ayyar, “the greatest Vainika of the day, by his genius and perseverance, so successfully reproduced many of the splendid combinations of Raghava Ayyar on a later day, as to compel the admiration of the latter.” The music of the same Kalyanakrishna Iyer, also known as Kalyanakrishna Bhagavatar, was highly respected by Vina Dhanammal. 203T. Lakshmana Pillai, 1931:85. 204U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:9.

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

practicing the ghana margam (the path of the ghanam style), he came under the patronage of the Zamindar of Kapistalam: “Having first grasped the principles of the Kanam school and of the allied mode of singing called Cakkaratanam

as taught by Poppili Kecavaiya, he went and settled down

at a place called Kapistalam, where he embarked upon

intensive practice under the patronage of a certain rich man

called Iramapattira Muppanar (Ramabhadra Moopanar).”205

3.8.5 Three Patrons and Three Songs

3.8.5.1 Patron 1: The Moopanars at Kapistalam Kapistalam is located 7 miles west of Kumbakonam, and 15 miles northeast of Tanjavur, on the Kaveri river.206 As we have seen, Muttaiya Moopanar of Kapistalam patronized Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s father, and his son Ramabhadra provided a serene calm place for the young Krishna Ayyar to master the difficult new style he had studied under Bobbili Kesavayya. U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar says that while at Kapistalam, Ghanam Krishna Ayyar was often visited by his two musician brothers, Subbarama Ayyar and Sundara Ayyar. Subbarama composed and premiered (iyarri arankerrinar) a kuravanji dance drama about Ramabhadra’s great qualities and munificence, and then after receiving suitable presents (takka cammankal),207 the two brothers went off to Tanjavur. As tokens of his affection, Ramabhadra Moopanar gave a golden “g-string” (arainanum) and a diamond earring to Krishna Ayyar, who in turn bestowed (literally “composing, he adorned or garlanded”) several padams on his generous patron (ivar avarmitu cila patankalai iyarri anintar).208 205U.V.

Swaminatha Ayyar, 1990:16–17.

“Capistalam from Sanskrit kapi, monkey, and sthala, place. The abode

of Hanooman.” Maclean, 1893/1982:205. 207Cammanam, compliment, gift, reward, present.—Tamil Lexicon. 208U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:15. Note the use here of the term patankal, padams, to describe the compositions. Through his narrative, Swaminatha Ayyar uses

both terms, kirttanam and padam, not necessarily articulating a clear distinction

between the two genres.

206Kapistalam,

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[A10] Made avar (Can I ever forget?) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

One of those is the following padam Made avar (Can I ever forget?) [A10)], written on Ellakki Ramapattira as the nayaka or hero.209 The way in which the nayaka is described in the anupallavi is as the son of the great Muttaiya, his father Muttaiya Moopanar. This is a mode of description we can see in others of Krishna Ayyar’s padams. It is sometimes difficult to tell who is being praised more lavishly, father or son, in these anupallavi epithets. This is quite likely intentional on the part of the composer, who may want to stress the greatness of the family line over that of an individual, or put in another way, to praise the son through praise of the father. Here is the anupallavi text for Made avar: “Made avar, anupallavi text: This man whose renown has been established all over the earth, this kingly man of high religious merit, born of Muttaiyan, is our King Ellakki Ramabhadra; ask my lord is it reasonable for him to behave as he has toward me, -adi?”

A padam recovered

Made avar was performed by Vina Dhanammal in 1936, but from that time up until 1990, no further performances were documented within her family. T. Viswanathan said that at one point his sister T. Balasaraswati was interested in dancing the song, but had forgotten a part of the caranam section, so she was not able to perform it. In 1989, T. Sankaran procured a cassette recording of Made avar from S. Natarajan, who had learned it from Prof. T.S. Sabhesa Ayyar while studying in the Music College of the Annamalai University (located on the outskirts of Cidambaram) in the 1930s. Sri Sabhesa Ayyar was known to have learned many Ghanam Krishna Ayyar compositions from Maha Vaidyanatha Ayyar, his guru and one of the greatest 209It

appears that “Ellakki” is an honorific prefix, probably from the Marathi language, but I have not found confirmation of this.

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

musicians of the late 19th century (his biography was also written by U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar). Maha Vaidyanatha Ayyar in turn learned compositions directly from the composer. From this cassette, T. Viswanathan was able to reconstruct the missing part of the caranam, and beginning in 1989, Sri Viswanathan performed Made avar in quite a few of his concerts. The song has taken on a new life.

3.8.5.2 Patron 2: Raja Amara Simha at Tiruvidaimarudur

From Kapistalam, Ghanam Krishna Ayyar next went to stay at Tiruvidaimarudur (known as Madhyarjunam in Sanskrit). Tiruvidaimarudur is located 6 miles east-northeast of Kumbakonam, approximately 13 miles distant from Kapistalam.210 As we have seen, Raja Amara Simha (Amarasimha) of Tanjavur was forced to give up his rule by the British East India Company authorities. They withdrew their support of Amara Simha in favor of the future Raja Sarabhoji (Serfoji), and pensioned him off to Tiruvidaimarudur in 1798, where he stayed until his death in 1803. Dr. S. Seetha says of the importance of Tiruvidaimarudur for the arts under Amara Simha’s “miniature court”: “After Sarabhoji II ascended the Tanjore throne with the help of Schwartz, Amarasimha held his miniature court at Tiruvidaimarudur, the seat of Tamil devotional music. Musicians and composers were attracted by the splendour of this small court. Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, Gopalakrishna Bharati and the Hindusthani musician Ramadoss enjoyed the benefits of Amarasimha’s blessings. There were regular dance performances by the devadasis in the court of Amarasimha who gave special encouragement to the fine art.”211

210“Tirvadamaroothore,

Pop 2,580. From Tamil tiru + idai (sacred + middle), marutham, Tamil terminalia tomentosa, bedd, plus ur, place. Place in the middle of which is an arjoon tree. Sanscrit name madhyarjuna, meaning middle plus arjoon tree, terminalia tomentosa, bedd. [murdah.]” Maclean, 1893/1982:898 (citation is excerpted). 211S. Seetha, 1981:105. We have seen earlier that the East India Company objected to Amara Simha holding court like a Maharaja at Tiruvidaimarudur.

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Dr. Seetha here refers to Tiruvidaimarudur as “the seat of Tamil devotional music.” In response to my request for further information on this reference, she responded: “Sacred tradition has it that Tiruvidaimarudur, known as Madhyarjuna in Sanskrit and Idaimarutur and Idaimarutil in Tevaram is famous as one among the eleven shrines dedicated to Lord Siva in the manifestation of eleven rudra-s (Ekadasa rudra concept.) These are worshipped respectively in these [eleven] kshetras... Of these, the shrine dedicated to Lord Mahalingesvara, the presiding deity at Tiruvidaimarudar is said to be the most sacred as it is centrally situated. Further, the sanctity of the place has been referred to in sacred works such as Kanta Puranam, Lingapuranam, Brahma Vaivanta Puranam and Sivarahasyam. This serves to establish the antiquity of the sacred sthala of Tiruvidaimarudur.” “Incidentally, Ramaswamy Dikshitar, the father of Muttuswamy Dikshitar, studied at the feet of Sri Venkatavaidyanatha Dikshitar, the maternal grandson of Venkatamakhi, who lived here for a long period. This place is further associated with Virabhadrayya, who is hailed as ‘Margadarsi’ and an exponent of ghana and desi margas. It is also believed that the place is well known for its long association with the guru parampara of Virabhadrayya, the author of the Huseni Svarajathi.”212

Tiruvidaimarudur is indeed centrally located within the district; it is only six miles from the great Saiva matam (monastery) of Tiruvavatuturai. U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar writes that his teacher Sri Minakshisundaram Pillai spoke to him about Tiruvidaimarudur and its relationship to Tiruvavatuturai one time when they were passing through that area: “He told me that Tiruvitaimarutur is a famous place of religious worship, celebrated in a puranam composed by the scholarly poet Kottaiyur Civakkoruntu Tecikar. As soon as he mentioned Civakkoruntu Tecikar he started praising lavishly

212Dr.

S. Seetha, letter to the author, April 15, 1992.

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

his scholarship and works... The temple at Tiruvitaimarutur falls under the jurisdiction of the Tiruvavatuturai monastery. The management of the temple is in the hands of a tampiran. There is also a Katralai Mutt [an in-town branch] of the Tiruvavatuturai monastery. Since Tiruvidaimarudur is only six miles away from the seat of the great monastery, it is a common practice, when occasion arises, that the Atinakkarttar, officers, stay whenever necessary in the Kattalai Mutt at Tiruvidaimarudur.”213

It was to such a place, historically a seat of Tamil devotional music, and then as of 1798, the new home of the deposed Raja Amara Simha, that the young Ghanam Krishna Ayyar was invited by Amara Simha, an event which must have occurred sometime between 1798 and 1803, the five years he is known to have spent in Tiruvidaimarudur. U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar says that Amara Simha sent representations through appropriate parties to invite Ghanam Krishna Ayyar to come and adorn his court. The two having been acquainted (or having heard of each other) previously in Tanjavur, Ghanam Krishna Ayyar is said to have responded positively to the invitation, and taking leave of Ramabhadra Moopanar, he went to Tiruvidaimarudur.214 Amara Simha, who was a great devotee of Siva (civa pakti mikkavar) and a practiced musician himself, was very pleased at Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s arrival, and so signaled his pleasure by giving a silver 213U.V.

Swaminatha Ayyar, 1990:157–158. Kottaiyur Sivakkoruntu Decikar was also the author of the Sarabendra Bhoopala Kuravanji, on Maharaja Sarabhoji II (1798–1832), to which belongs the composition Collum vakai (I will tell you how) [A1], considered in this study. We have also earlier heard the account from Swaminatha Ayyar of how the sensuality of the Tiruvidaimarudur Ula had upset the local priests who complained to some “Maharashtrian nobles” resident in that place. 214A variant of this story involves some initial troubles which were resolved by the power of Krishna Ayyar’s music: “Tradition has it that Krishna Iyer gatecrashed into Amara Simha’s palace when intrigues denied him right royal admission. Krishna Iyer waited for the prince to retire into deep slumber and from the middle of the road, with not even the tanbura for his support electrified the prince with the delicate shades of the padam in Pantuvarali raga ‘Nittirayil soppanattil’ (In my sleep, in a dream).” T. Viswanathan, 1982:30. See also C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar, 1948:117–118, for a beautifully verbose rendering of this variant.

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chariot and four wooden horses to the Mahalinga Murtti Siva temple of Tiruvidaimarudur.215 Raja Amara Simha treated Ghanam Krishna Ayyar with great consideration. When Krishna Ayyar realized how he was appreciated, and how he could have daily darsan (worship in the form, literally, of sight of the deity) of Siva as Lord Mahalinga Murtti, he decided to stay on. Amara Simha for his part ordered all his courtiers to make sure Ghanam Krishna Ayyar wanted for nothing as “because of him, this ghana marga style will thrive in all of Tamil Nadu.” They passed many happy days together, patron and palace musician, in music and felicitous conversation (again, the term used is sallapam).216 After Amara Simha’s passing in 1803, his son Pratapa Simha (died ca. 1850) evidently continued to patronize music and dance in the manner of his father, likely at Tiruvidaimarudur. Subbarama Dikshitar in 1904 described Pratapa Simha, as an expert in Sanskrit, Marathi, music, and especially in mridangam, the double-headed barrel-shaped drum used in Karnataka music. Dikshitar says that Pratapa Simha died a few years before the last Raja, Sivaji Il (who died in 1855).217 [A2] Ella arumai (All precious things) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

It was on Pratapa Simha (son of Amara Simha) that the next padam, Ella arumai (All precious things) [A2] was composed. As with Made avar, the previous padam considered, the nayaka in Ella arumai is also lauded in the anupallavi as the son of his great father: Ella arumai, anupallavi section:

“He himself gives every gift and all wealth in the proper

way, egolessly, he gets it done. This gracious man Pratapa

Ramarajan, born by Siva’s blessings to Amarasimhendran,

wears a beautiful crown.”

215This

paragraph is paraphrased by U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:15–16. The Tamil text was explicated for me by T. Viswanathan. 216This paragraph is paraphrased by U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:16. 217Subbarama Dikshitar, Madhyarjunam Pratapa Simha Maharaja, in A. Sundaram lyer, 1988:90–91.

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

This leads us to an interesting question: in the narrative of U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, we find Ghanam Krishna Ayyar leaving Amara Simha’s patronage for the court of the Zamindar of Udaiyarpalaiyam (with an attendant touching farewell scene between the composer and Amara Simha). This clearly implies that Amara Simha was alive at this time, and therefore it should have happened by 1803 at the latest. Ella arumai is written on Pratapa Simha, the son of Amara Simha. Therefore, if the other factors in the chronology are correct, the song would have to have been composed on the son while the father was still alive (unless, sometime after leaving Amara Simha’s court, he composed the padam on Pratapa Simha in the course of a brief return visit to Tiruvidaimarudur). Perhaps, it would have been the normal procedure in court poetry to sing on a perhaps quite young son, perhaps in the presence of his father or even both his parents—I do not know. This question can only be posed, not resolved, here.

Tiruvidaimarudur after Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

Tiruvidaimarudur was still the residence of the descendants of Amar Simha at the end of the 19th century. Maclean’s Manual of the Madras Presidency has the following entry regarding the “Madyarjoon Pensions,” referring to the descendants of one “Prataup Sing” who is clearly the Pratapa Simha mentioned above: “56. MADYARJOON PENSIONS- The Madyarjoon pensioners are the descendants and dependents of Prataup Sing, son of Amar Sing, Rajah of Tanjore, who was dethroned by the British Government in favor of Sarbhojee in 1798. Madyarjoon is a village 7 miles from Combaconam and 30 miles from Tanjore, and the family were there removed; and hence the name. The chief of the pensioners is now Yeckojee (Ekoji­ ed.), the adoptive grandson of Amar Sing, to whom no pension was assigned until the beginning of 1873, when, on the recommendation of the Madras Government, a monthly stipend of Rupees 1,000 was sanctioned for life only. The pensions to the other members of the Madyarjoon family were sanctioned by the Government of India in 1849. These pensions are administered and paid in the Tanjore district.”218

218Maclean,

1885/1987:I:49–50.

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Maclean’s account tells us that the Tiruvidaimarudur branch of the royal family line was still receiving a pension from the British at the beginning of the 20th century. It also enables us to construct a partial continuing lineage of this family from Amara Simha (who died in 1802 or 1803), to Pratapa Simha (who died a few years before 1855), to the adopted Yeckojee (living as of 1893). In the late 20th century, the heritage of Tiruvidaimarudur in music and dance continues to echo in the surnames of some of the great musicians and dancers who came from that place. The female vocalist Tiruvidaimarudur Bhavani recorded the padam Unakko manam illai (You do not seem to have any heart) [C4] in approximately 1904; this padam of unknown authorship is documented in the Performance History in the Appendix.

3.8.5.3 Patron 3: Kaccirangan of Udaiyarpalaiyam

Inta ur kattukkulle yallava irukkinratu? (This place is way out in the woods, isn’t it?)

With these words, Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s distraught musician friends tried to pry him away from his last great patron family, the Rajas (or Zamindars) Kaccirankan, and his son Kacci Kalyanarangan, of Udaiyarpalaiyam. But we are here ahead of our story. The town of Udaiyarpalaiyam has a long history; Maclean reports that it was said to have been founded in 1314. Marie-Louise Reiniche dates the founding of the town somewhat later, giving the most extensive summary of its history I have found. As she gives us an excellent picture of the settling down of a group of warrior chieftains and their transformation into quasi-Maharajas (her term), and as it has not been heretofore available in English, I have translated extensive portions of her summary: “Its name indicates, its history is strictly tied to that of the Poligars (palaiyakkarar, chief of an armed camp), carrying the title Udaiyar who founded the locality, likely in the second half of the 16th century. According to the family chronicles of the Rajas of Udaiyarpalaiyam, their ancestors were originally from Kancipuram, and as this was the case,

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

they are called descendants of the Pallava kings. At the beginning of the 16th century, the poligar Pallikonta Rangappa Udaiyar, at the request of the Vijayanagar emperor, militarily assisted the Nayak of Gingee and received in recompense, among other things, the right of “guard of the kingdom” (aracu kaval) (which implied rights of taxation on the population) of all the south eastern part of the actual district of South Arcot, between the rivers Vellar and Kollitam... Following a dream, the young son of Rangappa, lost in the forest) discovered in the place where he found himself the presence of a linga and decided to found on this spot Udaiyarpalaiyam. Let us note that in this troubled period in the history of Tamil Nadu, this new capital, situated in a region of inhospitable forests, would soon become a haven [repaire] for these men of war who continued to exercise their right of ‘guard of the kingdom’ until the end of the 18th century, in the region which was attributed to their ancestor... In the 17th century, the images of the principal divinities (among them the goddess Kamakshi) of Kancipuram, which was under siege by the Muslims, would be preserved at Udaiyarpalaiyam. Finally, the continuing fact of these warriors for the dharmic kings for their own locality (they installed there Brahmins and occupied themselves with building and endowing temples) and in the region: they made numerous donations to great temples, among these those of Cidambaram and Srimushnam.

“What was the extent of this kingdom before the 19th century? Symbolically, it extended over a large part of the north of Tamil Nadu. More practically, it corresponded to the region in which they exercised their right of aracu kaval: but this term implies that they were dependents of more powerful masters, and all information suggests that the “right” was divided up in the same region, likely in competition, with that of other comparable warrior chiefs. “With the Pax Britannica and the disarmament of the Poligars, Udaiyarpalaiyam, transformed into a Zamindari, came to finally have borders, fixed at a radius of between 10 to 15 kilometers around the town. The area in which the Zamindars took a tax

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[fonciere] (out of which they would give a predetermined proportion to the British government) constituted 60 villages and hamlets, peopled in large majority by peasants of the pataiyaci (or Vanniyar) castes, to which also belonged the masters of Udaiyarpalaiyam. “From the revenues of this dry country (won bit by bit from the forest and whose productivity depended entirely on the rains)... the Zamindars of Udaiyarpalaiyam prospered not a little, continuing their function of ‘dharmic kings’ vis-a-vis Brahmins, religious leaders, and local and regional temples, surrounding themselves with an administrative apparatus and developing a court ceremonial: from men of war they were transformed into quasi-Maharajas who the Europeans honoured with their presence. From this height, there now remain only miserable [flambeaux] since the abolition of the Zamindaris in 1953 put an end to the legal functions of the masters of Udaiyarpalaiyam, taking from them additionally, for various reasons, the means of exercise of their royal function as well. However, the town has hardly changed (5,879 inhabitants in 1871; 8,553 in 1981); it keeps all its past in its structure and in the names of its streets, and the symbolism of its royal position has not been completely forgotten.”219 Udaiyarpalaiyam was indeed, then, in a forest, a location chosen perhaps partly because of the sighting of a Siva lingam and partly for its practicality as a Hindu warrior stronghold during a time of political instability. It is located about 15 miles to the north-northeast of Tanjavur, and 15 miles north-northwest of Kumbakonam; this places it outside the most fertile areas of the Kaveri river delta. I have not visited the place, my guess is that today it may more properly be described as arid tracts than as a forest per se. By the time that Ghanam Krishna Ayyar attracted the attention of Kacciranga Maharaja of Udaiyarpalaiyam in the first years of the 19th century, it had undergone largely the same deterioration in its political power and autonomy as had all the 219Marie-Louise

Reiniche, 1985:84–86. I have translated these excerpts from the original French. (My thanks to Prof. Glenn Yocum for the reference to this article.)

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

other native kingdoms, great or petty, of Tamil Nadu.220 From the British administrative view, Maclean reports the decline of Udaiyarpalaiyam as beginning at the end of the 17th century:

220In

“Agricultural & market town; Built 1314 by poligar [q.v.]

Chinna Nullapoodeiyaur as directed in a dream. Headquarters

of the zemindarry. Formerly considerable but now much

decayed. The zemindar’s palace is in a ruinous state, but

contains a fine durbar [q.v.] hall with some good wooden carving, and an inscription [shausanam]. It is in an old fort built by Mahrattas. Old Shiva temple with semi-circular tank. ... About 1696 a peshcush [qv] of Rs. 40,000 was fixed on this zemindarry by the Nawaub [q.v.] of Carnatic. [qv]. In 1757

the poligar [qv] was invaded by the French and forced to pay

a tribute of the same amount. In 1765 the Nawab assisted

by the British drove him from his polliem for refusal to

contribute men and money for reduction of Madura. The

expelled poligar took… refuge… first in Tanjore and then in Mysore till 1780, when with the assistance of Hyder he

regained possession and was in possession till 1783, when

he became renter of his district. The entire management of

the estate was in 1798 handed over to an agent of the Nawaub;

a monthly allowance of Rs. 1,000 being paid to the poligar.

This continued till Trichi was made over to the Company in

1801. On the 23 December 1817 a Sunnud-i-milkyat-istimrar

[qv] was issued to the poligar, he receiving merely the village

in which he lived together with villages surrounding head

quarters. Present pesh cush, Rs. 642.”221

Tamil Nadu, among the formerly independent princely states, Pudukkottai (the native place of many important musician families, located between Tanjavur and Madurai) alone maintained nominal independence from the British all the way up until India’s independence in 1947. For detailed studies of the Pudukkottai kingdom see Nicholas Dirks (1987) and Joanne Waghorne (1994). 221C.D. Maclean, 1893/1982:609–610. Entry spelled “Oodayarpolliem.” Some of the terms in this passage are: “Peshcush, from Persian; literally, ‘first fruits.’ Rent to the Government paid by the proprietor of a permanently-settled estate,”

1893/1982:681. “Sunnud-i-milkyat-istimrar, document by which the British

government recognized the ownership of zemindars at a fixed assessment, current chiefly in the northern circars,” 1893/1982:860.

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From this account, we see that, albeit on a smaller scale, Kacciranga of Udaiyarpalaiyam was subject to the same forces acting on Maharaja Sarabhoji of Tanjavur. At the time, he determined to invite Ghanam Krishna Ayyar to come visit his court, he was probably on the receiving end of his 1,000 rupee per month allowance, no longer actively engaged in fighting for the defense of Hindu dharma, and moving to occupy himself in creating as good a replica of the court as possible. Subbarama Dikshitar in 1904 gave a brief sketch of Yuvaranga (Tamil Yuvarankentiran), the ruler of Udaiyarpalaiyam during the time of Tulaja II (1763–1787), saying that he was a great rasika (connoisseur) of music, and noting that many padams in the Telugu language were written on him by different composers.222 T. Viswanathan states (and elsewhere, C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar implies) that this Yuvaranga is the same man as Kacciranga.223 (We have also seen earlier the term yuvaraja used in the sense of an heir apparent.) The musical astuteness of Yuvaranga is attested to by C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar, writing in about 1930: “Yuvaranga [Kacciranga?] was a king among the artists and an artist among kings, so much so, that he was called the Boja of the South, and to aid the comparison, the celebrated Gopala Sastri of his court was acknowledged as the Kalidasa of the South. Yuvaranga was no mean poet composer, singer and player. The professionals that sought his patronage had their work cut out for them, in that their patron gave a Roland for an Oliver during the intellectual and artistic tournaments, jousts and bouts. Though he does not loom large politically or aristocratically, the rulers of Vijayanagara, Tanjore, Madura, Pudukkottah and Mysore were all jealous of his unique attainments, unstinted patronage and keen and critical appreciation of everything good and great in the field of human knowledge.”224

U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar writes that when Ghanam Krishna Ayyar was at Tiruvidaimarudur, Kacciranga (probably, then, this 222Subbarama

Dikshitar in A. Sundaram lyer, 1988:105–106. Viswanathan, 1982:30; C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar, 1948: 117. 224C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar, 1948: 110. 223T.

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

same Yuvaranga) had heard of his great musical prowess. So, a desire grew in him to have Ghanam Krishna Ayyar come to be his samasthana vidwan (court musician). But he wondered to himself, since Krishna Ayyar was under the care of Amara Simha, would he or would he not come (varuvaro mataro)? Kacciranga determined to first simply invite Krishna Ayyar for a visit, and then to reveal his heart’s desire a bit later. He sent an invitation through appropriate persons, and Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, having an equally high opinion of Kacciranga’s great qualities as a rasika and patron (as Kacciranga had of Krishna Ayyar as a musician), happily decided to come.225 After listening to Krishna Ayyar several times, Kacciranga slowly, softly (mella) exposed his desire. Krishna Ayyar, considering the proper surroundings, the good qualities and the affection of Kacciranga, agreed, saying “let me first go and take leave of Amara Simha.” There followed a sad goodbye between the composer and his old patron, after which time Ghanam Krishna Ayyar came to live at Udaiyarpalaiyam, where he was to stay until his very last days, when he returned to his native village Periya Tirukkunram.226 The stories about Kacciranga and his son Kacci Kalyanaranga stress their astuteness as rasikas (connoisseurs), qualities which made the obscure and relatively poor kingdom of Udaiyarpalaiyam so attractive to Ghanam Krishna Ayyar. At Udaiyarpalaiyam, there quickly grew a remarkable attachment between Krishna Ayyar and Kacciranga Maharaja, so much so that the composer stopped traveling to other places, and Kacciranka was distressed if he did not see Krishna Ayyar every single day. One important aspect of the symbiosis in the relationship of patron and artist is succinctly expressed by U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar: “The affection and the musicianship of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar came to light at that time in the form of several

225Suggesting

a motive for Ghanam Krishna Ayyar leaving Tiruvidaimarudur, C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar states that “the boy sought the court of Yuvaranga of Udayarpalayam, dissatisfied with the weak appreciation of the ruler of Tanjore [Amara Simha of Tiruvidaimarudur],” (1948:117). This adds support to the contention that Yuvaranga and Kacciranga are one and the same. It also suggests that Krishna Ayyar was still quite young at this point, ca. 1798–1803. 226This paragraph paraphrases U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar 1987:26–27, except for the reference to returning to his native village, which is in 1990:23.

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kirttanas, while the affection of Kacciranka came to light through gifts.”227

U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar writes that due to Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s renown and his kindness to fellow musicians, musicians from other places came often to visit the court of Udaiyarpalaiyam, and gaining introduction to the Raja through the good graces of Krishna Ayyar, they would sing, receive suitable gifts and proceed on their way. It is now we return to the beginning of this particular chapter in Krishna Ayyar’s life, where the visiting musicians are astonished that such a great vidwan is way out in the backwoods instead of in one of the great courts of South India.

3.8.6 Kacciranka’s Nod of Assent

“One time some musicians came. They as usual sang and got gifts. Later they went to Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s house and were having conversation (sallapam). At that time, they said to him, ‘You should be in Tanjavur, Mysore or Tiruvanantapuram. It’s not enough that you stay with this Zamindar. In the academies (vitvat capaiyil) of those samsthana vidwans, you can show the great power of your music (sangita sakti) and shine! Good gifts will also be available. This place is in the middle of a forest, isn’t it?’ Ghanam Krishna Ayyar felt sad that they didn’t understand the true affection and good qualities of Kacciranka. He said to them, ‘What you say is right’. It is great to be in a big Raja’s samasthanam. You may even get more great gifts; you may receive more titles, and varieties of different material things. But you cannot get Kacciranka’s nod of assent (cirakkampam) there! Even if I were to receive hundreds of thousands of gold sovereigns elsewhere, my Lord Kacciranka who realizes greatness, his nod is equal to this whole world.” 228

227English

translation, T. Viswanathan and M. Allen. Original Tamil text: kanam kirusnaiyarutaiya anpum arralum avvappotu cila cila kirttanankalaka velippattana. Kacciranganutaiya anpum kotaiccirappum avvappotu kanam kirusnaiyarukkuriya cammanankalaka velippattana. 228 Translation, T. Viswanathan and M. Allen. From U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:29.

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

Hearing this, the musicians all wondered at Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s affection; they spoke among themselves about how lucky Kacciranka was to have the loyalty of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, how he must verily be the “greatest crest jewel” (ciromani) among rasikas. The musicians were sad that Krishna Ayyar just hid himself away in the forest; but Krishna Ayyar for his part received complete satisfaction from the nod of Kacciranka Maharaja. 229 In Swaminatha Ayyar’s narrative, when Kacciranka passed away his son Kacci Kalyanaranga did not immediately receive the title of Zamindar, and so he went away to the town of Tiruvanaikka for some period of time. [B2] Paccilam temal (Covered with beauty spots) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

As with the other two compositions of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar we have discussed, the anupallavi section of the song “Covered with Beauty Spots” lauds both the father and son: Paccilam temal, anupallavi section:

“To Muttuvijaya Rangendran, without equal in all the three worlds, who regularly made penance, was born the great king Kacciranka Maharaja; in one night an eternity passes for this beautiful woman her mind confused, intoxicated by Kama.”

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar left Udaiyarpalaiyam for some time to visit relatives, and also visited Kacci Kalyanaranga at Tiruvanaikka. In the year 1842, Kacci Kalyanaranga succeeded the Zamindari and returned to Udaiyarpalaiyam, inviting Ghanam Krishna Ayyar to his court. There, as the account of Swaminatha Ayyar comes to an end, Krishna Ayyar is now too old to ride his horse so the new Raja gives him a beautiful palanquin and bearers. Swaminatha Ayyar says that Krishna Ayyar was full of great affection for Kacci Kalyanaranga, a feeling which made him calm and happy (kulir, literally “cool”) in his advanced years.230 229Paraphrased 230Paraphrased

from U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:29–30. from U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:30–32.

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The song Paccilam temal (covered with beauty spots) [B2] is practically unknown in south India today. T. Sankaran reports that his mother Lakshmiratnam sang this padam, although he does not know the source from whom she had learned it (this is the same situation as with Yar poy colluvar [A14]). Sankaran says that Paccilam temal “has gone out of vogue in the family.” 231 It was listed in the repertoire of T. Balasaraswati although I did not find any documentation of actual performances. In recent history, it seems to have lived only in the repertoire of T. Viswanathan. In the anupallavi text, it appears that the name of Kacciranga’s father is given, as Muttuvijaya Rangendran. I have not found corroboration of this name from another source, but the wording is quite clear that the great Muttuvijaya, priceless in the three worlds, is the father of the great Kaccirankan, who the heroine has come in search of.

3.8.7 Padams on Vishnu and Murugan

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar is said to have had such influence on his patrons that, if in a song, he pointed out that a certain temple was in need of repair or renovation, action would swiftly be taken. “He commanded considerable respect and his word was carried out earnestly especially in the renovation of temples, tanks etc.” 232 The second group of padams we will consider by this composer were written on deities, the heavenly residents of the earthly temples. [A4] Engumayamana (Our beautiful King) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

3.8.8 On Ranganatha of Srirangam

According to T. Sankaran the song Enkumayamana (Our beautiful King) [A4] was recorded on 78 RPM in the early years of the 231T.

Sankaran, Personal communication, 1990.

Rajagopalan, 1990: 116. In another view of this activity, “Charities like temple

repair and tank digging which every king and queen yearned to do to earn fame here and in the other world resulted in providing ample work to the poor. “ K.R. Subramaniam, 1928/1988:84–85.

232N.

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar

twentieth century by Tiruvidaimarudur Bhavani (who we hear on Unakko manam [C4]). Through the generosity of V.A.K. Ranga Rao, I received the 78 RPM disc of Engumayamana recorded by Tiruccendur Shanmuga Vadivoo before 1930. The footnotes for this song (found with the full translations in the Appendix) point out some of the unusual features of the text; for one, this Tamil padam is one of the few I encountered on Vishnu (Ranganatha). It describes some details of the ritual processions at the temple of Srirangam, on an island in the middle of the Kaveri river at Trichy.

3.8.9 Third Caranam of Engumayamana

Murugan’s uncle, in the center of the two Kaveris,

Will give his grace to those who speak truthfully, seeking asylum in him; I fruitfully joined Sridharan (one of the names of Vishnu), With penance, purification, ceremonial rites;

With all these come the Lord’s blessing, friend.

Hence the reference in the third caranam to the “uncle of Murugan” 233 who lives in the “middle of the two Kaveris.” We also note the conflation of the sacred and the royal beginning right from the first line of the pallavi, when the nayaka is described as the Raja of Srirangam. And there is one delightful cameo in the second caranam where Krishna is the subject. There the women are described as all falling in love with Krishna, a perfect setting for a padam, but taken at one remove, at a slight distance. The speaker describes rather than participates in it. In this scene, the ula genre is again evoked, as the women of all ages are falling in love with the king/deity as he comes through the streets in procession.

233In

[A12] Padari Varuhudu (My heart trembles) For full translation and commentary, see the Appendix.

the Madurai area, Vishnu is known as the brother of the goddess Minaksi, therefore becoming brother-in-law to her husband Siva and maternal uncle (maman) to their offspring Ganesa and Murugan.

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3.8.10 Murugan at Palani Padari varuhudu (My heart trembles) [A12] and Velavare (Holder of the lance) [B4], the final two songs of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar to be considered, both on Murugan, are two of the most famous Tamil padams, their popularity stretching all through the period of documentation. Over the years, some sources have cited Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar as the author of Padari varuhudu234 but B.M. Sundaram and others strongly believe it to be a composition of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar: “The Zamindar family of Udaiyarpalaiyam, who patronized Krishna lyer, possessed the collection of Krishna lyer’s compositions (I don’t know whether they are still available, because the family itself has now dwindled), wherein I was, long back, able to (in company of T. Sankaran) find this composition.”235

T. Sankaran agrees with Sri Sundaram that Padari is a padam of Ghanam Ayyar.236 Several recordings of Padari are documented in the Performance History in the Appendix. I was not able to hear the 78 RPM of “Dhanam’s Daughters” (Rajalakshmi and Lakshmiratnam, Vina Dhanammal’s oldest two daughters), but the text of that recording was published (see notes in Appendix) and has been included with the translation. As the reader will see, the text variants for this particular song are quite extensive, and the number of recordings is great. The documentation of dance performances is also fairly broad, including in addition to three performances by T. Balasaraswati, one each by three other dancers. [B4] Velavare (Holder of the lance) For full translation and commentary, see the Appendix.

234Rangaramanuja

Ayyangar, 1953:348 (Song #134); K.R. Madhavi, 1960: 160; Dr. S. Seetha, 1981:230. T.K. Cidambaranatha Mudaliar, 1943:9 (Song 7), lists as “author unknown.” 235B.M. Sundaram letter to the author on January 10, 1991 (parentheses in original). 236T. Sankaran personal communication, 1990. He points out that U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar says that Ghanam Krishna Ayyar uses Velavar as one of his mudras, noting that Velavar occurs in the anupallavi of Padari.

Kavikunjara Bharati

3.8.11 Murugan as the Holder of the Spear The song Velavare (Holder of the lance) [B4] has also a long and continuing history of great popularity among Tamil padams. To some, it represents what is best in the genre, especially in conjunction with one particular performer. On the association between this song and this performer, C.R. Srinivasa Ayyangar wrote in approximately 1930: “They [padams of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar] can, and in my

opinion, they do, take their place on the same pedestal on

which the compositions of Kshetragna are enthroned. My

remarks will be better understood and supported if one

takes the trouble to go to Miss Dhanam for the rendering of

Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s master-piece in Bhairavi, that opens

with the words ‘Velavare’.” 237

The song has been widely recorded on 78 RPM, but it is interesting to note that aside from five performances by T. Balasaraswati stretching from 1936 to 1971, no other dance performances were documented.

3.9 Composer: Kavikunjara Bharati

Moving to consider Kavikunjara Bharati, we will find some strong resemblances in the circumstances of his life with that of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar; they both lived and worked in the 19th century (although Kavikunjara Bharati was junior to Krishna Ayyar, by perhaps thirty years), and they were both court musicians. Another similarity from the point of view of our study is that many biographical details for Kavikunjara Bharati are available, as were for Ghanam Krishna Ayyar. In this case, it was a grandson of Kavikunjara Bharati, Kotisvara Ayyar (himself an important 20th-century composer), who was largely responsible for the publication of Kavikunjara Bharati’s works, notably the Skanta Purana Kirttanas, brought out in 1914, and his padams, published in 1927 with a brief biography of the composer. We have information regarding Kavikunjara Bharati’s family background, 237C.R.

Srinivasa Ayyangar, 1948: 119–120.

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his musical training, patronage, and the transmission of his music down to the 20th century. The largest difference in the two men’s work which immediately strikes us is the absence of padams written on patrons in the body of work of Kavikunjara Bharati. Though he served the courts of both Sivaganga and Ramanathapuram (Ramnad), the works commissioned by his patrons are on Murugan and Siva (in the padams and the Skanta Purana Kirttanas) or Vishnu (in his Aragar Kuravanji).

3.9.1 Family and Early Life

As mentioned above, it was through the efforts of N. Kotisvara Ayyar that the texts of many of Kavikunjara Bharati’s compositions have been published. A simple diagram will help keep the family relationships clear (Fig. 3.2), as they are introduced in the text that follows.

Figure 3.2 Kavikunjara Bharati family lineage.

A two-page biography of Kavikunjara Bharati was published in 1927, on the front of a book containing the texts of the Tamil

Kavikunjara Bharati

padams of three composers, Kavikunjara Bharati, Madura Kavi Bharati, and Srirama Kavirayar. A citation at the end of this short biography says that it was “written and sent to the publisher by the heirs (cutantirar) of the composer,238 in all likelihood referring to Kavikunjara Bharati’s grandson N. Kotisvara Ayyar. Kotisvara Ayyar’s father Nagu Bharati died when Kotisvara was small, and he was raised by his grandfather. According to the biographical account, Kavikunjara Bharati was born in 1810 in the village of Perunkarai, on the south bank of the river Vaikai in Ramanathapuram District. Ramanathapuram is the seat of an ancient kingdom whose rulers were known as Setupatis, guardians and lords of Setu. Setu is another name for Ramesvaram, the gateway to the ancient land bridge leading to Sri Lanka and the site of one of the most famous pilgrimage temples in all of India. The Setupatis were feudatories of the Pandyan kings of Madurai. Perunkarai was a village within this territory, in which property had been gifted to Kavikunjara Bharati’s and other Brahmin families. Kavikunjara Bharati’s father was Subramania Bharati and his grandfather was Kotisvara Bharati. According to the biography, both were scholars in Tamil and Sanskrit, and the family had enjoyed the patronage of the Setupatis for some generations: “In those days Iraniya Karuppa Tirumalai Setupati of

Ramanathapuram patronized the Brahmins who were

well-versed in veda sastras. He encouraged them by

giving lands as gifts (manniya) so that their families and

generations to come could enjoy it. Kavikunjara Bharati’s

family then living at Perunkarai was one of the recipients

of this gift.”239

The account says that several of Kavikunjara Bharati’s matemal ancestors were indeed accomplished musicians, notably his mother’s uncle’s son (or maternal grandfather) (matamakarana) 238Kavikunjara

Bharati, 1927:2. Cutantiram or cutantaram, Owner, heir, claimant, one who enjoys any property, as of right.’—Tamil Lexicon. Here “heir” would seem to be the appropriate translation. 239Kavikunjara Bharati, 1927: 1. English translation by Smt. G. Sulochana. I have not found the name “Iraniya Karuppa Tirumalai Setupati” in N. Subrahmanian’s

history (1988:65–71) or any other source.

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Nandanur Nagu Bharati, a composer and singer of prabandhas and other poems.

3.9.2 Madura Kavi Bharati

As a young man Kavikunjara Bharati came under the musical tutelage of Madura Kavi Bharati (flourished ca. 1780).240 Madura Kavi’s padam texts and a brief biographical treatment are given in the 1927 book of Kavikunjara Bharati’s padams; the biographical note says that Madura Kavi was born in the same village of Perunkarai where Kavikunjara Bharati was to be born: “Originally from Perunkarai, he moved to the sacred place Madurai and led a pious life, associating with good people and staying in the shrine of Minaksi temple, singing hymns in praise of Lord Sundaresvarar [Siva]. In course of time, by grace of Goddess Minaksi he acquired the sweet voice to sing padams and kirtanams. Henceforth, he began to sing padams in praise of Gods and good people. Gradually he became very popular. The Chieftain of Ramanathapuram, Muttirulappa Pillai visited Minaksi temple. He heard Ganapati Subbayyar sing several padams in praise of him.

Pleased and surprised by his sweet voice, he honoured him by the name ‘Madura Kavi.’ In addition, the chieftain gave him lands and other things as gifts (mariyatai). Later on, he visited places like Sivaganga and Palaiyappattukkal, singing in praise of chiefs and receiving gifts from them. He was lucky to associate closely with great musicians. He passed away before the age of eighty.”241

Today there are two popular padams attributed by many to Madura Kavi, Yarukkahilum bayama (Of whom should I be afraid?) in Begada ragam, and Unnai tudu anuppinen (I sent you as my messenger) in Saveri ragam. Neither of them is in one of the three ragas selected for this study, however, and some scholars have expressed doubts about the attribution of 240This

dating by N. Rajagopalan, 1990:109. Bharati, 1927:2. English translation by Smt. G. Sulochana. I have not found the name of “Muttirulappa Pillai” among the rulers of Ramanathapuram, but based on the time period of Madura Kavi, it could well be another name for Mutturamalinga Setupati I (ruled during 1761–1794).

241Kavikunjara

Kavikunjara Bharati

the authorship of both these songs. This has raised enough doubts in my mind to make me decide not to present them as Madura Kavi’s compositions in this study.242

3.9.3 The Composer at Court

Kavikunjara Bharati was, as described on the title pages of both the 1914 Skanta purana kirttanai and the 1927 book of his padams, Samastana Vidwan (court musician) of the Sivaganga and Ramanathapuram courts. We first see him honored at Sivaganga as a young man, for the renown his compositions had already attained. Figure 3.3 can help guide the reader through the discussion of Kavikunjara Bharati’s major works.

242Yarukkahilum

Figure 3.3 Works of Kavikunjara Bharati.

bhayama is contained in the published padams of Madura Kavi and Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar. While it is in praise of “Modi linga durai”, likely referring to Mutturamalinga Setupati I (ruled during 1761–1794), to the musicologist B.M. Sundaram of Pondicherry, this does not constitute convincing proof of authorship. He writes: “Yarukkahilum bhayama is no doubt, a padam by [Vaidisvarankoil] Subbarama Ayyar only. The words ‘Modilinga durai’ are, of course, found in the anupallavi. It has been said by the old time vidwans like Ariyakkudi Ramanuja Ayyangar that Subbarama Ayyar has appended the term, perhaps when he went to meet the Raja of Ramnad, who was on a pilgrimage (probably to Vaideeswarankoil too.) Simply because of the usage found in this padam, we cannot ascribe it to Madhura Kavi Bharati or to anyone else.” B.M. Sundaram, letter to the author on January 10, 1991. Unnai tudu anuppinen is attributed to Madura Kavi by T.K. Cidambaranatha Mudaliar in 1943, but curiously the song is absent from the 1927 book containing Madura Kavi’s padams.

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3.9.4 An Elephant Among Poets Kavikunjara Bharati’s compositions attracted the admiration of musicians and patrons of music in the southern part of Tamil Nadu while he was still a teenager. P. Sambamoorthy says that Kavikunjara Bharati received the title Kavikunjara from the ruler of Sivaganga, the Zamin (small kingdom) adjacent to Ramanathapuram in the north (which had been a part of the Ramanathapuram Zamin until approximately 1730): “Gauri Vallabha Rajah, the then ruler of Sivaganga, heard his compositions through his samasthana vidwans. He invited Kavikunjara Bharati to his court and requested him to give a recital of his compositions. The Zamindar was very much pleased and honoured him profusely. He conferred on him the title ‘Kavi Kunjaram’ and appointed him as Samasthana Vidwan.” 243

According to C.D. Maclean, this Gauri (or Gowry) Vallabha Tevar (adopted son of Velu Nacciyar, the Queen of Sivaganga from 1781 to 1800) was the Zamindar of Sivaganga between 1801 and his death in 1829.244 This would place Kavikunjara Bharati’s visit to the Sivaganga court before the age of 19. As for the title Kavikunjara bestowed on the young composer, the Tamil Lexicon gives for kuncara “elephant, (also) an epithet to denote excellence, used in compounds like Kavikunjaram. “Kavikunjara Bharati, then, is the most excellent of, an “elephant among,” poets. According to Kamil Zvelebil, the elephant was a vahana (mount) for Murugan earlier historically than the mayil (peacock), with which Murugan is so closely associated today.245 K.R. Madhavi 243P.

Sambamoorthy, 1984:II:310–311.

Maclean, 1885/1987:I:56–57.

245“It is important to mention in this context of Tamil motifs connected with

Subrahmanya [Murugan] the question of the elephant as the god’s vahana... Two or three facts emerge: a) The elephant of Murugan as his mount apparently is a purely South Indian feature. b) There are different accounts of its origin and function and, in fact, one should distinguish between several elephant- vahanas of the god. c) Since about the 12th Cent. A.D. the elephant tends to disappear in favour of the peacock as the god’s mount. d) However, it is certainly the elephant which, in Tamilnadu, precedes the peacock historically... The elephant of Murugan is usually described as a white, powerful and terror-striking animal.” K. Zvelebil, 1991:36. 244C.D.

Kavikunjara Bharati

writes that besides giving a title, the Sivaganga Zamindar also awarded two villages to Kavikunjara Bharati’s family: ”Once when the Raja of Sivaganga killed a 16-foot tiger in a

hunt, many people composed poems about the incident and

the prabandha called ‘Venkaik kummi’ composed by Bharati

was found to be the best of the lot. In token, the Raja gave

away two villages... as a gift to Bharati. Some are of the opinion

[however] that Bharati obtained these two villages for his

valuable work called ‘The Aragar Kuravanji.’ ... His descendants

are also musicians and they maintain his high traditions of

their forefathers. They still enjoy those two villages given as

gift to Bharati…”246

3.9.5 The Aragar Kuravanji

The composition of the Aragar Kuravanji has been dated to 1840 by P. Sambamoorthy.247 K.R. Madhavi concurs, saying that it was composed at the request of the Rani (Queen) of Sivaganga, Kattama Nacciyar.248 Maclean reports that Kattama Nacciyar was the last surviving daughter of Gowri Vallabha Tevar at the time her petition to be recognized as the legitimate ruler of Sivaganga was accepted by the British in 1863. She remained the Rani until she passed away in 1877.249 The song Ivan yaro (Who is he?) [A7] included in this study is from the Aragar Kuravanji; its context within that dance drama will be discussed below. P. Sambamoorthy, describing events after the composition of the Aragar Kuravanji, says that the composer was “subsequently invited by Mutturamalinga Setupati [II], the Raja of Ramanathapuram, to come to his court. There he was appointed 246K.R.

Madhavi, 1960:154–155. In this context, the “giving” of a village to an artist would typically mean the assignment of revenues for a certain area of land, or perhaps the gift of revenue from a certain area, not a total transfer of ownership. 247P. Sambamoorthy in Kavikunjara Bharati, 1963:iv. 248K.R. Madhavi, 1960:154. 249Maclean, 1885/1987:1:56–57. All sources report that the succession of Sivaganga was constantly in dispute between approximately 1830 and 1880; it is, therefore, difficult to say exactly who was in power at any given time. Kattama Nacciyar was apparently one of several claimants to the throne through

most of this period. In 1840, the date of the commission of the Aragar Kuravanji,

she may have been one of several Ranis.

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Samastana Vidwan.” 250 Sometime between 1865 and 1870, Kavikunjara Bharati completed the composition of his Skanda Purana Kirttanas.251 Subbarama Dikshitar in 1904 wrote that the younger brother (tampi) of Mutturamalinga Setupati II of Ramanathapuram, Ponnuswamy Tevar, requested their composition “in the manner of the Arunacala Kavi Ramanatakam,”252 that is, rendering a classical text via the medium of popular song, stringing together many songs to tell the story of, in this case, Skanda (Murugan) for a lay audience. The sources agree that one Aludaiyarkoil Atmanatha Bhagavatar sang the Skanda Purana Kirttanas throughout Tamil Nadu in Kavikunjara Bharati’s lifetime, making them tremendously popular. Aludaiyarkoil Atmanatha Bhagavatar was either Kavikunjara Bharati’s nephew or son-in-law (or perhaps both) according to the various sources. The 1927 biography says that Kavikunjara Bharati taught Atmanatha Bhagavatar the compositions and their varnamettus, musical settings.253 We have a pen-picture of Kavikunjara Bharati in his elder years from Kaviyogi Sri Suddhananda Bharati of Sivaganga, who must have seen the composer when an extremely small boy.254 250P.

Sambamoorthy, 1984:II:311. Mutturamalinga Setupati II, who assumed rule of Ramanathapuram upon coming of age in 1862, ruling until his death in 1877, was the nephew (sister’s son) of Kottaiswamy Tevar (who was discussed earlier in connection with the padams of Arunacala Kavirayar). Mutturamalinga Setupati II was himself a noted poet, composer, and discerning connoisseur. T. Sankaran says: “Before he was fifteen he became proficient in all branches of Tamil. He could easily assess the merits of the laureates, musical or literary.” Several books of his musical compositions were published by his brother Ponnuswamy Tevar. T. Sankaran, 1977:49–51. 251Subbarama Dikshitar says (1988:113–114) that Bharati completed the work in 1865; P. Sambamoorthy (1984:II:311) says that he began their composition in 1865 and finished the work in 1870. 252Subbarama Dikshitar in A. Sundaram Ayyar, 1988:113–114. Other sources call Ponnuswamy the elder brother of the Setupati (T. Sankaran, 1997:51 and P. Sambamurthy, 1984:310). K.R. Madhavi (1960:154) calls him the ruler of Pudukkottai, but I do not find his name among their Tondaimans rulers. He died in either 1869 or 1870 and was the father of Pandithurai Tevar, founder of the (20th century) Madurai Tamil Sangam. 253Kavikunjara Bharati, 1914:1 (Kotisvara Ayyar introduction). 254Suddhananda Bharati’s dates are given as 1893–1990 by N. Rajagopalan 1990:346, and his birthday as May 11, 1897, by K.R. Madhavi, 1960:184. All sources agree that Kavikunjara Bharati passed away in 1896.

Kavikunjara Bharati

Suddhananda Bharati writes that he was profoundly impressed by Kavikunjara Bharati upon meeting him in his youth; this is a fitting image of the illustrious composer to leave us with: “I have seen him in my boyhood. He was a strong, bulky,

pot-bellied man, with a smiling face and kind heart. He

smeared on my front sacred ashes as I sang a verse on

Murukan—and blessed me. I was much attracted by his tone,

tune and Tamil. I heard the whole Skanda Purana Kirtans

with rapt attention. It is a monumental treasure rich in style

and substance. His grandson Sri Kotisvara Ayyar was my

intimate; his mela raga kirtans are famous. Kavi Kunjara

was adored by the princes, poets and singers of those

days.”255

3.9.6 His Padams: Tone, Tune And Tamil

The book in which 36 padams (and one invocatory kirttanam on Siddhi Vinayakar, Ganesa) of Kavikunjara Bharati appear was published in 1927; the texts were edited by Pammal Vijaya Ranga Mudaliar, the father of the eminent Tamil dramatist Pammal Sambanda Mudaliar. To M. Arunacalam, this association in itself “speaks volumes for the respect the songs had among the poems of his day.”256 The book is clearly labeled as a collection of padams, like the book of Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar’s padams (to be considered next) and unlike U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar’s collection of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s compositions, which as we have seen mixes the terms kirttanam and padam rather freely and groups the composer’s songs by subject (deity or patron).

3.9.7 Geography and Repertoire

Only one padam of Kavikunjara Bharati, Inimel avarukkum (from now on) [A6], was in the repertoire of T. Balasaraswati or was known to T. Viswanathan. With other members of this family, the situation is the same: Kavikunjara Bharati’s padams are not as well-known as those of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar and 255Suddhananda 256M.

Bharati, 1980:7–8. Arunacalam, 1989:135.

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Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar. This could be for several reasons. For one, the fact that Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar and Ghanam Krishna Ayyar both lived and moved mostly either in Tanjavur district or in the area between there and Chennai to the north, while Kavikunjara Bharati lived further to the south and was patronized at Ramanathapuram and Sivaganga, could have meant that Kavikunjara Bharati’s padams were not as much a part of the repertoire of the dancers from Tanjavur district as they were of the dancers from the Ramanathapuram area. “We were an independent kingdom, you know.”

—Kasinath Dorai

I asked Sri Kasinath Dorai, great-grandson of Mutturamalinga Setupati II and himself an accomplished musician, if compositions of Tanjavur district composers (mentioning Ghanam Krishna Ayyar and Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar by name) were often performed at the Ramanathapuram court. He responded, “Not really. We were an independent kingdom, you know, and there were the compositions of Kavikunjara Bharati, Madura Kavi, and my own great grandfather.” The question of the geographical spread of musical compositions before the era of the automobile (although certainly well into the era of the railroads, as we are speaking now of the 19th and early 20th century) is, as are so many others, difficult to answer definitively. On the one hand, there are stories about how at the turn of this century musicians rarely heard music except from their own teacher, that is, of teachers not liking their students to have other influences besides those the teacher was trying to inculcate.257 Yet on the other, we have already presented documentation which suggests that a musician’s life in the 19th century was often quite an itinerant one (perhaps the major exception being Tyagaraja, who refused to sing in praise of any human and who evidently traveled very rarely outside a small radius around his own village). 257I

have heard such a story from T. Sankaran regarding Semmangudi Srinivasa Ayyar, in which he feared the wrath of his guru if he went ‘outside’ to listen to music.

Kavikunjara Bharati

The padams of Kavikunjara Bharati in the 1927 collection (as distinct from the songs in the Vaishnavite Aragar Kuravanji) are all on Murugan, though sung on him at different temples and using the different names Murugan is known by at these places. The greatest number of these padams are on Murugan at Kunrakkudi (also known as Mayuragiri, “peacock mountain”258) as the hero or nayaka. Kunrakkudi is a fitting spot for a Murugan sthala (place of worship), it is located atop a hill 23 miles northeast of Sivaganga, “two miles from the border of Poodoocottah [Pudukkottai-ed.] state.259 Though I have not found documentation to this effect, my guess is that the Kunrakkudi Murugan temple may have been a special place of worship of the Sivaganga ruling family. This would certainly go toward explaining that out of the 36 padams in the collection, at least nine are on Murugan (under one of several names) at Kunrakkudi.260 [A6] Inimel avarukkum (From now on) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

“From now on there can be nothing between you and I.”

The first two padams we will consider here, both included in the 1927 book, are composed on Murugan at Kunrakkudi. The first, Inimel avarukkum (from now on) [A6], calls the nayaka “cikanti malai kantacami,” Murugan (as Kanda Swami in this case) of “Sigandi mountain.” Evidence that “Sigandi mountain” is another name for Kunrakkudi is contained a padam published in the collection of Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar’s padams. There, in the anupallavi of one padam, Murugan is called ciganti malai murukaiyan (Murugan of Sigandi mountain) while in its third caranam the phrase kunrakkutiyir cerikkum vativelar 258Kamil

Zvelebil, 1991:42.

1893/1982:826. Entry as “Coonnacoody, pop. 2,021.” The Tamil terms

making up its name are kunram, hill, and kudi village. 260Of the 36 padams, 20 give no indication of a particular place, simply calling the nayaka “Velavan”, “Kumaraiyar” or another generic name for Murugan. With nine of the remaining 16 padams written on Murugan of Kunrakkudi, Kunrakkudi becomes by far the most-mentioned location in the collection. 259Maclean,

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(Murugan who thrives, grows, flourishes, and prospers in Kunrakkudi) appears.261

3.9.8 Two Padams and Two Legends at Kunrakkudi “Murugan at Kunrakkudi (Peacock Mountain)”

Perhaps the two most famous legends associated with Murugan revolve around (a) his conquest of Cur, often called the “mango demon”, and (b) his relationships with his two wives, Valli and Devayanai. Both stories are evoked in the two padams we will consider which Kavikunjara Bharati composed on Lord Murugan of Kunrakkudi. In Inimel avarukkum [A6], these are mentioned in the third caranam, while in Etu kanum [C1], we find mentions of the stories in anupallavi, first and third caranams. Let us briefly discuss these two legends in turn.

3.9.8.1 Cur, the “Mango Demon”

The concept of Cur (or Curan) in South India and its relationship to the Asuras of all-India mythology is a complex issue. Kamil Zvelebil writes of Cur, chief of the Asuras: “Murugan’s enmity towards the evil force termed Cur belongs to the oldest motifs of this god”… “This being, a personification of anxieties and terrors, was depicted in the earliest sources rather as an impersonal feeling, a bodiless destructive force crawling around in darkness... It was personified as Curan, and made one of the Asuras, then their chief.” ...“cur personified as a demoniac being of great power was ultimately destroyed by Murugan when it took shape of a monstrous mango tree in the sea...”262

Zvelebil further reports a “minimyth” associating the conflict between Murugan and Cur specifically with Kunrakkudi, the locus of Inimel avarukkum and Etu kanum: 261The

padam is Inimel avar enna tantalum, Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar, 1906, song #69. I am grateful to B.M. Sundaram for this reference. (Letter to the author, January 10, 1991.) 262K. Zvelebil, 1991:80,99,74 (these page references correspond to separately quoted passages within the paragraph).

Kavikunjara Bharati

“There is a group of minimyths connected with various places dealing with the vahanas (riding animals, vehicles) of Subrahmanya (Murugan). The one which is probably the most interesting is the myth of Kunrakkudi alias Mayuragiri (‘Peacock Hill’). The Asuras who waged war against Murugan had originally performed penance to become the god’s vehicles: Curan to become his peacock, Patuman to become his cock-banner, Cinkan to become the vahana of the Devi (i.e. the lion), Murugan’s mother, and Tarakan to be the vehicle of god Aiyanar (i.e. the elephant). The original Peacock (mayura, mayil) who somehow learned about this, wanted to spoil their penance; it asked Siva to change them into bhutas. This happened. The four demons, informed who spoiled their tapas, and thinking that the Peacock was helped by Brahma’s Swan and Vishnu’s Kite (who supposedly manifested thus the solidarity of the vahanas), sought revenge. They went to the Peacock and told him that the Swan and the Kite ridiculed him and substantially diminished his tanmanam, ‘self-respect’. At once, the Peacock attacked the Kite and the Swan; the two went to complain to its master Murugan. Therefore, Murugan cursed his Peacock changing him into a rock; but he also cursed the four (Curan, Patuman, Cinkan and Tarakan) to be born as Asuras (antigods). The Peacock—he was after all the god’s original vahana—begged Murugan to be gracious. Murugan waged his famous war against the Asuras, and after Surasamhara (destruction of Curan-Sura) he came to Kunrakkudi. There he lifted the curse so that one part of the hill became again the living peacock, but another part had to stay there forever under the name Mayuragiri (Mayilmalai). This (undoubtedly late) myth is told in the Mayuragiri Sthalapurana.” 263

The conflict between Murugan and Cur serves Kavikunjara Bharati in the two texts below as a foil to show both the bravery of Murugan, also, in Etu kanum, ironically to point out his duplicity. There, the nayaki chides the nayaka Murugan for pretending to be meek and agreeable when in fact everyone 263K.

Zvelebil, 1991:42–43 (parentheses in original).

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knows that he beheaded the vicious demon. We will see some of the same ironies drawn out of the rich story of Murugan and his two spouses.

3.9.8.2 Valli and Devayanai, Murugan’s southern and northern wives

The strands of the relationship between Murugan, Valli, and Devayanai are tremendously complex and could easily occupy a dissertation in themselves. I will restrict myself to a few remarks in order to give perspective on the song texts below. We see references in both Inimel avarukkum and Etu kanum to Murugan’s two wives, Valli and Devayanai. In the third caranams of both padams, the two wives are portrayed together; that is, Murugan embraces and loves Valli and Devayanai with equal affection and devotion, to both their satisfaction. “Murugan is the beheader of the arrogant demon Cur, he is the supporter of Kavikunjara’s Tamil, he is the great youthful hero who rides the peacock. He embraces his wives Valli and Devayanai, and rubbed love-perfume on my arm; even if this same Murugan comes to me with his overpowering fragrance of punuku cattam, even if at an auspicious time…, from now on there can be nothing between us (Inimel avarkum, third caranam).”

Valli and Devayanai are, however, quite different women, goddesses, and historical-mythological conglomerates. It is commonly stated knowledge in Tamil Nadu that Valli is Murugan’s Tamil or southern wife while Devayanai is his northern spouse. Valli is an “earthly” girl, while Devayanai is a “heavenly” girl.264 To Zvelebil, Valli represents kalavu, the original Tamil “free-love marriage”, while Devayanai represents karpu, chastity. Valli was evidently the first of Murugan’s two loves: “Narrinai 82.4-5 is the text in which Valli is mentioned for the first time. The context is erotic. The hero wants his

264Fred

Clothey, 1978:65, characterizing descriptions of Valli and Devayanai in the Paripadal, the fifth of the eight Sangam anthologies of classical Tamil poetry known as the Ettutokai.

Kavikunjara Bharati

sweetheart to elope with him following the example of Valli who accompanied Murugan in eloping with him sacrificing all her other ties. This shows beyond doubt that in the 1st–3rd Cent. A.D., at least the kernel of the Murugan—Valli myth must have been well known to the Tamils, a part of their legendary heritage. Later, Valli became the Kalavu manappiratti ‘the lady (wed to Murugan according to) the Kalavu (‘free love’) marriage’, and the embodiment and symbol of anbu, ‘love, affection.’ ... According to the texts, Murugan appears either alone, or accompanied by Valli. Textually speaking, Valli is the earlier of the two wives. Devasena (Teyvayanai, the Northern wife) appears much later, and sporadically... However, even in these texts, she has no name of her own; she is only identified by her attributes like ‘the chaste one.’ In fact, her name does not appear anywhere in the corpus of ancient Tamil literature.”265

In the first caranam of Etu kanum we see a reference to Murugan’s wooing of Valli in the millet field: “Inimel avarkkum, first caranam:

Saying “I could never leave you”, giving such assurances, you united with me, enjoying love-play. But then you went and told my elder sister the news, and made she and I quarrel. You fell in love with young Valli in the millet field, you conquer all the devotees in the world, as you did young Valli; didn’t you think I knew about all your tricks? Your talk of love comes only from the tip of your tongue and no deeper; bravo for you! please go!”

As an infant, Valli was adopted by a hunter in the hills, and as a girl, she tends her father’s millet fields; she is a daughter of the mountains. Kurinci, the mountainous region among the five ancient Tamil landscapes, is also Murugan’s beloved region. Showing us what kind of “tricks” Murugan resorts to in order to win his devotees (as we will see, this is part of the Nayaki’s plaint in Etu kanum) Fred Clothey recounts Murugan’s courtship of the young Valli: 265K.

Zvelebil, 1991:81 (parentheses in original).

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“[S]he was found as a baby under a creeper by a hunter chieftain known as Nambarajan, purportedly at a place known as Vallilmalai near Chittoor in Tamil country. She was brought up by the hunter, and like all daughters of hunters spent most of her adolescent hours protecting the millet fields from birds. Told by a wandering fortune-teller that she would be married to Murukan, she longed for him, determing to love no other. Meanwhile, Murukan... was informed of the beauty of Valli, the daughter of the hunter chief. When he went to see her for himself, Murukan was immediately struck by her innocent beauty and charm. He appeared before Valli as a handsome young hunter and sought to win her through amorous advances. She resisted. Hearing the girl’s father and brothers returning to the field, he became a venkai tree, hoping thereby to remain near the girl without being detected. Noticing the tree, the men decided to cut it down, only to have Murukan, at the next opportunity, become an old ascetic. As an ascetic, Murukan received the hunter’s permission to have Valli remain with him as his handmaiden. However, even as an ascetic, Murukan could not resist making amorous suggestions to the girl. She became suspicious and remained at a distance. Then Murukan remembered he had neglected to ask the aid of his brother Ganapati in this enterprise, and realized it was for that reason the obstacles had not been removed. At Murukan’s request, then, Ganapati appeared as an elephant and frightened Valli nearly out of her wits. In desperate need of protection, Valli ran to the old ascetic, embraced him, and at his insistence, agreed to marry him. Then Murukan revealed his true self to her and married her clandestinely. When Valli’s family found the young lovers they insisted on an orthodox wedding. This was duly held in Nambirajan’s hut.” 266

In the padam Inimel avarukkum (From now on), several proverbs are used by the upset nayaki: 266F.

Inimel avarukkum, second caranam:

Clothey, 1978:83–84.

Kavikunjara Bharati

“Tell me! Once the cow is milked, can its milk return to the udder to spring forth again? You are like someone who is given a fortune but is still not satisfied; where one is enough, you try to put a thousand into my hand!”

[C1] Etu kanum (Hey look!) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

Turning to Etu kanum, in the anupallavi we see the nayaki accosting Murugan for posing as a sannyasin, a renunciate, reminiscent of how Murugan posed as an ascetic in the millet field in one of his attempts to win Valli. Etu kanum, anupallavi: “Just like a sannyasi, you come and give me advice. Hey, what is this? In war you killed the mango demon Cur. Oh lord Kumara, bravo for you—a great warrior posing like a harmless pacifist—Hah! Your clever tricks won’t work here.”

The song Etu kanum (Hey look!) [C1] is not as well known today as Inimel avarukkum. The recording documented in the Performance History (see Appendix) is of Smt. K.R. Madhavi Rajagopalan of Bangalore, who learned Etu kanum from Prof. R. Srinivasan of Travancore University. Smt. Nirmala Sundararajan of Chennai told me that she had learned Etu kanum from Smt. Syamala Balakrishnan, who herself had learned it from Ariyakkudi Ramanuja Ayyangar. Smt. Balakrishnan’s mother is also the sister-in-law of Namakkal Sesha Ayyangar, who is known to have had many padams in his repertoire. I have found no documentation of the song being recorded on 78 RPM, or danced. In the text, the suggestion that Valli could be the other woman (possibly implied by Caranam #1) led one reader of this text to think that the speaker-cum-sakhi must be Devayanai, Murugan’s northern or Aryan wife. As with the previous song, we find the composer also likes to use proverbs to have the speaker illustrate her point.

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3.9.9 The Kuravanji Dance Drama We now return to the Aragar Kuravanji, mentioned earlier, to consider one of the songs from that dance drama. The Kuravanji form has a standard plot, in which the nayaki, seeing the nayaka (in this case Vishnu) coming in procession, falls in love with him. In his précis from the introduction to the 1963 publication of this Vaishnavite work, P. Sambamoorthy describes the progression of the story, revealing many appropriate themes or moments in which a padam might take place. One difference between individual padams as performed in a dance concert and as found in a kuravanji, is that in the kuravanji each song is part of an ongoing story, while each padam in the Bharata Natyam recital is a stand-alone piece. After invocatory songs in praise of Vighnesvara (Ganesa), Murugan, and Saraswati, the nayaka is introduced: “A picturesque description of Malaragar surrounded by devotees performing various services is given in a song in Saranga raga. The heroine Mohanavalli appears on the scene and she is engaged in sports with her maids. How she was playing the ball is described in a captivating song in Khamas raga. A Kummi teeming with rhetorical beauties is next rendered. Malaragar comes in procession. The heroine sees him and falls in love with him. The well-known song Ivan Yaro in Kambhoji raga is sung by her on that occasion.” 267

[A7] Ivan yaro (Who is he?) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

In the third caranam of Ivan yaro, Kavikunjara Bharati evocatively portrays the scene where the lord (Vishnu in this case) is carried in procession in the streets surrounding the temple; the scene is in many ways similar to Muttuttandavar’s padam Teruvil varano (Won’t he come down my street?) [A13] where the nayika is waiting and hoping to see the lord (Nataraja in that case) come in procession down the street where she waits along with other devotees: 267P.

Sambamoorthy in Kavikunjara Bharati, 1963:v. The kummi is a popular folk song genre.

Kavikunjara Bharati

“His head is brightly shining; his gold earring is shining. Precious small bells shake on the jewelled girdle around his waist. He is wearing gold cloth, he has a large Vaishnava mark on his head just like the beautiful lord of desire, he is giving darsan and blessings—could it be the lord himself? (Ivan yaro, third caranam).”

Sambamoorthy notes that this particular song offers a wide scope for abhinaya. Here, in the course of the progress of kuravanji, we see several tableaux that are very fitting for portrayal in padams: “Mohanavalli sends a maid to go to Him and communicate her desires. The delay in the arival of the hero makes her feel sad. In her love-distress she rebukes the moon and the Cupid (sic). She addresses the sea in a song in Senjurutti raga... The sakhi asks the heroine to be patient and not become restless.

“The gypsy woman appears on the scene. The songs sung by her narrating the glory of her tribe, their time-honoured occupations, the picturesque nature of their mountanous abode, and her skill in foretelling one’s future afford delightful reading. She waxes eloquent on her capacity to do things impossible on their very face, like twisting the sand into a rope and drawing strands from out of stone. The kuratti is requested to read the palm of the hand of the heroine. After offering her customary prayers to the Hill Deities, the Kuratti starts on her work and finally predicts that the heroine’s desire will be fulfilled. The happy union takes place. The play concludes with a Mangalam.” 268

Another section, another whole story in itself, often occurs in kuravanji dance dramas; in this section, after the nayaka and nayaki are happily united, they are no more to be heard from and the husband of the kuratti (gypsy woman) comes in search of her. These two become the main protagonists in this second 268P.

Sambamoorthy in Kavikunjara Bharati, 1963:v-vi.

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half of the kuravanji form, given over to a pastoral rhapsody concerning their relationship and their mountain home, its flora and fauna, beauties, and natural wonders.

3.10 Composer: Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar

This particular biography will be rather brief, for two reasons. One, we have already spoken quite a bit about the 19th century in the course of treating the life and work of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar and Kavikunjara Bharati, therefore, much of the basic groundwork by which to understand composers of this era has already been laid out; two, there is simply next to nothing publicly known about Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar, so little that at times one might wonder if there was such a man at all. And this is despite the fact that he appears to have been alive the most recently (with the possible exception of Kavikunjara Bharati who died in 1896) of all the Tamil padam composers covered by this study. Why this almost total lack of information? One reason could be that Subbarama Ayyar appears to have not been regularly patronized by anyone court or monastery; a second reason is that he seems not to have had a regular guru–sisya (master–pupil) relationship which would ideally produce disciples to carry on his tradition; and a third is that no descendants have come forward with information, as U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar and N. Kotisvara Ayyar have done for their respective forebears Ghanam Krishna Ayyar and Kavikunjara Bharati. Smt. K.R. Madhavi, the scholar who has written most extensively on the Tamil padam composers, said in her 1960 M.Litt. thesis for the University of Madras: “The history of this remarkable man is involved in considerable obscurity. Only scanty information is available... We may guess that Subbarama Ayyar may have belonged to the 19th century since most of the Tamil padas have sprung up at a very later period [relative to Telugu padam

Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar

composers such as Ksetrayya, 17th century-ed.]. We cannot make it more precise and say in which quarter of it he flourished.” 269

Let us report what we can about this “remarkable” man and eminent composer of Tamil padams. The earliest written reference to the composer appears to be (as with so many other of the composers we have considered) the Sangita Sampradaya Pradarsini of 1904 by Subbarama Dikshitar, who says that Subbarama Ayyar’s padams written on Murugan “with Muttukkumara mudra [signature] are even still now well-known, sung and studied” (muttukkumara muttiraiyotu ivar ceytu patankalai ipporutum prasittamaka patappattu varukinrana).270 Abraham Panditar in 1917 wrote that Subbarama Ayyar had lived “about 50 years ago,”271 which leads me to say “flourished ca. 1867” in the title above. Beyond this, the literature until now has been mute; no stories of his life, no anecdotes of troubles or catalytic experiences, nothing.

3.10.1 Sources

Subbarama Ayyar seems to exist only in two places. One is in his music, which is very well known among traditional music and dance families of South India in this century. Subbarama Ayyar’s and Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s padams are by far the mainstays of the Tamil padam repertoire in the family of Vina Dhanammal, and they were also well known in the family of Kancipuram Dhanakoti Ammal and her nephew Kancipuram Nayana Pillai.272

3.10.2 “The Book”

The other place the composer lives is in a book of texts of Tamil padams gathered under the title of “Subbarama Ayyar’s padams 269K.R.

Madhavi, 1960:158.

Dikshitar in A. Sundaram lyer, 1988: 111. Also, the Piracittam above,

“publicity; promulgation; fame, celebrity; state of being well known.”—Lexicon. 271“Subbaramayyar of Vydeesvarankovil. A Vidwan in Tamil and music. He has composed many padams, which end with the name of Muttukkumara. He lived about 50 years ago.” A. Panditar, 1917/1984:179. 272T. Sankaran, 1984b:31–32. 270Subbarama

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on the name of Muttukkumaraswami” (Cuppurama aiyaravarkal iyarriya muttukkumara cuvamiperil patam).273 This small book was published in at least three editions, two of which are clearly dated 1906 and 1910, and the third of which uses the cyclical 60-year Tamil system of dating, and was therefore either published in 1875 or 1935.274 The title page on the three editions of this book varies somewhat in its content. As with many books of that day, the title page is a veritable encyclopedia of information itself275; the title page of the 1875/1935 edition is reproduced with translation here (see Plate 3.1).

273In

Plate 3.1 Title page of Subbarama Ayyar 1875 (or 1935).

the Bibliography see Subbarama Ayyar, Vaidisvarankoil. 1875/1935, 1906, 1910. 274I received Xerox copies of the 1875/1935 edition, courtesy of Smt. M.K. Saroja. 275See B.S. Kesavan, 1985, on the early history of printing in Tamil Nadu.

Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar

Regarding the origin and dating of the composer, the title page of 1910 says nothing, but the title pages of both 1875/1935 and 1906 contain as a prefix to the composer’s name the words “resident in Bikshandarkoil in the Chola country” (ponni nattaic carnta piksantarkoyilil irukkum).276 The verb irukkum, “being,” implies a present or future situation of being; the title page then would lead us to believe that the composer was living in Bikshandarkoil (a town in the vicinity of Trichy) at the time of publication, that is, sometime between 1875 and 1906. 277 The word Vaidisvarankoil does not appear on any of the three title pages; it is however contained in many of the songs themselves, or rather, another name of the place, Velur, is contained in the songs, as the home of the Lord Murugan as Muttukkumaraswami. One of the padams discussed below, Nan anke varuveno (Should I go to him?) [A11] is a good example of the reference to the nayaka coming in the anupallavi section. Nan ange varuveno, anupallavi:

“All the celestial beings come and bow before Muttukkumara, the dweller of Velur. I fell in love with him; I cannot bear it any more, gazelle, adi, my honey.”

Following this line of thought, the composer Subbarama Ayyar may have composed his collection of padams on Muttukkumaraswami of Vaidisvarankoil while residing at Bikshandarkoil, or perhaps before moving to Bikshandarkoil, sometime in the last quarter of the 19th century. Information given to me by Sri B.M. Sundaram (musicologist, composer, and producer for All India Radio) who lives in Pondicherry suggests, however, a movement in the other direction. When I told Sri Sundaram that my inquiries in Chennai and Vaidisvarankoil itself had been fruitless in unearthing any substantial or even circumstantial information on the composer besides what I have presented above, he gave me a synopsis of a 276Ponni

natu, Chola country; carnta, associated with, united with, near to, joined.— Tamil Lexicon. 277My line of thought here (following M. Arunacalam’s exposition of the history of the publishing of Muttuttandavar’s songs, discussed earlier) is that the first edition of the book to be published stated this, and subsequent editions

simply retained the original text, reprinting as found.

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paper he had presented on Subbarama Ayyar, based on interviews he had conducted “with the composer’s descendants” in Bikshandarkoil. “Vaideesvarankovil Subbarama lyer. His father was Ponnuswami lyer alias Ponnayyar. Subbarama lyer was born at Bikshandarkoil, near Tiruchirapalli. His year of birth was 1829. Subbarama Ayyar studied Tamil and Sanskrit and also music from Bikshandarkoil Subbarayar, an asthana vidwan of Mysore. He was compelled to marry (a girl from Tiruchirapalli), though he was not at all interested in leading a family life and always in pursuit of spiritual attainment. One day, he left home, without the knowledge of anyone and proceeded to various places, till at last, he settled down in Vaideesvarankovil, near Mayiladuturai. The temple there had plenty of Devadasis in service. On witnessing a dance for a Pada by one of the Devadasis, he turned his attention to compose Padas. He but lived a saint’s life! We are not in a position to enumerate all the Padas composed by him, since many are either lost or have not come to light.” 278

3.10.3 Subbarama Ayyar’s Possible Guru Bikshandarkoil Subbarayar (or Subba Rao) mentioned here as possibly the teacher of Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar was a well-known vocalist of the 19th century, at one time serving as a court musician at the Mysore Palace. N. Rajagopalan reports that Maha Vaidyanatha Ayyar was enraptured by his rendition of the Sahana raga kriti Giripai, and that “Subbarayar used to send his tambura to the hall 15 minutes in advance to be kept on the tune ‘to create the musical atmosphere’.”279 A 1930 article by G.V. Narayanaswamy Aiyar (the father of the famous singer of the mid-20th century, G.N. Balasubramaniam) also remembers Bikshandarkoil Subbarayar to be a legendary performer: “The learners of the art that succeeded Tyagaraja and his contemporaries, had excellent material to feed upon.

278B.M. 279N.

Sundaram, letter to the author, January 10, 1991 (parentheses in original). Rajagopalan, 1990:325.

Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar

Tyagaraja taught his Kirtanams to a host of pupils, by whom the torch of musical learning was carried, to the several parts of South India. The most important of them were Manambuchavadi Venkatasubbier... and Nangavaram Nilakanta Aiyar, who was a very capable teacher of music and produced two gems of musicians. One of them was Bhikshandar Kovil Subbarayar, who, possessing a singularly wonderful and melodious voice, bewitched his audience with his exquisite music, ‘their only fear being that he should make an end’.” 280

3.10.4 Subbarama Ayyar’s Possible Patrons

In addition to the information from Sri Sundaram, in Chennai, I was given information about possible patrons of Subbarama Ayyar by Sri T.S. Parthasarathy, musicologist and then-Secretary of the Music Academy of Madras. Sri Parthasarathy reported that he was told by a member of the Vatima Brahmin community some years ago that Subbarama Ayyar had been patronized by Vatimas living in one of the villages nearby Vaidisvarankoil, but not in Vaidisvarankoil town itself. The person who gave Sri Parthasarathy this information is now gone and he was not able to pursue the thread further, but the Vatima community is known to have patronized Gopalakrishna Bharati, the famous 19th-century composer of Tamil devotional music, in that same geographic area.281 As mentioned above, my inquiries in Chennai, Vaidisvarankoil and Cidambaram (among musicians and dancers hailing from Vaidisvarankoil) did not produce any additional information. 280Narayanaswamy

Aiyar, G.V., 1930:246–247. Also see T. Lakshmana Pillai’s account of yet another duel of musical titans, this time between Coimbatore Raghava Ayyar and Bikshandarkoil Subbarayar, who “is said to have quietly got out and soon made his exit from the town [Coimbatore], never to return as long as Raghava Ayyar was there.” T. Lakshmana Pillai in JMAM, 1:4:242, October 1930. 281The two villages (kiramam) mentioned are Mutikontan and Anatantavapuram (or Anantatantavapuram). U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987:98 (I am grateful to T.S. Parthasarathy for this reference).

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3.10.5 Velur: The Place of Subbarama Ayyar’s Padams Vaidisvarankoil (known also as Velur) is a small town in the northeastern part of Tanjavur district, near the Kollitam (Coleroon) river, 4 miles southwest of Sirgari and 11 miles northeast of Mayavaram (the same Mayiladuturai mentioned by B.M. Sundaram above; these towns are all on the main transportation route between Cidambaram and Tanjavur).282 The name Velur (the ur, place) of Vel (Murugan’s spear) is perhaps associated with Murugan himself.283 Kamil Zvelebil discusses the etymology of the term Vel in the course of describing possible relationships between Murugan and Kama, the “god of lust and love” whose flower-arrows we see shooting across the whole Tamil padam landscape: “According to some opinions, the reason why the god of lust and love Kama is not found in the earliest love-poetry of the Tamils is the fact that the function of the love-god was fully performed by Murugan whose other name was Vel, i.e. ‘(the one who kindles) desire.’ This interpretation of his name may be correct: Cevvel would have to be interpreted ‘The Red (one who kindles) Desire’, and compared to Karuvel which is another name for Kama. On the other hand, the name Vel could also be connected with the term for ‘sacrifice’ and/or with the root found in the name of the Velir aristocratic community, and in that case, Cevvel would rather be interpreted as ‘The Perfect Vel’ or ‘the perfect sacrifice’, and Netuvel ‘The Great Vel’ i.e. the great chieftain, the great lord.”284

282“Veitheeshwarancoil,

from vaidya, physician, and ishvara lord, and kovil temple. Sanskrit name Vaidyanathapura, meaning Shiva, the lord of physicians, and puram, town. Place of pilgrimage. From Shiyally southwest 4 miles, from Mayavaram northeastern 11 miles. From the sea west 10 miles. Old and large Shiva temple with inscriptions and two copper-plate grants.” Maclean, 1893/1982:827. 283Here we must be careful to distinguish Vel, “lance” or “spear,” Murugan’s most famous prop, from Vel (taking the retroflex “l”); these are two separate words with distinct sets of meanings.

284Kamil Zvelebil, 1991:82 (parentheses in original).

Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar

Velur, then, the term we see used by Subbarama Ayyar to denote Vaidisvarankoil in the anupallavi section of many of his padams, adds resonances of perhaps both the erotic (in that it evokes Kama) and the majestic (as it evokes a great sacrifice or chieftain) to the epithet for Murugan, Velur Muttukkumara. The main shrine in the Siva temple in Vaidisvarankoil is a lingam of Vaidyanathan (Tamil Vaittiyanatacuvami), the lord Siva as a physician or healer; the temple is a place of pilgrimage for Hindus, including those who come with ailments they wish to be cured. The Devi (the goddess, wife of Siva) there is named Sri Taiyal Nayaki. In the temple, there also is an important shrine for Lord Murugan as Sri Celva Muttukkumaraswami.285 It was at this shrine that (as told by B.M. Sundaram above) Subbarama Ayyar witnessed a performance of a padam by one of the devadasis in service there, and began composing padams himself.

3.10.6 Authorship

The three editions of the book containing the padams of Subbarama Ayyar mentioned above contain almost identical contents. Each has the same 77 padams listed in the same order, except 1875/1935, which omits the last two songs, Atarkkulle and Ettai kandu ni.286 Misspellings in the earliest edition are corrected in later editions, and new misspellings are introduced in the later versions. There are two measuring sticks that scholars and musicians have used to determine whether a padam is composed by Subbarama Ayyar. One is whether the padam is on Muttukkumara as the nayaka, that is, the name Muttukkumara (usually in conjunction with the place name Velur) is found in the anupallavi. The second criterion is whether the composer’s mudra (signature) Subbaraman is found, in the final (almost always the third) 285Celvam,

“wealth, riches; immensity, prosperity, flourishing state; enjoyment, pleasure; Indra’s heaven. Tamil Lexicon. “Muttu” we have already glossed as a

term of endearment, in the discussion of Muttuttandavar; Kumaran or Kumarar

is a word for the youthful Murugan as a son, boy. Altogether this might read,

then, as lord Murugan the “flourishing pearl-like beloved boy”, son of Siva. 286See discussion of Peyandi [El] for further mention of Ettai kandu ni.

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caranam. Nan anke varuveno (Should I go to him?) [A11] would qualify as a textbook Subbarama Ayyar padam by these yardsticks. The 77 song texts in the book reveal, however, that by no means do all the songs in the book meet even one of these criteria. It is quite a diverse collection of texts from the point of view of nayaka. In addition to 24 padams which do name Muttukkumara of Velur as the nayaka,287 other padams are mostly on Murugan at one or another temple, using his different names. Also, padams to Siva, Vishnu, human patrons, and other songs are found.288 Figure 3.4 shows the distribution of songs in this collection.

Figure 3.4 Nayakas of Subbarama Ayyar padams.

This diversity of nayakas is one of the factors which has led some musicians and scholars to question whether all the padams of the collection are indeed the compositions of Subbarama Ayyar (or in an extreme case scenario, whether Subbarama Ayyar was 287In

this group of 24, 20 have both Muttukkumara and Velur; I have also included 4 songs, which have the name Muttukkumara but not the place name Velur. 288In temples that have shrines to both Siva and Murugan, it is not made explicit in some padams just which deity at that location is the nayaka of a particular song. In the case of Subbarama Ayyar’s compositions, two locations at which there may be such ambiguity are Mylapore (the Kapalisvarar temple in Chennai) and Tirukkarukkunran.

Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar

a historical personage at all). Some of the most famous padams attributed to Subbarama Ayyar mention neither Muttukkumara or Velur, nor is the Subbaraman mudra found in the available caranams.289 Another factor leading to doubts about the book as an authoritative collection of Subbarama Ayyar compositions and no one else’s, is that seven of the songs in the book we are discussing are also to be found in the 1927 edition of the padams of Kavikunjara Bharati, Madura Kavi Bharati, and Srirama Kavi,290 their texts close to identical, sometimes the only difference being a substitution of mudra in the final caranam. Here are a couple of examples: first, for the song Kanavan vantu acaikkiran, Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar (VSA) #53 gives canmuka vela in the anupallavi (“six-faced spear-holder”, a common name of Murugan), while Kavikunjara Bharati (KKB) #19 gives at this point kunrai velane (“spear-holder of Kunraikkudi,” the location on which Kavikunjara Bharati composed so many of his padams). And in the third caranam of Kanavan vantu araikkiran, the final line of VSA #53 contains the mudra pattan cupparaman (the bhakta, devotee, Subbaraman) while KKB #19 has chopped this line off, i.e., the third caranam in the Kavikunjara Bharati text has one less line than VSA #53. Apart from these differences, the two texts are virtually identical. In a second example, the last line of the third caranam of the song Varunta varunta in VSA #21 reads Sricupparamanukku tavum tayalane while as Srirama Kavi #3 it reads Sriraman collukku arul murukecane. Again, the rest of the two texts are virtually identical. As we can see, a slight rewriting of one line of text is all that is necessary to change the text components which scholars use to identify authorship. 289One

problem in this regard is that almost never are three caranams performed. A dancer or musician performs only one caranam, usually the first caranam (from the point of view of the published text). Since the composer’s mudra usually comes in the final, third, caranam, the mudras for some songs may have been lost in the course of oral transmission this way. 290Subbarama Ayyar (henceforth “VSA”) song #13, avalitatinil is also Srirama Kavi #6; VSA song #14, cirukkimayakkam is also Srirama Kavi #5; VSA song #20, mane enke pona is also Kavikunjara Bhärati #30; VSA song #21, varunta varunta is also Srirama Kavi #3; VSA song #40, varuvatanal is also Kavikunjara Bharati #34; VSA song #52, yarukkakilum payama is also Madura Kavi #4; VSA song #54, kanavan vantu acaikkiran is also Kavikunjara Bharati #19.

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A different example of text-borrowing (in one direction or the other) to be found in the collection of Subbarama Ayyar’s padams is in song #6, Tane varukiraro. The 1st, 2nd, and 4th lines of the third caranam are also contained in the published edition of the songs of Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar.291 (I am not inclined to regard such occurrences as acts of plagiarism, rather as the use of a commonly available stock of phrases by several composers (See discussion of varnamettu in Chapter 5; also see Allen, 1998). “He is said to have gone beyond the limits in dealing with sex love”

—Ms. Madhavi Rajagopalan

As we have seen on practically every page of this study so far, the nexus between devotion and eroticism (translating the terms bhakti and sringara, respectively) is deeply embedded in South Indian history. There is no denying that some of the texts included in the collection of Subbarama Ayyar padams would sell quite well (in the translation of course) at adult book stores in any country of the world. The erudite scholar P. Sambamoorthy found one of the padams contained in this study, Kaiyil panam illamal (Without money in hand) [C2] detestable to read and sing; Kaiyil panam is by no means the most explicit in its use of the language of the songs in the collection.292 K.R. Madhavi states somewhat more cautiously regarding Subbarama Ayyar, “It is inferred that he must have chosen the path of sringara as the means for expressing his bhakti. He is said to have gone beyond the limits in dealing with sex love.”293 More such encomiums could be cited. 291The

third line contains the Subbaraman mudra. Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar, song #35, p. 31. I am grateful to Sri S.V. Seshadri of Chennai for bringing this to my attention. 292“As mentioned... all dignified padas admit of a dual meaning... There are pachchai [literally “green”] sringara padas of base love and commercialised love. From their very nature these are detestable to read and sing. One really wonders why some responsible composers should have descended to such a low level and prostituted their gifts in composing such compositions. As an example may be mentioned the Tamil pada ‘Kaiyil panam illamal’.” P. Sambamoorthy, 1964:207–208. 293K.R. Madhavi, 1960:160.

Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar

It is certainly possible that the diversity of texts contained in the publication, it may not be fair to attribute the clearly pornographic texts among them to Subbarama Ayyar. Put another way, given the doubts on authorship which have been aired above, it may not be accurate to assume that all the songs published together in the book were the work of the same composer. It could also be pointed out that the more explicit songs contained in the Subbarama Ayyar book are not among those commonly performed in dance (see the interestingly rather extensive 78 RPM recording history of Kaiyil panam [C2] below). I do not think those of Subbarama Ayyar’s padams which have been popular in dance performance would be judged more objectionable by a reasonable observer than, for example, texts of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar such as Paccilam temal [B2] which we have seen. On the other hand, taking a stand in defense of the composer’s alleged righteousness by seeking to separate the contents of the book into two (or more) groups of compositions, some of which are to be considered Subbarama Ayyar compositions and some not, is perhaps a misguided enterprise. Perhaps in such a collection as the book of Subbarama Ayyar padams we see the fuller spectrum of the Tamil padam oeuvre, than we have seen in examining the work of other composers. Perhaps, as one scholar suggested to me there may have been extremely erotic and/or explicit (these being two distinct things) compositions by Muttuttandavar or other earlier composers, which were edited out of existence by the time the first collections were published. Perhaps, finally, the study group of thirty padam texts in this dissertation is significant in that they have a documented living performance history, a ground upon which a debate of reform and revival has been argued in South India in the 20th century. Participants in the discourse over what constitutes respectable, chaste or high-flown (some of the English language terms used often by Indian scholars) language for a padam has had to grapple with (or avoid) the issue of the relationship between bhakti and sringara, the devotional and the erotic in Indian history. Artists and artistic reformers or revivalists edited or deleted certain padams from the living repertoire, while adding new (or reviving dormant) compositions, stretching the bounds of the genre in the process.

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[A3] Enke iruntalum, “Wherever he may be” For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

On Siva as Tyagaraja of Tiruvarur

The first two songs attributed to Subbarama Ayyar considered here are perhaps not at all known today outside the family of Vina Dhanammal or students of this family. Enke iruntalum (Wherever he may be) [A3] is one of Subbarama Ayyar’s padams not written on Murugan, but instead on Siva as Tyagaraja at Tiruvarur, the same nayaka we have seen addressed by Papavinasa Mudaliar in Mukattai katti [D3]. The only dance performances I found documented of Enke iruntalum are by T. Balasaraswati, between 1957 and 1966.294 Salem Godavari is known to have recorded Enke iruntalum on 78 RPM sometime before 1930, but I was not able to locate a copy of this recording. T. Viswanathan said that he and his sister learned the song from Smt. Kuppammal, a neighbor in Aravamudu Naidu Garden Street, Chennai.295 [A9] Mane mayile (‘O my gazelle!) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

In Mane mayile (“O my gazelle!) [A9], we see another example of a Subbarama Ayyar padam not composed on Muttukkumara of Vaidisvarankoil. Several readers of this padam have found the anupallavi section less than forthcoming as to who the nayaka is. While Dennis Hudson concludes that it is clearly Siva at Cidambaram, both T. Sankaran and S.V. Seshadri said that if they had not known in advance that it was a Subbarama Ayyar padam (i.e., it is included in the book of his padams), they would think the anupallavi signified nara stuti, praise of mortals.296 294The

song is listed in the 1955 Music Academy program as Sudukkarakkalli, a line from one of its caranams. 295They also learned the Saveri raga Tamil padam Unnai tutu anuppinen from Smt. Kuppammal. T. Viswanathan recalls that this would have been in the late 1930s. 296For T. Sankaran and S. V. Seshadri, personal communication, Chennai, 1990. For Dennis Hudson, letter to the author, March 19, 1992. My translation follows Dennis Hudson’s interpretation regarding the anupallavi.

Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar

Mane mayile, anupallavi:

“O honey, come and search for the moon297 who is the lord of wealth for the gods, the lord of Sri, and the shining lord of the assembly.”

Mane mayile (like Enke iruntalum considered above) is an extremely rarely performed padam. The only documented dance performances I know of were by T. Balasaraswati, in 1950 and 1952. The song also does not appear to have been recorded on 78 RPM. T. Viswanathan and T. Sankaran both said that it came into their family repertoire through Vina Dhanammal’s younger sister Rupavati Ammal, who lived in Hyderabad for many years, was an avid collector of rare songs, and had a huge repertoire. [A11] Nan anke varuveno (Should I go to him?) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

3.10.7 On Murugan as Muttukkumaraswami of Velur Nan anke varuveno (Should I go to him?) [A11] is another padam not well known in the present day. T. Sankaran writes that it was in the repertoire of Dhanakoti Ammal of Kancipuram, and also told me that it had been sung in the cinema in Khamas ragam.298 I found no documentation either of dance performances nor 78 RPM recordings of the song. The recording documented with this study is by Smt. Kalanidhi Narayanan of Chennai, a dancer and teacher who has collected many rare padams. This song is a textbook Subbarama Ayyar padam, that is, the nayaka is clearly identified as Muttukkumaraswami who lives in Velur, and the composer’s mudra (signature) Subbaraman occurs at the end of the final caranam: 297“Candran

[the moon] no doubt refers to Siva at Cidambaram.” Dennis Hudson, letter to the author, March 19, 1992. See Appendix for full translation and commentary. 298For reference to this padam and Kancipuram Dhanakoti Ammal, see T. Sankaran 1984b:31–32. Reference to its appearing in a movie is T. Sankaran, personal communication, 1990. Sankaran did not remember the name of the movie.

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Nan ange varuveno, third caranam:

“As a true devotee, Subbaraman’s song is blessed by Velavar; When you find that Murugan, please ask, Should I come to him or will he come to me?”

3.10.8 On Murugan as Kumaresar of Parani The two 78 RPM recordings in this study of Kaiyil panam illamal (Without money in hand) [C2], the song Professor Sambamoorthy found detestable, are both of Brahmin male singers, and are of some antiquity. Miss A. Sundaram (of Madurai) is also known to have recorded Kaiyil panam illamal sometime before 1931, but that recording was unavailable to me. In a fourth reference to the song, T. Sankaran also found Kaiyil panam illamal in a notebook of Smt. P. Ranganayaki of Tiruttani, formerly a devadasi attached to the Tiruttani Murugan temple. Smt. Ranganayaki has worked closely with the Dutch dancer and scholar Saskia Kersenboom-Story, and was also a regular broadcaster on All India Radio for some time, according to Sankaran.299 [C2] Kaiyil panam illamal (Without money in hand) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix. Kaiyil panam illamal, Pallavi section:

“Without money in hand did you come here to make love with me? If you’re asking for a loan, if you’re saying ‘I’ll pay later’, Please stand up and go, Lord.”

Kaiyil panam illamal is a good example of a padam which has apparently been set to several ragas (at least four) during the 19th–20th century. Of the two recordings I have, one is in Bhairavi ragam, the other in Todi. Then, Kaiyil panam illamal as found in the book of Subbarama Ayyar’s padams (song #41) is said to be set in Saranga raga, and finally, Miss A. Sundaram’s 78 RPM recording was said to be in Sahana raga. 299Smt.

Ranganayaki’s life and work are described in Kersenboom-Story, 1987.

Gopalakrishna Bharati

Murugan as Parani Andavar, the lord of Parani, is a celibate, a renunciate. But here in this padam, we see Murugan in a different light, hanging around the nayaki and trying to have her favors for free: Kaiyil panam illamal, first caranam:

“Even if a man is very beautiful, would one go to a secluded

place with him? For a courtesan, besides money is there

any attraction at all in having sex? Your trip here has been

for nothing. The elder woman of the house will curse you.”

Kaiyil panam illamal, second caranam:

“Singing a song tra la la, you just came here to give me a

namam with false smiles and sweet talk, Trying to allure

me, you came. You are fooling around with my mind/heart.

Even if someone does a simple ariya kuttu (folk dance) for

their living,

Will they forget the business end of it?”

But is this entirely out of synch with the description of Murugan trying to win Valli, as told by Fred Clothey in the section on Kavikunjara Bharati’s padams above? There we saw that Murugan could not resist making advances to the beautiful young Valli, even when posing as an elderly ascetic. Kaiyil panam illamal is perhaps in the vein of “teasing songs” which T. Sankaran told me his grandmother Vina Dhanammal used to teach occasionally to her young grandchildren.300

3.11 Composer: Gopalakrishna Bharati

Gopalakrishna Bharati, the “Father of the Tamil music renaissance”301 was a famous 19th-century composer whose songs are still today widely known and performed. Partly because 300Sankaran

said that another padam contained in the Subbarama Ayyar book, Yar enru miratturir, was taught by his grandmother to his cousin Vijaykrishnan “to tease him.” Personal communication, Chennai, 1990. I have heard no one suggest that such songs were danced in recent memory. Also reference the Telugu padam Intaku Galigite, in Jon Higgins, 1992. 301N. Rajagopalan, 1990.

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he is already so well known, and partly because the great majority of his compositions are at the periphere of the Tamil padam genre, quite distinct textually from the main body of sringara padams, I am not giving a detailed treaünent of either his life or work. I will briefly present here, however, two of his compositions to help us further develop our picture of the parameters of the padam genre. [E 1] Peyandi tanaikkandu (Such a Crazy Man) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.302

The first composition, Peyandi tanaikkandu (Such a crazy man) [E1] is a song in the ninda stuti tradition. Unlike the 18th-century ninda stuti compositions of Marimutta Pillai and Papavinasa Mudaliar which we have seen, here there is sringara, a definite love interest, implied. Not only is God (in this case Siva, although not specifically Nataraja, as a raised leg is not a basic premise of this song) held up to affectionate ridicule by the sakhi (probably the mother or an older female friend) who is the speaker, but so is the nayaki, who has fallen for this strange nayaka with his unsavory habits beyond the bounds of normal social decorum: Peyandi tanaik kandu, anupallavi: “He lives in the burning ground, doing his black magic, -adi; he disputes, bets, wrangles with the ferocious goddess Kali.” Peyandi tanaik kandu, first caranam:

“He joyfully ate the food left as an offering by Kannappan; he kicked Yama the god of death with his leg, killing him; he placed a woman (the river Ganges) right on his matted locks; in his desire for sweetmeats, he incurred a beating.” Peyandi tanaik kandu, second caranam:

“When the proper time comes, he will raise his leg and dance. Until the end of time, he will keep that leg raised.”

302Gopalakrishna

Bharati (1987) and T.K. Cidambaranatha Mudaliar (1943) give the ragam as Saranga.

Gopalakrishna Bharati

When we try to determine the authorship of this song, it appears to belong equally to Gopalakrishna Bharati and Kavikunjara Bharati, and perhaps to other composers as well. It is found in the Skanda Purana Kirttanas of Kavikunjara Bharati published in 1914; it is also found in a book of Gopalakrishna Bharati compositions published in 1987 as well as in U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar’s biography and collection of Gopalakrishna Bharati song texts.303 If we look a bit deeper into this particular text, we find links to a whole sub-repertoire, a kind of Peyandi-complex of texts. The famous Tamil padam Ettai kandu ni in Kalyani raga is quite close to Peyandi textually. Its pallavi, ettai kandu ni iccai konday makale en penne kanne ni ippotu (What did you see in that man which excited your fancy?), contains the same basic premise as Peyandi. Interestingly, we also find that Ettai kandu ni has another resemblance to Peyandi: its authorship is also in doubt. While Ettai kandu ni is contained in the book of Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar padams, Kuppuswamy and Hariharan credit its composition to Marimutta Pillai, while the dancer and scholar Smt. Nirmala Ramachandran attributes Ettai kandu ni to Papavinasa Mudaliar.304 Still a bit further afield, the Peyandi appears to have relations outside of Tamil Nadu. A.K. Ramanujan has written on the Virasaiva poetry of Karnataka State: The myths play with great humor on Siva’s grotesque ornaments: His bloody elephant skin, his funeral-pyre ashes, his three eyes, inauspicious skulls, matted hair, and his body crawling with serpents. Folk bhakti also makes capital out of Parvati’s love for such a wild maverick. Parvati’s mother asks: “What made you fall in love with him?…

Was it for the wedding gifts his nonexistent parents will

bring?

303Kavikunjara Bharati, 1914:29; Gopalakrishna Bharati, 1987: 26–27 (song #7); U.V.

Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987: 169 (song #15). kandu ni is song #77 in Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar (VSA), 1906 and 1910, but is absent from VSA 1875/1935; Kuppuswamy and Hariharan, M., 1983:87; Nirmala Ramachandran, presentation at Sruti Seminar on Dance Traditions, Chennai, December 1989.

304Ettai

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Or for the moon in his locks and the blazing eye in his

forehead?

Or for killing Kama, or for swallowing poison?…

Was it for the tiger skin he stripped and wore as a shawl?

Or his foolhardy courage in holding blazing embers in his

strong hands?

Or for grabbing the big snakes to drape around his neck as

garlands?

Or for the sari he would get you by begging? Or for the deeds

he wrought or his lovesports?

What made you fall in love?”305

Salem Godavari recorded Peyandi on 78 RPM before 1931. T. Sankaran told me that his mother Smt. Lakshmiratnam sang this song, and M. Arunacalam says that it “was a hit in the concerts of 1930–1940.”306 Smt. Nandini Ramani told me that this composition appeared in a Tamil movie at some point; otherwise, I have not come across any further documentation. [G 1] Natanam adinar (He danced) For full translation and commentary, see Appendix.

The second composition we will consider, Natanam adinar (He danced) [G1], was from the late 1930s to the late 1950s by far the most widely-danced Tamil composition in South India. We can see that the textual structure is quite different from almost all the Tamil padams, we have considered so far, yet many dancers who perform this piece call it a padam. There is a passage of rhythmic syllables called jati which is performed after the anupallavi and again after the caranam (in both cases the jati passage leads back into the pallavi). The song is not cast in the sringara mould of nayaka, nayaki, and sakhi. My conclusion is that this song served as a symbol for the emerging new world of dance and dancers beginning in the 1930s. 305A.K.

Ramanujan, 1984:217. This passage comes in the context of a discussion of the Virasaivite woman poet Mahadeviyakka, though it does not appear to be a translation of one of her poems. 306M. Arunacalam, 1989:70.

Other Songs in the Study

As the devadasi social community, which had been the sole custodian of the nautch or sadir dance307 for many generations, gradually turned and was turned away from their traditional occupation by social pressures, the women from the nontraditional community (most coming from the Brahmin community) who took up dance embraced Natanam adinar as an anthem, just as they embraced Nataraja himself as a new kind of hero for dance, Siva visualized as the Cosmic Dancer, free from the kind of criticism that an earthy, sensual Murugan (or Krishna for that matter, though he is seen much more in Telugu padams than in Tamil padams) could come under from social reformers (See Allen, 1997).

3.12 Other Songs in the Study

Of the five remaining padams to be considered in this study, Yarpoy colluvar (Who will take my message?) [A14] is by the late 19th or early 20th-century composer Subramania Panditar, about whose life I have found no information. The other four padams are of unknown authorship: they are Enna ninaintarodi (What was he thinking?) [A5], Aparupamana pen (A unique, special woman) [B1], Rattiri porutenke (Where were you last night?) [C3], and Unakko manam (You do not seem to have any heart) [C4]. Complete translations of these padams are found in the Appendix.

307These were some of the names used for the dance before the name Bharata Natyam

came into use in the 1930s. See Arudra 1986:30–31, and (for other names) B.M. Sundaram 1987:3, a letter to Sruti in response to Arudra’s article.

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Chapter 4

Texts, a Quiet, Private Corner 4.1 A System of Texts Now that we have been introduced to the texts in the course of considering their composers, we move in this chapter to discuss the texts as a whole, as a system. Although each song is of course an individual composition, there is a high degree of redundancy in both the texts and the musical settings of the Tamil padams, far more than I would have guessed at the beginning of my research. Each song participates in the traditions of a greater whole, a repertoire, and through the exposition of the characteristics of this whole repertoire, we can come to an understanding of both its core songs and characteristics, and those which constitute a periphery. Whereas up until now the texts have been presented more or less in a chronological fashion (in the course of discussing their composers), this part of the study organizes the songs into groups based on the direction of address in the songs, that is, along vectors of who addresses who. This strategy of organization for the texts came about because while learning to sing the songs and working on their translation over a number of years, I found that the situation of who-addresses-who in a padam has strong correlations with the nature of the content of the address. It, therefore, seemed a fruitful way to organize the materials; in fact, it became the compelling organizational element in this study for padam texts. The historical antecedents of padam, characters The Tamil Padam: A Dance Music Genre of South India Matthew Harp Allen

Copyright © 2023 Jenny Stanford Publishing Pte. Ltd.

ISBN 978-981-4968-56-0 (Hardcover), 978-1-003-33638-9 (eBook)

www.jennystanford.com

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featuring in the padams, the directions of address, and the formal structure of padams are the important system characteristics we will consider.

4.2 The Ashta Nayakis (Eight Heroines)

At this point, mention should be made of what is probably the most important extant system of classification used by scholars to discuss (and by connoisseurs to appreciate) the shades of psychology enveloping the dramatis personae of padams and their complex relationships with each other. The system takes its name, ashta nayika or ashta nayaki, from the eight-fold (or sometimes nine-fold) possibilities of classification given to the nayaki, the heroine. From this terminological concentration on the nayaki, we might with reason infer that indeed it is she who is at the center of the cast of characters. While the object of desire in the padams is nominally the nayaka, it is above all the emotional states of the nayaki that the dancer focuses on, presenting through her abhinaya, mimetic gestural language. I am not going deeply into this ancient and marvelous system here in my study, as it has been thoroughly explicated by many scholars, but will briefly present the eight classifications as given by Dr. V. Raghavan in his essay on the Sringaramanjari of Akbar Shah. Akbar Shah was closely connected to the Golconda Court, a Muslim kingdom in the Deccan (central India), in the mid-17th century. According to Dr. Raghavan, Akbar Shah’s Sringaramanjari was based in part upon at least two earlier works, the Rasamanjari of Bhanudatta, and the commentary on that work by the scholar Amoda.1 Akbar Shah’s characterization of the ashta nayakis both built on and critiqued earlier characterizations, taking its place in a scholarly lineage ultimately leading back to Bharata himself, author of the Natya Sastra (2–8th century A.D.), here described by Pramod Kale: 1V.

Raghavan, 1951:77.

The Ashta Nayakis

“The Indian tradition reveres it as a book of divine revelation. It also enjoys the unique status of a prescriptive law-book, expounding the rules and regulations which govern the world of theatrical activity. Its mythic world view and overall structure resemble the mythological compilations, known as the Puranas, which encompass within themselves, the acts and activities, thoughts and feelings of humans and non-humans, in all three worlds, throughout the four ages of past, present and future. To the orthodox in India thus the Natyasastra has the combined force and authority of the divinely revealed Srutis, the sage expounded Smritis and the broad based popular tradition of the Puranas.”2

Of great interest to the scholar of padams is that the Telugu padam composer Ksetrayya had connections to the Golconda court3 at the same approximate time as Akbar Shah was composing his Sringaramanjari at that same spot. Dr. Raghavan’s essay reveals, among other things, that erotic poetry in general and padams, in particular, were avidly patronized by the Sultan of Golconda and his courtiers. The ashta nayakis were the subject of considerable scholarly debate at court regarding how the delineation of each nayaki should be drawn—how the one might shade into the other—the rasikas (connoisseurs) arguing their application to particular poems and padams. With this general background, the eight nayakis are enumerated in Fig. 4.1, following Dr. Raghavan’s characterization of them in the Sringaramanjari. We will return at the end of this chapter to briefly consider the relationship between this system and the organizational ideas put forward for the text here. Now, let us move to briefly trace a path from the earliest known poetry of the Tamil country, to the era covered by this study. 2Pramod

Kale, 1974:1. (The dating of the Naya Sastra in the previous paragraph is also Kale’s, from 1974:9.) I found Kale’s book an excellent, readable study of a dense and challenging subject. 3We have seen this in discussing Ksetrayya’s padam Vedukato in Chapter 2.

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Figure 4.1 The Ashta Nayakis.4

4.3 Classical Tamil Poetry: Akam and Puram This discussion of the structure of padams will involve the use of terminology from the genre’s historical antecedents, first among those the corpus of classical Tamil poetry known as Sangam (also spelled Cankam) poetry, whose two divisions are called akam and puram. The poet-scholar A.K. Ramanujan translated and discussed much of this body of work, bringing it to a world audience. The akam portion of Sangam poetry is particularly of interest for this study as it is the love poetry of that period, although we will find influences from both akam and puram poetry in Tamil padams. I cite here excerpts from Ramanujan’s important 1967 essay on Sangam poetry:

4V.

“The literature of Classical Tamil later came to be known as Cankam literature. Cankam means ‘an academy or fraternity.’ ... A whole mythology has grown up around these poems, and in particular the myth of antediluvian kingdoms extending back many millenia and of a large body of works lost in a Great Flood. ... In the rhetoric and in the anthologies the poems were classified by their themes as akam and puram.

Raghavan, 1951:77. The ashta nayaki classification only begins to scratch the surface of Sanskrit aesthetic theory as it relates to padam. See also Jon Higgins, 1993.

Classical Tamil Poetry

Akam meant ‘inner part’, puram ‘outer part.’ ... Akam poems are love poems; puram poems are all other kinds of poems, usually about good and evil, action, community, kingdom; it is the ‘public’ poetry of the ancient Tamils, celebrating the ferocity and glory of kings, lamenting the death of heroes, the poverty of poets… “Akam poetry is directly about experience, not action; it is a poetry of the ‘inner world.’ In Akattinai Iyal, the chapter on akam poetry, the Tolkappiyam distinguished akam and puram conventions as follows: ‘In the five phases of akam, no names of persons should be mentioned. Particular names are appropriate only in puram poetry.’ The dramatis personae for akam are idealized types, such as chieftains representing clans and classes, rather than historical persons. Similarly, landscapes are more important than particular places. The love of man and woman is taken as the ideal expression of the ‘inner world,’ and akam poetry is synonymous with love poetry in the Tamil tradition. Love in all its variety—love in separation and in union, before and after marriage, in chastity and in betrayal is the theme of akam.”5

Stages of love, geographical regions or landscapes, flowers, animals, seasons, and times of the day, were all related in an extensive system of associations in Sangam poetry, constituting a subtly suggestive poetic vocabulary.6 Traces of this usage can still be seen in the Tamil padams, though not used in a systematic way. Perhaps, the most evocative matching of elements we will see in the padams is the association of Murugan with his kurinci region (the mountain tracts of Tamil country), and the association of both with kalavu, extra- or pre-marital stolen love.7 We have already seen, in the discussion of the work of 5A.K.

Ramanujan, 1975:98–104. The Tolkappiyam referred to here is the classical work on Tamil grammar, its composition assigned to the second (middle) of the three ancient Tamil Sangams. 6A.K. Ramanujan, 1975:107 or 1985:242, for these relationships in chart form. 7A.K. Ramanujan, 1985:238, describes the kurinci association with kalavu here as “clandestine, before marriage.” According to Winslow 1862/1983:267, “kalavu - theft, robbing, pilfering... the secret intercourse of lovers, illicit connexion...

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Kavikunjara Bharati, descriptions of Murugan wooing (and winning by trickery) his future wife Valli, the daughter of a hunter in the kurinci region. This takes place as she tends her family’s millet field, guarding it from the birds; the growing of millet is another association with the kurinci region made in the Sangam poetry.

4.4 Bhakti Poetry

Several recent studies have been published in English on the period of Tamil Bhakti poetry, a corpus of hymns composed between the 6th and 9th centuries A.D.8 (See Norman Cutler, 1987; Indira Peterson, 1989.) The inception of this devotional bhakti movement coincided with the political hegemony of the Pallava dynasty of Kancipuram over the area of modern Tamil Nadu, and involved the mixing of indigenous Tamil with literary and religious themes and elements historically associated with northern South Asia. It also occurred as part of a movement to consolidate the power of the Hindu religion in southern India, at the expense of Buddhism and Jainism, both of which were eventually virtually extinguished in the south. This was achieved by developing a new side to Hinduism; portraying it not as the religion of rigid fixed Vedic rituals and sacrifices, where access to the divine was mediated by a highly trained priestly class, but as a personal religion, where direct devotional expression was the key to union with one’s chosen manifestation of God, that is, to salvation. This devotional bhakti poetry incorporated elements from the Sangam world of akam and puram (a largely secular world, where very little poetry was on gods as such), transforming them any clandestine intercourse of the sexes, chiefly female.” As we have seen Kamil Zvelebil renders kalavu as the “ancient Tamil free-love marriage”, with respect to Murugan’s wooing of Valli. 8“The term bhakti is a derivative of the Sanskrit root bhaj, ‘to divide, apportion, share.’ In the religious sphere bhakti denotes an attitude of devotion on the part of a worshipper to a personal god. In this religious atmosphere devotees are linked with their god and with one another by a bond of ‘shared’ love and grace.” N. Cutler, 1987:1.

An “Export and Reimport” of Erotic Bhakti?

as necessary to fit the requirements of the new age. A.K. Ramanujan and Norman Cutler have written about this transformation: “Early bhakti movements, whether devoted to Siva or Vishnu, used whatever they found at hand, and changed whatever they used—Vedic and Upanisadic notions; mythologies; Buddhism; Jainism; conventions of Tamil and Sanskrit poetry; early Tamil conceptions of love, service, women and kings; folk religion and folksong; the play of contrasts between Sanskrit and the mother-tongue.”9

The akam conventions of love poetry were among the strongest influences taken into bhakti poetry, serving as perhaps the ideal model for the relationship between the devotee and God: “The bhakta’s (devotee’s) relationship to god is characteristically modeled after a select number of human relations: master-servant, friend-friend, child-parent, and most importantly, beloved-lover. In the Tamil context, bhakti is also frequently expressed in the idiom of the relationship between king and subject.”10

The love poetry of the Sangam period was a major stream to be incorporated into bhakti poetry, reframed in the process to now denote not just love among humans, but the love of God.

4.5 An “Export and Reimport” of Erotic Bhakti?

After the era of bhakti poetry, and its patronage by the Cola rulers up until ca. the 13th century (discussed in Chapter 2), we find no additional major literary movements in Tamil Nadu to be considered in discussing the padams. There is, however, a speculative theory regarding a path leading from the Tamil bhakti poetry of the 7–9th-century to the 17–19th­ century Tamil padam, worth considering here. The idea of export and reimport of erotic bhakti from, and back to, Tamil Nadu, has been proposed by V. Subramaniam: 9A.K. 10N.

Ramanujan and Norman Cutler, 1983:177. Cutler, 1987:1 (italics added).

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“The romantic erotic approach to god through transvestite nayika bhava bhakti was the foundation of the bhakti movement in Tamil country where the poets used the dominant Aham erotic genre naturally. Then it gradually spread to North India in a de-Tamilized Sanskritized form, mainly through the Bhagavata Purana. The original Aham form was used by the Alwars and Nayanmars to express their songs of love in the first person with only one modification, namely using the name of the Lord. ... Unfortunately for Tamil literature and the performing arts, the Aham inspiration for bhakti poetry was gradually eased out, if not erased together. ... While erotic bhakti thus became a dim memory in its own Tamil homeland, its emigration northwards produced striking results. ... The transvestite romanticism of Dhyaneshwar’s poetry on Krishna identifying himself as a gopi in the first person most probably drew inspiration and legitimation from a confluence of the Gaatha tradition and the Bhagavata Purana, just then reaching Maharashtra. It was this ‘emigrant’ Tamil Aham eroticism and the Marathi Prakrit romanticism that were accepted as legitimate by Sanskrit alankara sastra that migrated South, through the Vijayanagar empire, and influenced Kshetragna in composing his erotic padams and also his successors like Sarangapani in Telugu and several Tamil padam composers of the 19th century. ... It was also this same circuitously imported-transformed product that most influenced the Tanjavur Quartet in composing their varnam-s, and several Tamil padam composers. ... Fortunately for the Tamils, both the Sangam romantic Aham tradition and the bhakti erotic tradition based on it were preserved in odd corners by a literate minority. Thus Muthutandavar (Muttuttandavar – ed.) clearly preserved the tradition for the chinna melam caste and for all Tamils in his padam-s, before Kshetragna’s work wiped out his memory.” 11

It is beyond the scope of this work to comment in detail on the many links within the greater tradition of Indian erotic 11V.

Subramaniam, 1990:36–37.

An “Export and Reimport” of Erotic Bhakti?

poetry, which include notably for the dancer the 11–12th century Gita Govinda (Songs of Krishna) of Jayadeva. However, at least two points, one at either end of this bhakti trail seem to make sense: first, it is widely accepted among scholars of Indian religion that bhakti began in the south. I have heard scholars of South Indian religion complain half in jest that their colleagues who study the North know only one fact about the South, the fact of its being the home of bhakti. So, it is possible that bhakti could have been exported from South to North India around the end of the first millennium A.D. The second point I would like to point out is that just as we have seen the Telugu Nayaks deputed by the Vijayanagar Emperor by 1530 coming to rule in Tanjavur and the deep south, bringing in their train many families of artists and scholars, those artists coming south certainly brought their expressive cultural forms and values to Tanjavur. The Telugu padam composer Ksetrayya is not known to have had any connection at all with the Vijayanagar Court, but he was connected with the Golconda Court in the 17th century, a place at which Dr. V. Raghavan paints a vivid picture of patronage of erotic poetry.12 In some form, Tamil erotic bhakti poetry may have been exported north, and then in some form, returned to Tamil Nadu during the reign of the Telugu Nayaks.13 Whether or to what extent the Tamil erotic bhakti tradition remained in Tamil Nadu during the period between the 11–12th and 16–17th centuries is another difficult question. V. Subramaniam and elsewhere M. Arunacalam and Kasinath Durai14 have argued that except for a few people (such as Muttuttandavar) tucked away in a few corners of the Tamil country, Tamil erotic bhakti was extinguished. We must leave the question open. Figure 4.2 summarizes the possible streams feeding into the Tamil padams of this study, the upper stream representing a possible export and reimport 12V.

Raghavan, 1951. what extent this returning wave of erotic bhakti poetry can be seen as containing Tamil elements, or as being created from Tamil elements, I am not prepared to guess. 14M. Arunacalam, 1989; Kasinath Durai, personal communication, Madurai, 1990. 13To

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of erotic bhakti, and the lower stream representing a continuing indigenous Tamil erotic bhakti.

Figure 4.2 A “Bhakti Trail”.

4.6 A Triad of Characters

Probably the strongest continuity between the Tamil padams of the 17–19th century and the akam poetry of ancient Tamil literature is the group of characters who figure in the two groups of poems.15 The dramatis personae of Tamil padams are a subset of those found over 1,500 years ago in classical Tamil poetry.16 A.K. Ramanujan has written: 15In

addition to the “dramatis personae,” the essential diachronic-less plot­ lessness, name-lessness (qualified as we will see by the introduction of puram elements into the anupallavi and sometimes at the end of the last caranam), the essentially quite private, inner feeling of the padams are all strongly reminiscent of the akam genre. 16See Kamil Zvelebil (1974) and Saskia Kersenboom (1987) for an account of the development of Tamil poetry in the period from Sangam to modern, and Norman Cutler (1987), Part I, for a schematic description of the rhetorical system and dramatis personae of the 6–9th-century corpus of Tamil Bhakti poetry.

Directions of Address

“The dramatis personae in akam poetry are limited to a small number: the hero, the heroine, the hero’s friend[s] or messengers, the heroine’s friend and foster-mother, the concubine, and passers-by.”17

By the time of the padam genre (over a thousand years later), we find that the list has been more or less fixed at a triad of characters; the nayaka―hero, the nayaki―heroine, and the sakhi (or duti, tori)―friend, maid, or sometimes mother, or unspecified female elder.

4.7 Directions of Address

The diagrams in this chapter take their structure from this triad of characters (Fig. 4.3).

Figure 4.3 The characters.18

For each group of songs considered in turn, one of the three lines of this triangle will become a vector, designating the addresser and addressee within the songs of that group. Given that there are three characters, and given that one rhetorical situation is chosen for each song, there are six possible ways in which a song could be cast, with either of the three characters 17A.K.

Ramanujan, 1985: 248.

am indebted to the work of Norman Cutler (1987) for the basic idea of this

diagram as well as some of its specifics, such as the idea of vectors connecting its three points.

18I

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being the speaker, and either of the remaining two being the addressee. In practice, songs where the nayaka speaks are rare; in this study, there is only one song, Yaro ivar yaro [F 1] in which he speaks, and the addressee is not clearly specified (although the object of his affection is clearly Sita). So, we will see four main categories, although I have split one of these into two (Groups C and D) based on considerations which will be explained as we reach that section.

4.8 Evolution of Three-Part Structure from Two-Part Structure

The three-part formal structure found in padams is a structure shared by kritis, the song form par excellence of classical music today.19 The three-part structure evolved from an earlier twopart structure, in which an anupallavi section was not clearly articulated. In the Sankirtanams of Annamacharya (15th century) and the other Tallappakam composers of Tirupati, we see a twopart structure, of pallavi plus multiple caranams. In the 17th­ century Telugu padams of Ksetrayya, scholars are to this day not agreed on whether the anupallavi exists as a separate section, or whether his original pallavis were later split up into a pallavi and anupallavi section. In general, pallavi sections and anupallavi sections each have about half the text of a caranam, so the latter hypothesis must be considered as a possibility. It is not within the scope of this essay to go deeply into this subject here; all of the songs of this study, as all padams in current performance, are clearly regarded as having three sections—pallavi, anupallavi, and caranam(s).

4.9 The Number of Caranams

The number of caranams in padams varies from song to song. Often in printed texts, a “full” complement of three caranams 19For

a good discussion of the evolution of the hegemony of the kriti form and its dynamic historical interaction with the Pallavi form, see Amy Ruth Catlin, 1980 and 1985.

Progression Through the Form in Performance

is given,20 while in performance (either a dance performance or strictly musical performance) most often only one caranam is played or danced. The reasons given for this abridgment of the full form vary from the length of time it takes (and attendant strains on the attention of the modern audience) to the lack of any new musical interest (as each successive caranam uses the same melodic setting for the changed text). I do not have information as to whether more caranams used to be performed in the past than are now.

4.10 Progression Through the Form in Performance

This diagram visualizes the progression through the three sections of padam (or kriti) in performance, either in a dance or strictly musical setting (Fig. 4.4).

Figure 4.4 Movement through a three-part structure of padam.

A padam begins with its pallavi.21 In the performance of padams, there is a great deal of repetition of individual lines, or 20It

is common parlance to hear “all” three caranams of padams referred to. when it does not, that is, sometimes padams are sung beginning with the anupallavi section. I heard heated debate on the validity of this practice. VAK Ranga Rao of Chennai has argued that beginning from the anupallavi section of a padam distorts the sequence of presentation and violates the integrity of the text (personal communication, Chennai, 1990.) In the family of Vina Dhanammal, quite a few of the Telugu padams are sung beginning from anupallavi. T. Viswanathan attributes such a practice historically to reasons of musical necessity. The pallavi section is most always set in a lower melodic range than the anupallavi section, sometimes so low that it projects to audiences hardly at all. Therefore, musicians found it advantageous, to begin with the anupallavi section.

21Except

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even phrases or individual words within these lines (such repetitions are not indicated in the above diagram). The pallavi line (or lines) is often repeated three or four times, even within the constraints of the 78 RPM format. In a dance performance of a mature artist, the number of repetitions is decided by the dancer, based on the number of interpretations of the line that she wishes to offer.22 At the conclusion of the pallavi section, usually signaled by a held tone and then a short pause by the vocalist (and sometimes by a very brief cadence by the mridangist at the conclusion of the last tala cycle of that section), the anupallavi commences. Repetition similar in scope to that of the pallavi often occurs, after which the pallavi is again sung, usually in reprise fashion, that is, once through without any or much repetition. The first caranam to be performed is then taken up, followed by a reprise of the pallavi. Padams often end here, after the performance of only one caranam. Repetition of lines within the caranam sections is on average less than in the previous sections. If the second and/or third caranams are performed, the pallavi reprise occurs also after each additional caranam. 22The

repetition of lines of text occurs both in the padam and kriti genres, but in a different manner. In padam, as we see, the dancer may want to offer several interpretations of the line through her abhinaya, mimetic gestural language. The repetition of the line does not ideally involve melodic improvisation on the part of the dancer’s accompanying musicians, as this would be considered to distract from the dance. However, it is considered proper for a musician to offer very subtle melodic variation during the course of extended repetition of a line. Here, we are obviously referring to a matter of fluid boundaries between what constitutes subtle variation as opposed to improvisation. The subtle variation is seen as supporting the dancer, while an improvisation that showcases the musician’s virtuosity is seen as a distraction in the dance context. In the performance of kriti, it is common for the main performer to sing melodic variations on selected lines, as part and parcel of the art of his or her performance. When the variations are composed (by the composer, an influential performer of the hallowed past, or sometimes by the current performer), the term sangati is used to describe such variations. These often are set to the opening line of the pallavi section. When melodic variation over a line of text is improvised in concert, it is called niraval.

Pallavi, the Sprout

4.11 Pallavi, the Sprout: Throwing the Idea In Fig. 4.4 above, we can see graphically the importance of the pallavi section, serving as the theme of departure, periodic return, and final resting place. The idea articulated in the pallavi section is the alpha and omega of the padam; we will not see a linear progression of the plot in the course of witnessing a performance. Nothing will, in the sense of plot progression, change (unlike some song forms which can accommodate a dramatic change or conversion in the speaker’s point of view over the course of the song). What does happen is that the pallavi statement blossoms—pallavi itself means “sprout” or “sprouting”—it is counterpointed and becomes clarified (“ornamented” may also be a good term here) over the course of the song. The anupallavi and caranam sections play distinct roles in this counterpointing and blossoming. As I discuss the characteristics of the three sections and their interrelationships within the padam system, I will be drawing on the terms akam and puram from classical Tamil poetry introduced earlier, as in the movement from section to section of a padam we find an oscillation between these two poles of feeling (or style) of presentation. The pallavi is an akam or interior text; following the characteristics of this type as laid out by A.K. Ramanujan, the speaker does not name specific names, places, or events in the pallavi section. The speaker (almost always a woman, the nayaki or sakhi, as imagined by a man, the composer) instead makes one key statement or asks one key question, having to do with the relationship (potential or actual; past, present, or future) between the nayaki and the nayaka. The pallavi, which states the central thought of the padam, also has the lowest text density of the three sections of padam. This factor is directly related to its suitability for interpretation through abhinaya. Dancers that I have spoken with felt that a lower density of the text—fewer words and fewer total syllable sound over a given period of time—give them greater freedom of expression, all other things being equal.23 The ideal padam text 23That

is, low text density alone cannot redeem an inherently unimaginative or unsuggestive pallavi line.

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serves as an appropriate springboard or scaffolding upon which the dancer can build their interpretations. In the pallavi section, we see usually the greatest amount of interpretation by the dancer over the repeated sung line of text; when we reach the caranam, we see a much greater density of the text, including sometimes madhyama kala (literally “middle speed”) sections in which the text density is doubled relative to previous lines. In that situation, we usually see less repetition of the lines by the dancer.

4.12 Anupallavi, “The Lord Whose Fame Ever Grows”

In the anupallavi section, we find a correspondence to the puram elements of classical Tamil poetry, the exterior or public side of that corpus. In the anupallavi of the Tamil padams, the nayaka is usually mentioned by name, and a specific place is often mentioned, either the temple at which a particular deity resides and is worshipped, or the town at which a particular patron resides and munificently supports the arts. Often the location itself is the subject of lavish formulaic praise, enhancing and reflecting the greatness of the nayaka. In the case of a padam on a human patron, the patron’s father is equally often extolled. Indira Peterson’s account of how sacred places are described in the Tevaram hymns (6–9th centuries A.D.) gives us a clear idea of the ancestry of the anupallavi section of the Tamil padam: “The poets’ descriptions of sacred places are, by and large, formulaic, emphasizing through conventional metaphors their beauty, abundance, and prosperity. Like the itinerant bards of the Cankam tradition, the Nayanars exalt their patron and king by praising his land and its delights. Descriptions of lush gardens and fields alternate with cityscapes in which ‘tall mansions touch the clouds’.”24

The multiple epithets contained in the anupallavis are difficult to render in the same sequence in English, because of the way they are structured, using what A.K. Ramanujan has termed 24I.

Peterson, 1989:147.

Anupallavi, “The Lord Whose Fame Ever Grows”

left-branching syntax.25 Indira Peterson supplies an example of this left-branching syntax from the Tevaram literature: “Phrases such as ‘in-the universe’s-every-age-devotees­ praising-Himalayan gods-king’ read in reverse order in

English: ‘The king of the Himalayan gods, the Lord whom

devotees praise in every age of the universe.’ I have had to

supply the prepositions ‘of’ and ‘in’, which make clear in

English the relationships between ‘king’ and ‘Himalayan gods’,

and ‘praise’ and ‘age’.” 26

Many good examples of this can be found in the anupallavis of Tamil padams. In the anupallavis, once the reader traverses the epithets and arrives (from left to right) at the name of the nayaka, the eye cannot stop but must keep moving, as immediately an action is applied to the heavily-epitheted hero. I will just give one example, to point up the complexity of accurate translation. Here, the nayaka’s name (Tiyakecan, Siva as Tyagaraja of Tiruvarur), the last word of the anupallavi, has the dative case attached to it as a suffix, propelling us back to the pallavi, which tells us that wherever this Tyagaraja is, he still loves the nayaki (literally, on him there will still be fond thoughts of her): Cenkaru nir otai curum, Tiruvarurtanil varum He lives at Tiruvarur, right around the pond filled with purple lilies

Tevati tevan vacanta tiyakecanukku He is first among the gods, Vasanta Tyagaraja… Enke iruntalum …Wherever he may be 25“When

Enke iruntalum [A3] (anupallavi section returning to pallavi)

two languages are as startlingly different from each other as modern English and medieval Tamil, one could despair. For instance, the ‘left-branching’

syntax of Tamil is most often a reverse mirror image of the possible English.

Medieval Tamil is written with no punctuation and no spaces between words;

it has neither articles nor prepositions, and the words are ‘agglutinative,’

layered with suffixes. Moreover, the syntax is a dense embedding of clause within clause.” A.K. Ramanujan, 1981:xvii. 26I. Peterson, 1989:89.

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4.13 Murugan Atop His Mountains One feature of the Tamil god Murugan is that his special place (within the classical division of the Tamil country into five landscapes) is the kurinci, mountainous region. Among the many temples to Murugan in Tamil Nadu, the “six army houses” (aruppatai vitu) are considered the most sacred. These are mostly mountain fastnesses, although the list of six is not rigidly fixed and includes Tiruccendur, which is located on the (flat) seacoast. In this regard, we should remember that in Tamil Nadu, what constitutes a mountain is necessarily measured to a less exacting standard than in the Himalayas. Moving to the anupallavi in performance, entails the melody rising to its highest register during the song. The texts of Tamil padams on Murugan often speak of this great lord who lives high atop the great (named) mountain. There is thus a felicitous correspondence between melodic motion and textual content to be seen in several of the songs on Murugan in this study. In general, anupallavis perhaps counterpoint the thought thrown in the Pallavi, more than they directly develop in a sequential fashion. The (most often absent, usually truant) hero is named, his greatness and that of his place are extolled, and if the nayaka is a human patron, he is often referred to in tandem with his father (as we have seen in the padams of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar in particular; here we see him characterized as the one who gave birth to such a wise, powerful and magnanimous son by virtue of his own greatness and exemplary devotion to God.) In the anupallavi sections, links are strongly made between the nayaka and his place, and if on a human patron, between the patron, his family lineage, his devotion to God, and (again) the greatness of the place where he resides.

4.14 Caranam: “In My Tender Youth”

By virtue of the greater amounts of text contained in the caranam sections, it is difficult to succinctly encapsulate the totality of what occurs therein (the same situation pertains in analyzing the music of padams.) I will generalize that arriving in the

Presentation of Compositions by Group

caranam section, some stories, proverbs, or examples are cited by the speaker to support the contention of the pallavi. Here perhaps, we see the most individuality expressed by the padam composers, in their choice of textual material. Kavikunjara Bharati, for example, likes to use proverbs to illustrate his speaker’s point (see in particular Inimel [A6], Etu kanum [C1], while Ghanam Krishna Ayyar tends to minute descriptions of the nayaki’s beauty, using a relatively small group of images to focus on a relatively select number of parts of the body—the breasts full and delicately veined, the waist thin as a streak of lightning, the plaintain-like thighs, the face like a classical “carved picture” (cittira pol)—and her personality attributes, her sweet soft speech. Sometimes in the third caranam can be seen a return to the puram side of the scale, in that the composer’s mudra (signature) may be found. And when the contour of the melody rises to its highest point, the anupallavis and caranams of padams on Murugan sometimes gesture to his association with the mountain kurinji landscape. In some padams, notably those of Kavikunjara Bharati and Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, the third caranam sometimes contains additional references to the composer, his family, and his patronage by the Raja, or the god and his family, or some stories associated with him.

4.15 Presentation of Compositions by Group Group A: Nayaki to Sakhi

Within each group of songs, we will see clustering of such themes and images defined by the addresser and the addressee. The selection of songs for inclusion in this study was geared toward providing a representative sample of the living padam repertoire, the songs being chosen because they fell into one of three ragas often used for the musical settings of padams. I found it particularly interesting how the distribution into groups by who-addresses-who flowed from that initial selection, resulting in many songs falling into this first group. The first group we will consider, where the nayaki addresses the sakhi, constitutes almost half the songs in this study; therefore, I would argue that the padam as constituted in this one group

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(Group A) must have a strong voice in the ultimate definition of what a padam is, to the minds of connoisseurs and performers of the tradition.

Figure 4.5 Group A, Nayaki to Sakhi.

In the songs of Group A, the nayaki or heroine speaks to her sakhi about issues with the nayaka, that is, on the subject of some aspect of her relationship with, most always her love for, the hero (Fig. 4.5). This is common to all the songs—the relationship may be past, present, or future; it may be that the nayaki does (or possibly, does not) want to pursue the relationship further at this point. The emotional state of the nayaki may be agitated, angry, recalcitrant, “pining”, “melting” or (less often) composed and calm. It may oscillate among different states either as the song progresses, or as the capable dancer interprets even one line of text.

Presentation of Compositions by Group

Pallavis of Padams in Group A First let us give brief synopses of the pallavis of this group of songs, taking all 14 at a clip. Note that with two exceptions [A4] and [A5] the “he” in each of the pallavis is not named; we do not know if the lord is human or divine; for such information, we will have to wait until the anupallavi. Note also two Tamil words which I am using without translation; the first is manam, meaning equally mind and heart, which I prefer to render in the original rather than have to make such a choice in English. Secondly, the Tamil -ti or -ati (softened to adi in my transliteration) is in itself not so much a word as a quick after-click of the tongue, but it carries precise significance in designating a female intimate. In fact, it often occurs as a suffix to a verb ending, such as vati, (va plus adi, “come, adi”). Adi is sometimes used in conjunction with another word to describe the sakhi, such as names of animals annam (swan), kuyil (cuckoo); or precious (sweet) substances—ten (honey), kanmani (apple of my eye). The pallavis of Group A read as follows: [A1] I will tell you just when and how to approach him on my behalf, and just what to say at that time, adi, my honey. [A2] Which woman poisoned the manam (heart/mind) of my all-seeing, all-knowing lord against me? [A3] Wherever he may be, I know that he still loves me and thinks of me constantly, adi, my swan. [A4] How can I describe the special secret beauty and majesty of our omnipresent Sriranga King, adi? [A5] What was he thinking, the omnipotent dweller of Tillai—did his thoughts change toward me, adi, sakhi? [A6] From now on there can be nothing between he and I, adi. Go! [A7] Who is he, sakhi? I have absolutely no idea. [A8] My manam not understanding, I fell in love with him; for that love, what fruits have I seen? [A9] Oh my gazelle, my dancing peacock, my singing cuckoo, apple of my eye, I do not see my prince. [A10] Oh my damsel, can I ever forget his deceit? But at the same time, can I not think of our sweet embraces? [A11] Should I come there to him, or will my lord himself come here to me? Asking this gently and coaxingly, finding out his manam, go and come, adi. [A12] My heart and soul are trembling, melting, throbbing, tell him, adi! But wait, stop a moment; is your

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heart of stone, adi? How can you gayly strut about, showing off at a time like this? Go, adi! [A13] Won’t he come into this street? Won’t he at least turn and look my way? [A14] Who will go speak to him on my behalf? I don’t see any trustworthy person. Oh my swan, what will I do?

Discussion

The pallavis of Group A taken together reveal quite a wide variety of situations within the general context of sringara, the portrayal of the love between man and woman. Most of the songs state or imply a condition of separation, and in almost all of these, the nayaki seeks to remedy the situation by being joined or rejoined with the nayaka. In the clearest exception, the pallavi of Inimel [A6] is categorical on its face that no more relationship is possible, but the caranams of this song reveal indicate that in her heart, the nayaki perhaps wishes that a reconciliation would be possible.

Compositions from Kuravanjis

The songs [Al] and [A7] form a subcategory within Group A as they are both contained in kuravanji compositions, operas or dance dramas which follow a plot and in which, therefore, individual songs occupy a particular place in the progression of that plot. In Collum vakai [A1], the nayaki is preparing her sakhi for the job of going to the nayaka (in this case Raja Sarabhoji). The nayaki is completely confident in the achievement of her goal all through the song, saying to the sakhi that she the nayaki will tell the sakhi exactly when, where, and how to approach the nayaka. In the anupallavi, we will see her add that Sarabhoji will be pleased in his manam (manattukku icaintitum) upon hearing the appropriate message delivered in the appropriate fashion at the appropriate time. In Ivan yaro [A7] (as we have already seen in the discussion of its composer Kavikunjara Bharati), the song begins as the plot has reached the point where the nayaki sees the nayaka (in this case the god Vishnu as Aragar of Aragarkoil outside of Madurai) coming in procession and, in the manner of the ula prabandha genre dating from at least the 10th century, swoons in love at this first darsan, sight.

Presentation of Compositions by Group

Mentions of nayaka in pallavis The two songs, [A4] and [A5], which do mention the identity of the nayaka in the pallavi section, do not repeat this in their respective anupallavis. The anupallavi of Engumayamana [A4] further describes the lord, while the anupallavi of Enna ninaintaro [A5] reads very much like the first line of the first caranam of several padams in which the nayaki refers back reflectively to her youth, when the nayaka had made (variously) advances on and promises to her.

Absence of “-adi”

We also notice from the above synopses that the sakhi is called either adi or some other name of intimacy in all but two of the padams; the two padams in which no such name is used are the two earliest songs of this group, Manadariyamal [A8] and Teruvil varano [A13], both compositions of Muttuttandavar. A consequence of this absence is that in Muttuttandavar’s two songs here, it is not made precisely clear that the nayaki is speaking to a sakhi. Regarding the early compositions of this study, we further note that none of the 18th-century composers (Papavinasa Mudaliar, Marimutta Pillai, Arunacala Kavirayar, or Uttukkadu Venkatasubba Ayyar) are represented with any songs in this group.

Anupallavis of Padams in Group A

Let us follow the same procedure with the anupallavis as we have done above for the pallavi sections, giving brief synopses for each in turn. [Al] Sarabhoji Maharaja of Tanjavur, who is praised by great people, will be pleased when you sweetly tell him my message. [A2] This gracious and attractive man, Pratapa Rama Raja, born to Amaracimhendran (Amara Simha) who wears a beautiful crown, who gives great gifts in the appropriate way ... [A3] Vasanta Tyagaraja, the first among the gods,27 lives right at Tiruvarur, surrounded by fragrant watercourses filled with purple lilies. [A4] When I see his golden lotus feet, my 27The

Tamil construction here, Tevadi tevan, for “First among the gods”, is analogous to that used for human kings, Rajati rajan, “King of Kings.” This is another example of the continuities between the royal and sacred which permeate this literature.

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hungers all go away; he is everywhere, wherever I might look, adi. [A5] One day previously, coming to me totally alone, he firmly said “I will garland (marry) you”; but now ... [A6] Plentiful fruit trees abound in the cool climes around Sigandi mountain where Kandacami lives; but even if that Kandacami comes voluntarily to me ... [A7] Shining like fire, covered with rubies, fully decorated he comes riding in the temple car, in the beautiful procession. [A8] Holy Nataraja, who pleases his wife Sivakami, blesses his devotees every day. [A9] Oh honey, come and search for the Moon who is the lord of wealth for the gods and the lord of Sri and the shining lord of the assembly. [A10] This man whose renown is established all over the earth, this kingly man of high religious merit born of King Muttaiyan, is our Lord Ellakki Ramabhadra; ask him, adi oh adi, is his behavior toward me reasonable (or, “what is the reason”)? [A11] I fell in love with Muttukkumarecar, the dweller of Velur, before whom all the celestial beings come and bow; I cannot bear it anymore, my gazelle, oh adi, my honey! [A12] I have kept Velavar who dwells in Parani, the place without equal, in my heart. What is happening? Matan’s arrows in my breast make me swoon—bring my lord Kandacami here to me! [A13] With one eye, he instantly burned the three cities to ashes, this Natana Rajan (King of Dance). [A14] He lives atop the Tiruttani mountain, whose fame ever rises; not just humans but also the sacred texts praise him as the embodiment of truth and purity. To such a Murugan ... (who will carry my message?)

Discussion

We find that the nayaka blesses his devotees if divine and gives great gifts and does great works in a selfless manner if human. Nayakas of both human and divine nature defeat forces of evil and compel the respect of both gods and men, who in song after song are seen coming to bow before such a Lord. The place of residence of the nayaka is equally great as the nayaka himself, either a beautiful grove with fragrant flowers and cool water tanks, or a magnificent court, or a mountain surrounded by heavily-bearing fruit trees. The nayaka is more often than not, errant in his ways, although descriptions of this are not usually present in the anupallavi itself; the anupallavi seems to serve as

Presentation of Compositions by Group

a foil or counterpoint for this waywardness, by emphasizing his greatness and usual state of uprightness, making, therefore, his current behavior (insinuated in the pallavi and to be documented in the caranams to follow) incomprehensible as well as intolerable. The nayaka, first and last, is irresistibly attractive and drives the nayaki to distraction with desire.

Caranams of Padams in Group A

Due to the sheer mass of the caranam texts, it is necessary to briefly summarize them here instead of giving complete synopses. (Songs [A1], [A4], and [A7] will be referred to as a group at the end of this section.) [A2] The one available caranam begins by referring to the kankanam kattina nal, the time just before marriage when the groom-to-be ties a yellow cord on his intended’s arm; such golden days of the past (whether specifically a marriage day, the promise of marriage, or a less specific “in my youth” when the nayaka approached her in a contamaka manner, as if a close relation) are probably the most often-used images with which the composers begin their caranams. The next line uses the phrase enke iruntalum, “wherever he may be”, the same phrase, which opens the pallavi of songs [A3], and is found peppered through other padams. The last part of the caranam returns to a puram feeling by describing great building projects undertaken by her lord, the king of kings, out of his great devotion. [A3] Here we find a reference to the “former golden days” coming at the beginning of the second caranam, followed by the allegation that some evil woman, cutukkarakkalli, has drugged her lord Muttukkumara with a magic potion, an occurrence we also see in [A12] where the nayaki says that her lord will sprinkle the magic powder on her (not on another woman, in that case). Here in [A3] the distraught nayaki clings to the idea that he is still in love with her, and thinks of her even while making love with the other woman, saying, “is anyone like me available for him” (en pol avarukku kitaikkumo)? This is a phrase we will find used also to refer to the fitness of the nayaka, as when the sakhi says to him “is there anyone else for her such as you, lord?” [A4] (see below). [A5], as mentioned above, contains the reference to munnam oru nal, sometime ago, in its anupallavi. [A6] is marked by the use

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of proverbs, using a simile to demonstrate the nayaki’s insistence upon the termination of the relationship. The phrase eppatikku pen pirakkumo, “what kind of world is this for a woman to be born into?”, occurs in its second caranam; it is a phrase we also see in several other padams. Its third caranam contains puram-style references to Murugan as the slayer of the demon Cur (Suran), as the lord who embraces his two wives, and who supports the composer Kavikunjara Bharati’s Tamil. [A7] (see below). [A8] contains the reference to Maran (also Mayan or Matan, the Indian “Cupid”) whose flower arrows pierce her breast and in general turn everyday reality upside down—the cuckoo’s love call is a cruel deception, and one hundred yugas (eras) pass in a single minute. In [A9], the first caranam contains several references we have seen before, beginning at the time of the nayaki’s maiden youth, when the nayaka took her by the hand. After kalandu “mixing” sweetly with her thousands of times, we see some other woman doing evil to her lord, using love potions on him, causing him to wander about somewhere—the nayaki knows not where—in an agitated and confused state. The second caranam introduces again the showers of Matan’s arrows, this time causing the moon’s normally cool rays to become scorching hot. The conclusion is another well-used reference, as to how the present condition can only be explained by the nayaki to her friend as fate, the result of her previous prayers, i.e., her past sins. Song [A10] once again begins the first caranam with a reference to the nayaka, having garlanded the nayaki, on a flower bed, having tied the pre-nuptial bangle or bracelet (kankanam katti). And after chronicling the misdeeds of the nayaka, again the second (final) caranam ends with the nayaki saying to her friend that it must be fated thus, it must have been written on her head (talaiyil erutto). [A11] sees in the first caranam the flower arrows of Mayan piercing the nayaki, and half the time it takes to snap fingers becomes an aeon. The second caranam opens with an image seen in several padams (ref. [C3]), where the nayaki’s eyes grow dim, from waiting up half the night watching the road for the nayaka to come. This song also sees the nayaki alternating between the affectionate and angry address of the sakhi, calling her on the one hand mane, kanne, (gazelle, apple of my eye) and on the other

Presentation of Compositions by Group

pataki (woman guilty of a heinous crime) and cittiranki (heartless woman), illustrating the extreme vacillation in mood characteristic of her lovesick state. [A12] sees the nayaki eagerly anticipating her lord sprinkling magic powder on her, and one version of one of the caranams (from text source GSKA i:210) indirectly refers to Murugan in quite a clever way. Here the nayaka is referred to as playing in and among the sakhi’s “full bunch” breasts with his “12 hands”; as Murugan is also known as Arumukam (six faces), so would he have that number of hands-free for this activity. The caranams of [A13] refer to the nayaki’s waiting for him to pass in procession, hoping he will stop in front of her, and laments that she has no one to take her message to him. [A14] sees the mother-in-law referred to as a “sinful tyrant” (polla pataka niliye) because she always looks askance at her daughter-in-law, and also laments that there is no suitable person to take her message to the nayaka.

Subgroup: Peripheral Padams

Songs [Al], [A4], and [A7] (the two kuravanji compositions plus a song on Vishnu as Lord Ranganatha at Srirangam) constitute a subcategory of Group A in which there is not a state of anguished separation at the heart of the composition. Interestingly, the imagery used in the caranams of these three songs does not share the same stock of phrases we are seeing used so heavily in the rest of the padams of Group A. [A1] details activities at court, following King Sarabhoji through a busy day, leading up to the right time for the sakhi to approach him and “return with the garland” signifying his acceptance of her petition. It is a glorious and ethnographically suggestive if an exaggerated picture of life at the politically no-longer independent court ca. 1800–1830. In [A4] and [A7], we find the caranams singing the praise of the lord in stotram form. [A4] contains a reference to how the women swoon at the lord Vishnu as the beautiful boy Krishna (Gopalan) comes in procession, comparing him to the maruvi maruvi anaintavar, the “mixing joining embracing” one. These two verbs are among those found most in padams, for example in the pallavi of Made avar [A10], where the nayaki remembers the sweetness of past embraces, past mixings, and joinings.

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Group B: Sakhi to Nayaka We will now seek to bring out the characteristics of songs of Group B through the description of the three sections of this (much smaller) group of compositions. In this group, the sakhi speaks to the nayaka on behalf of the nayaki (Fig. 4.6).

Figure 4.6 Group B, Sakhi to Nayaka.

One of the padams of this group [B3] is a composition of Arunacala Kavirayar, two [B2] and [B4] are compositions of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, and [B1] is of unknown authorship.

Pallavis of Group B

[B1] She is a unique, special woman; she will behave according to your wishes (she will do just what you ask); may I bring her to you, lord? [B2] This young woman whose jeweled and girdled breasts are covered with perfectly spreading delicately veined beauty spots is singing on the terrace; having come seeking you, she is waiting there. [B3] Now is the time for you to go to her. She is in great distress with love for you, asking herself, “Will I succeed?” [B4] Spearholder! a young damsel is searching for you, lord; she has waited for you the whole night, up until daybreak. All of these pallavis say in essence the same thing. When the sakhi speaks to the nayaka on behalf of the nayaki, we may conclude,

Presentation of Compositions by Group

this is her plaint, that a beautiful young woman is waiting for you, pining for you; may I bring her to you? (or) she waits on the terrace for you (or) now is the right time to go to her.

Anupallavis of Group B

[Bl] Oh King of Vedacala golden mountain (Tirukkarukkunram), you are the kingly lord of auspicious sexual union. [B2] To Muttuvijaya Rangendran, unequaled in all the three worlds, a great religious man, you were born, great king Kacciranga Maharaja! One night is an eternity for this beautiful woman, her mind confused, intoxicated by Kama. [B3] O fragrantlygarlanded holder of the lance! O Murugan of Mylapore! [B4] She is youthful with fish-like eyes, long slender bowlike eyebrows; her waist is as thin as a thread, her face like the moon; and further, her body is fresh and pure as fine gold, is it not? Her flashing waist is thin as the creeper vine, her walk is as graceful as a swan, is it not? Here we see first, in [B1], the god Murugan referred to as the King of Tirukkarukkunram, the hilltop “Eagle Mount” shrine to Murugan about 40 miles southwest of Chennai, and specifically referred to as the lord of auspicious kalavi, sexual union—an excellent example of giving the divine-human attributes (God as the kingly lover). In [B2], we see Ghanam Krishna Ayyar praising both father and son, a procedure he adopts in all three of his songs on human patrons considered in this study. The caranam of [B3] lauds Murugan of Mylapore as the “fragrantly garland beautiful holder of the lance.” Finally, in this group [B4] is the exception in that we do not see a puram passage. We have already been given the nayaka’s name in the pallavi (simply as Velavare, not as attached to a particular place); this anupallavi text is like what is usually found in a caranam, in its description of the young nayaki’s beauty.

Caranams of Group B

Composition [B1], of unknown authorship, has different caranams in the performances of Smt. Madhavi Rajagopalan and Sri Maharajapuram Viswanatha Ayyar. Madhavi’s caranam (also the one danced by Smt. Swarnasaraswati) follows up on the social

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accomplishments implied in the pallavi—the young girl’s face bright as the moon, her sociability, and graceful speech. The poet says that “she belongs to Indrani,” a reference perhaps to this young girl belonging to the devadasi social community, as the god Indra (of which Indrani is the female form, therefore the name of his wife) is known for his patronage of dancers.28 The poet goes on to say that someone must have performed great worship, great pujas, to bring this nayaka and nayaki together. The caranam recorded by Maharajapuram Viswanatha Ayyar gives explicit biological information about the young girl, saying that she is ten years old, and “just became a woman” (i.e., had her first menses) six months back. It concludes by saying that it is auspicious that the nayaka and nayaki should be united. Taken together, the caranams of this song may give us a glimpse of some of the social realities which used to surround the ritual marriage of a young (pre-pubescent) girl to the deity of a temple, a rite by which she would become a devadasi, the always-auspicious wife of God.29 The first and second caranams of [B2] are an extensive chronicle of the young nayaki’s beauty and accomplishments, to which is appended reference to her lovesick state and a plea to the nayaka to “play in love” with her on a soft pillow bed; we see here many of the images already mentioned in previous caranams of Group A. The third caranam of [B2] contains puram style references to the “patron-complex” (father plus son) again, lauding the father Muttuvijaya Rangendran as “having Murugan’s blessings”, and once again entreating King Kacci Rangan to go to the nayaki “just as before” (mun polave) and embrace her, asking him “is there anyone like you for her?” Coming right at the end of the song, this “as before” adds a new twist, as no previous mention was made of any prior contact between nayaka and nayaki. The caranams of [B3] are quite packed with text and contain just about every typical image in the literature: Kama’s arrows, messengers, the body blackening with suffering, food becoming intolerable, and the normally sweet sounds of nagaswaram temple music (and/or the cuckoo’s soft call) turning harsh and unbearable, 28The

reference can also be read as saying that the nayaki is Devayanai, one of Murugan’s wives, as Devayanai is considered a daughter of Indra and Indrani. See Ratna Navaratnam, 1973:135. 29See Kersenboom (1987) on the concept and history of the Nityasumangali.

Presentation of Compositions by Group

are just a few. In [B4], we see much similarity with the caranams in [B2]; these are both padams of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar, and the similarity of the imagery (notably the preoccupation with the nayaki’s breasts) is striking between the two padams. Continuing where the (unusual) anupallavi has left off, the first caranam describes all the different types of ornamentation upon her youthful breasts (using the same term, ‘paccilam’, which occurs in the pallavi itself of [B2]), moving to her teeth, thighs, lips, tresses, and her soft tinkling walk that melts any and every heart. In the second caranam, the poet focuses on the nayaki’s despair as she stands as beautiful as a “carved picture” in the doorway watching for her lord to come. The third caranam sees her break down in copious pearl-like tears, and ends, just as [B2], with an appeal to the nayaka to go embrace the nayaki as before (again, mun polave). Coming right at the end of the song as in [B2], this is the first implication of a past relationship in the whole padam. We may note that as the third caranam is rarely danced, this component of the psychology of the song may be lost in performance. In summary, the pallavi sections of Group B are remarkably consistent, and the supporting imagery supplied in the caranams is also of a piece, although there is variation between the compositions in terms of style and explicitness of language. The nayaki is waiting, she is perfectly fit for the nayaka, the nayaka is entreated to accept her.

Groups C and D: Nayaki to Nayaka and Devotee to Lord

In the course of studying the texts of the third group, songs in which the nayaki addresses the nayaka, I eventually had to question the validity of using the terms nayaki and nayaka, and the tripartite rhetorical structure adopted up until now, to describe the rhetoric of some of the songs. This has led to the creation of two groups of four songs each for these eight compositions30: 1. Group C: Nayaki to Nayaka (Fig. 4.7)

30I

2. Group D: Devotee to Lord (Fig. 4.8)

would like to acknowledge the influence that the work of Norman Cutler has had on my writing of this section. See Discussion and Conclusions, below.

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First, we will examine the songs constituting Group C, which share many of the characteristics we have thus far seen in Groups A and B. The songs which have eventually come to form Group D did not fit into a sringara theme, that is, these songs do not appear to be about a lover-beloved relationship. They are cast in the mold of a speaker talking to—often teasing via ninda stuti—God. The speaker thus does not appear to be a nayaki, nor the addressee a nayaka. The songs of Group D will be discussed after considering Group C.

Figure 4.7 Group C, Nayaki to Nayaka.

This group of four songs involves the nayaki addressing the nayaka, and I have therefore retained the triadic diagram, even

Presentation of Compositions by Group

though a sakhi is nowhere mentioned in any of the four texts of this section.

Pallavis of Group C: “Hey You!”

[C1] Hey look! these clever tricks of yours won’t work here—please go, lord (aiya). [C2] Without money in hand did you come here to make love with me? If you’re asking for a loan, if you’re saying “I will pay later,” please get up and go, lord (cami). [C3] Where did you go last night? Tell me what happened, lord (cami). [C4] Don’t you have any manam? And don’t I have a great desire for you? Wait—tell me, lord! (cami). Of these four pallavis, at least the first three (all on Murugan) form a tremendously cohesive group in terms of the attitude or stance of the nayaki, if not reflecting the exact same circumstances which have led to that attitude. It is striking how different the voice of the nayaki is now, when she is speaking directly to the nayaka instead of indirectly about him to her sakhi. We find the nayaki boldly accosting her Cami (‘Swami’, lord), a stance or attitude neither evident in the indirect rhetoric of Group A, nor in Group B when the sakhi speaks directly to the nayaka. We may note that none of these compositions is addressing a human patron; such scalding treatment is apparently reserved (only permitted ...) for God.

Anupallavis of Group C

[C1] Just like a sannyasi (renunciate) you come and give me advice (or, you come around here singing). Hey, what is this? You, the brave Murugan (Kumara) who killed the demon Curan in battle, bravo for you! (sabash) [C2] Oh lord of Parani in the south, beautiful youthful Murugan (Kumareca), even if someone is your maternal uncle’s daughter, do you think she is going to go with you just like that? [C3] Oh dweller atop Tiruttani hill31 whose fame is ever-increasing, you bless Valli whose speech is sweet as the parrot (or, I know you went to see Valli of the 31Or,

in one version of the song, Tirupparankunran hill, five miles south of Madurai. Tiruttani and Tirupparankunran are both among the Aruppatai vitu,

the six “army fort-houses”, temples especially sacred to Murugan.

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long beautiful hair last night). [C4] Oh lord Vishnu,32 who grants whatever blessings your devotees wish, is this your behavior? In these anupallavis, we see the nayaki continue to boldly scold the nayaka, her lover, and/or client. The Kavikunjara Bharati composition among these, [C1] here contains another reference to Murugan’s conquest of the demon Cur, which we saw earlier in the third caranam of his composition [A6]. We also note that one version of the anupallavi of [C3] suggests that the “other woman” whom Murugan visited during the previous night was none other than his wife Valli. This led one scholar I consulted to suggest that the nayaki of this song could be portraying Devayanai, the other of Murugan’s two wives.33

Caranams of Group C

The first two caranams of [C1] are an absolutely glorious catalog of cutting remarks, consistent with the mood established in the pallavi. The nayaki first tells of Murugan seducing her and then straightaway violating their trust by going and telling her sister about their affair. The nayaki recounts the story of how Murugan fell in love with young Valli in the millet field and tricked her into falling into his arms,34 then says that thusly Murugan tricks all his devotees into loving him (as he doubtless tricked the wronged nayaki). As in the anupallavi of [C4], the nayaki ironically congratulates the great lord—who protects all his devotees, who created the whole world—for such a stripe of behavior. The third caranam of [Cl], as seen before in several compositions by now, adopts the puram mode and speaks of Murugan, who lives high atop the steps of Kunrakkudi mountain, who holds the spear, who loves both his wives Valli and Devayanai so happily, and who (in a reference to the composer) “blesses the famous family of Kavikunjara.” Only in the last line does the primary preoccupation of the nayaki return as she says, “instead of joyfully staying with me, you do your tricks caught in another wicked woman’s net. Aha! 32Or,

in another version, Siva as Tyagaraja of Tiruvarur. For all padams see complete translations in Appendix for further information. 33Jim Ryan, Personal communication, 1991. 34We have seen this story in the consideration of Kavikunjara Bharati’s padams on Murugan at Kunrakkudi.

Presentation of Compositions by Group

The caranams of [C2] also flow naturally from the situation set up in the pallavi; the nayaka is accosted for having come “with smiles and sweet talk”, expecting something for nothing. The nayaki reiterates that, even if she was greatly attracted to him, even if he was very beautiful, she would not just go with him “like that”, especially as she is a vecai, courtesan. She makes it clear through other remarks that for her, love is strictly a business proposition, painting a mocking pen-picture of the nayaka as one who just comes around humming “tra la la,” looking for love handouts. In [C3] occurs another reference seen earlier in [A11], to the nayaki having spent half the night waiting by the window, watching for the nayaka’s return while her eyes “grew dim.” In this particular caranam (the first of two given in the Appendix), the nayaki drops the tough facade to reveal her great pain at having been discarded by the nayaka. The second caranam maintains an accosting stance, with the nayaki accusing the nayaka and the rival wife or second wife (cakkalatti) of indiscretions in the manner of “didn’t she do this, and didn’t you do that?” Finally, in [C4], we see again at the beginning of the first caranam, the familiar reference to the youth (cinnam ciruvayatu) of the nayaki, when she trusted and gave herself to him completely, in the process breaking off the childhood relationship with her mother; the nayaki says that like a soft fruit she gave herself to be broken. The second caranam is in the form of several “if-then” statements, ending with “if behavior like this continues, it is a great misfortune to be born a woman.” As we move to Group D, we have now seen that although Group A appears quite diverse, due partly to its large size, there are many continuities to be found among the songs. Both Groups B and C have been seen to form a tightly coherent unit, where we can identify the addresser-addressee vector closely with a specific type of situation. The four songs which form Group D are 18th-century compositions, the works of Marimutta Pillai and Papavinasa Mudaliar. Three of the four are on Nataraja, and the ninda stuti approach is taken in two (and gently suggested in a third) of the songs. As we review the contents of the three sections of these songs, it will become clear why they have been conceived as a

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separate group from Group C, even though in both Groups C and D the speaker talks directly to the lord without reference to a sakhi.

Figure 4.8 Group D, Devotee to Lord.

Pallavis of Group D

[D1] You always have one leg raised; why such lameness (nonti), lord (aiya)? [D2] Oh lord (teyvame) standing there, dancing with one leg raised; take me as your devotee! [D3] Your face is showing, but your whole body is not visible; what is the secret of your being covered, lord (aiya)? [D4] You who used to get about quite well, now your left leg has become lame; why have you become crippled? Please tell me, lord (aiya). The three songs addressing Siva as Nataraja all make use of his raised left leg in the pallavi sections, while [D3] on Siva as Tyagaraja of Tiruvarur similarly makes use of a prominent aspect of the iconography of Siva at Tiruvarur, the fact that his image is mostly covered, excepting the head. In [D1] and [D4], the speaker (devotee) is clearly teasing the lord, addressing him through the ninda stuti mode. In the case of Nataraja, his raised leg is seen not as usually interpreted (ready to stamp down on Muyalakan, the “dwarf of ignorance”), but instead as evidence

Presentation of Compositions by Group

that Nataraja—the great invincible dancer who destroys and recreates the universe at will—has gone lame. As we will see, the job of the caranams in these ninda stuti compositions is to suggest possible reasons for such a condition.

Anupallavis of Group D

[D1] Great people in heaven and on earth praise you, oh dweller of Tillai’s Golden Hall! Yet even now, you are not resting ... [D2] Oh lord, you who gave birth to the spear-holding child (Murugan)! In shining Tillai’s Golden Hall ... [D3] Oh dweller of Tiruvarur, the grandest place in the universe! In your strong healthy body, could there be any defect, oh Tyagaraja? [D4] In the vast expanse of the great hall at Tillai, all the gods witnessed your dance in the Citsabha there, with your matted locks untied, flying. The first two songs, compositions of Marimutta Pillai, both refer to Nataraja as the dweller of the Golden Hall of Cidambaram, and end in incomplete sentences intended to be folded back into their respective pallavis. [D2] additionally identifies Nataraja as the father of Murugan, while using neither of their names directly—Nataraja is called the dweller of the Golden Hall, Murugan the “spear-holding child.” Now, in its anupallavi section, we can see that song [D3] is gently leaning toward a ninda stuti posture, the speaker asking in disbelief, “could such a body as yours possibly have any defect? Why should you keep it covered, Lord?” The anupallavi of [D4] counterpoints the pallavi (which has remarked the lord’s lameness) by describing the majestic powerful dance, which all the gods (tevar) had witnessed in the Citsabha, the “hall of wisdom” sacred dancing hall of Cidambaram.

Caranams of Group D

The caranams of [D1] are all couched in a “you went and did this; was it that that made you lame?” format. Stories associated with the gods found in texts called puranas35 serve as rich sources 35“The

Gupta period (4th–6th centuries A.D.) was not only the great classical period of Sanskrit literature, but, it also truly prepared the ground for the emergence of bhakti. ... Not only were the first Hindu temples built and the

first Hindu icons sculpted during this period, but the official forms of Hindu mythology were set down in great syncretic texts called the puranas. By the

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from which to draw particular incidents. In the ninda stuti format, the traditional stories are given a fresh twist in that the story becomes the premise which may have occasioned the lord (Nataraja) going lame. Various situations involving Nataraja’s dancing, his kicking Yama (Eman) the god of death to protect his devotee Markandeya, and his long walk in order to stamp out the sacrificial fire of his father-in-law Daksha (Takkan), to name just a few, serve as the basis for the question, “Was it this that made you lame?” Perhaps the most ingenious premise in [D1] is that from going to the house of Paravai (the lover of his devotee Sundarar) as a messenger on his devotee’s behalf, Siva (here as Nataraja) might have received a sprain from stumbling over her threshold in the darkness of night. This incident is magnificently illustrative of the extremes to which God will go to please his faithful devotee, and resolves itself in the very humorous suggestion (not contained in the usual telling of the story of Sundarar and Paravai, as far as I know) that there would have been a doorstep which tripped up Siva (Nataraja) and gave him a sprain. The third caranam finally comes to an end in asking, “among so many possible causes, which could be the one?” Indeed, it would be hard to choose—luckily, making such a choice is not at all the purpose of the song. In [D2], we have an example of a song on which is not cast as ninda stuti. The first caranam of this song describes some of the most important attributes of Siva as Nataraja, the deer and the battleax he carries in two of his four hands, the woman he carries in his body (as Ardhanarisvara, Siva as combining male and female elements), the Ganges river and the crescent moon he carries in his locks. The second caranam describes the lord Brahma, the sage Narada, and Siva’s mount Nandi, playing musical instruments to accompany Nataraja’s dance, while a chorus of celestial beings watches in delight and awe. The caranams of [D3] have already been noted in the discussion of their composer Papavinasa Mudaliar. The first caranam describes the twilight puja to Tyagaraja, asking why his fifth century A.D., Vishnu, Siva, their families, minions, and enemies seem to have become as real as the human dynasties.” A.K. Ramanujan and Norman Cutler, 1983:177.

Presentation of Compositions by Group

image is covered at that time; the second caranam describes the dance of Tyagaraja when taken out in procession, again noting at the end that the image is covered except for one foot, and asking why. The third caranam discusses the bathing time of the god, again noting that he is hidden (this time behind the doors of the shrine for abhishekam, his bathing). The speaker ends content, however, affirming that Tyagaraja protects his devotees and destroys all sin. In [D4] with only one caranam available, we find a very close similarity in approach, and choice of stories, to [D1]. Here Paravai is named specifically in the suggestion that the lord might have stumbled over her step; the kick to the god of death Yama, and the suggestion that he might have contracted a rheumatic condition from an imbalance of hot and cold elements in his body (of which we saw another example in [D1]) are also found again here. The last hypothesis, however, is unique to this composition: the speaker asks finally, “or was it my sins, Lord?” which caused Nataraja to go lame. Again, as with the compositions grouped together as B and C, we find in Group D, a close correspondence between the main themes and the devices used to realize them, of all the songs in the group. This group, however, is quite distinct from Groups A, B, and C, in that a situation involving lover and beloved is not here drawn by the composer. It also coheres as a group chronologically, as all the songs of Group D are from the 18th century. There now remain only a few songs left to consider, and it becomes more difficult to group them together. I have placed these two songs together as Group E (Fig. 4.9) because both involve one woman addressing another, and the two songs share a brash and somewhat confrontational mood. In [E1], the nayaki is recognizable by the standards of a sringara composition, that is, she is depicted by the speaker as a woman in love, in this case with that crazy Siva who dances with demons and has many other non-standard societal habits. The sakhi in some songs in the Peyandi-complex36 is understood as the mother, addressing the nayaki as makale, daughter. This does not happen here—we are given no indication of the relationship between 36The idea of a “Peyandi-complex” has been discussed in the section on Gopalakrishna

Bharati. He or Kavikunjara Bharati may be the author of the composition.

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the two women, except that the sakhi adopts a lecturing tone in the pallavi, which might suggest her (the sakhi) to be older and more experienced than the nayaki.

Figure 4.9 Group E, Sakhi to Nayaki.

In [E2], we have quite a different situation; here a woman (the sakhi, by our classification) lectures Yasoda, the mother of Krishna (the nayaki) about her son’s antics. Neither sakhi nor nayaki in this song fits the previous picture of them we have been building up through consideration of Groups A through C. In short, my reservations about envisioning these two songs as a vector from sakhi-to-nayaki rest partly with the nature of the sakhi in this group, which is so different from Group B, when she is the loyal faithful friend petitioning the nayaka to accept the nayaki, and partly by the fact that Yasoda is the mother of, not the lover of, Krishna, and therefore, not a nayaki at all unless we really stretch the definition to include any devotee Any reservation about placing the two together as a group is overshadowed, however, by the fact that these two songs are more similar to each other in rhetorical stance than they are to other songs considered in the study.

Remaining Compositions

The two compositions that have not been discussed in this section are Yaro ivar yaro [F1] and Natanam adinar [G1]. The first

Discussion

involves Rama speaking about his first view of his future wife Sita, not specifying to whom he is speaking, while the second involves an unidentified speaker speaking about the great dance of Nataraja. As we will see from the discussion in the next section, they are both on the periphery of the Tamil padam genre; here we simply note that they certainly are the exception from the point of view of rhetorical stance in this repertoire, each constituting a “group” of one in itself.

4.16 Discussion: A Corpus with Fuzzy Edges

I have found the work of Norman Cutler especially helpful in conceptualizing a scheme by which to organize the body of work known as the Tamil padam. From the beginning of my research, I was tossing around terms (to myself and willing listeners) like “mainstream padam”, “peripheral padam”, and even “non­ padam padam”, in an attempt to understand what is central, and what is not, to the repertoire. To add to the complexity of the picture regarding padams in particular, the term padam is used differently by different scholars and performers. Some songs are padams to one observer which are most definitely not padams to another—the song Natanam adinar [G1] of Gopalakrishna Bharati has been included in this study as a good example of a song which in my opinion one really has to stretch the definition of padam to embrace, yet it has been labeled padam by many dancers. Regarding the body of work he has studied, Cutler found that: “Tamil bhakti poetry is a corpus with fuzzy edges—not that Tamil Vaisnavas and Saivas are unclear about which texts constitute the sacred canons of their faith but there are poems included in the canon that stand apart formally from the majority of the saints’ poems and that sometimes closely resemble other poems that are not included in the canon.”37

37N.

Cutler, 1987:1.

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Within the canon of Tamil bhakti poetry, Cutler found “fuzzy edges” dividing the poems with a more direct form of rhetorical address from those with a more indirect form of address: “I will argue that ‘typical’ bhakti poems present themselves or can be manipulated to be interpreted as direct expressions of their authors’ devotion to Visnu or Siva, and that poems structured in terms of genres that mask the poet’s voice behind the voices of narrators that cannot easily be identified with the poet, even if they evince sentiments of devotion, are in a certain sense subordinated to poems of the first type.”38

At this point, in his argument, Cutler has begun to define what is indirect in terms of the voice of the speaker not being clearly identified as that of the historical poet. Later in his analysis, Cutler is more explicit about the system of rhetoric operative in bhakti poetry and its sectarian interpretation by later generations: “I would argue that Tamil Vaisnava and Saiva audiences use poems in which the poet unambiguously addresses the deity, the audience, or his own heart as a standard for interpretation of poems with less precisely defined rhetorical structures. From this point of view, the poems that are rhetorically most direct may, for purposes of analysis, be considered to be at the ‘core’ of the Tamil bhakti corpus; they constitute a standard. Poems in which no addressee is specified occupy a stratum once removed from the core, and poems in which neither speaker nor addressee is specified are located even farther from the center.”39

Developing this argument, Cutler discusses the borrowing of akam and puram conventions from Cankam poetry by the bhakti poets, stressing the primacy of the identification of speaker with historical poet (that is, the puram influence) while admitting a large akam influence as well: 38N. 39N.

Cutler, 1987:11.

Cutler, 1987:27.

Discussion

“In bhakti poems as in puram poems, it is not always clear whether the narrative voice heard in a poem is the voice of a dramatized narrator or of the historical poet. In the vast majority of cases, the colophons that accompany the puram poems identify the narrator’s voice as the poet’s own. Similarly, sectarian tradition resolves the equivalent ambiguity in the saints’ poems and uniformly interprets the narrative voices heard in these poems as the voices of the historical saints. And, as one would expect, events portrayed in the poems are taken to be events in the saints’ lives.”

“One might protest that this portrait of bhakti poetry hardly does justice to the corpus in its entirety. After all, in many of their poems the saints drew directly upon conventions of akam poetry, and to many, the link with the akam tradition may appear even more obvious than the connection with puram poems. It is true that the corpus contains many akam-like poems. But at the same time, sectarian interpreters of the saints’ poems place them in a framework that conforms to the puram/bhakti model. This model is constructed on the premise that poems that fall within its sphere are historical and specific. In contrast, the classical akam model responds to a poetry that is fictive and universal.”40

What is of greatest interest here for my study is that Cutler places a direct rhetorical strategy at the heart of the bhakti corpus, calling poems that use this strategy “typical” or “mainstream” bhakti poems, and those that do not, “marginal” examples of the genre.41 Moving to consider padams, I will use Cutler’s concept of a repertoire built upon core compositions, but containing marginal or peripheral compositions as well. What constitutes the core and the margins of the Tamil padam repertoire, I will argue in my turn, is somewhat the inverse of the findings of Cutler for the bhakti corpus. Just as bhakti poetry assimilated both akam and puram elements from the Cankam literature into a new framework involving personal religious devotion, the Tamil padam has 40N. 41N.

Cutler, 1987:68–69. Cutler, 1987:11,69.

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assimilated elements of erotic devotion from the bhakti literature (whether one argues these constitute purely indigenous or exported-and-reimported elements), inclusive of akam and puram elements as well (Fig. 4.10). We find a play between the ancient interior and exterior worlds living in the contemporary padam.

Figure 4.10 Akam and puram elements in Tamil padams.

A brief parenthesis: Whether the padam literature represents devotion as well as human love, the sacred as well as the secular, is a hotly debated question. Some argue that a padam is an allegory by which a situation apparently portraying a merely human love truly represents (or should represent), on a higher plane, the search of the human soul for union with the divine. Others vehemently disagree. The answer to the question of whether padams contain an allegorical level is dependent on both historical and social-cultural factors, and finally, today must lie as much within the individual who participates in or observes the performance of padams—his or her experiences, attitudes, values, and beliefs—as within any individual padam text itself. This argument—as to what a padam is—hints at an area in which the corpus of padams and bhakti poetry are quite different. As Cutler says (in the first citation above), there is a canon of bhakti poetry; that is, generations of commentator-scholars have agreed on what is in, and what is out. Within this canon, Cutler has worked to understand the mainstream and marginal poetic elements and compositions. With padams, as indeed with contemporary performing arts in general in India, there is not a canon parallel to the idea of the canon in European classical

Organization of the Repertoire

music; there are no authoritative listings of compositions, let alone authoritative editions of texts, laid down for padams. And no consensus has been reached about the issue of whether a padam is today supposed to be a religious allegory or strictly a secular entertainment. There is much room for individual initiative in deciding what, for one’s self or one’s school of thinking, is padam. My approach in choosing compositions for this study (mentioned in the introduction) was to be inclusive rather than exclusive, within certain limits.42 This has given me a diverse body of material to move around in, developing the concept of a core repertoire, partly through the perspective gained from including compositions of somewhat doubtful padamness, compositions which, following Cutler, I will consider to be marginal or peripheral examples of the genre.

4.17 Organization of the Repertoire: The Indirect Stance

Based on the sheer number of songs falling into Group A, let us first look there in our search for central organizational principles. Almost half of the songs in this study fall into Group A.43 Firstly, we observe that the nayaki speaks to the sakhi, about her love for the nayaka. I believe this constitutes in an important sense an indirect rhetorical stance, although not indirect in the identical sense used by Cutler with reference to bhakti poetry. For Cutler, the first step away from the direct rhetorical 42The

biggest limitation is probably in my not including works of 20th or 21st-century composers, with which I am not familiar and which are not included in the repertoire of my teacher and his family. 43As mentioned in the introduction, the principle of selection was by raga, not text. I am confident that if the whole repertoire of Tamil padams were to be examined, approximately the same proportions of songs would fall into the various groups as have done so in this study, a study of a slice of the repertoire. The inclusion of several of the songs in Group A could be questioned, for example, the two Kuravanji compositions, the two padams of Muttuttandavar wherein the nayaki does not specifically address a sakhi, or Enkumayamana, [A4] the praise composition on Ranganatha of Srirangam. Removing these compositions would still leave Group A the largest by far, however.

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approach in the “mainstream” bhakti poem, where a historically identifiable speaker addresses his god directly, is to poems “in which no addressee is specified.” Such poems “occupy a stratum once removed from the core.”44 This is the sense in which Cutler begins to move from the direct toward the indirect. What I mean by indirect here in the songs of Group A, is the fact that the nayaki does not talk directly to the nayaka about her love for him. She goes to her friend the sakhi, often asking the sakhi to go to the nayaka on her behalf. The indirect stance itself, I would suggest, must be a central feature of what it means to be a padam. Almost as if in response to the collective request of the songs of Group A, the sakhi in Group B approaches the nayaka on behalf of the nayaki.45 The songs of Group B, consistent with those of Group A, adopt an essentially indirect rhetorical stance, as the sakhi speaks not for herself but for the nayaki.46

The Direct Stance

In marked contrast to the songs of Groups A and B, the songs of Groups C and D take an essentially direct rhetorical stance. The songs of Group C do involve a true nayaki, in the sense that the speaker speaks as a woman who is involved in a human-style love relationship with the nayaka. We have seen that the songs of Group D, on the other hand, are not structured this way. For these songs, I’ve found it more appropriate to envision the main protagonist as a devotee and his or her god whom he or she addresses directly, rather than using the nayaki-nayaka 44These

quotes are excerpted from the third citation of N. Cutler, above. do not intend to imply a sequence or a logical “next step” relationship between songs of Group A and Group B here. Padams are considered free-standing individual pieces. I have never seen anyone argue this; but then again, I have never seen anyone organize padams by the rhetoric of address either. We might conceive of Group A as constituting the core of the core, then Group B as the next closest group to the core as Group B “follows” Group A in a thematicdevelopment sense. 46That is, except in cases where the sakhi ends up in the arms of the nayaka; no such songs are included in this study, but a good example of such a Tamil padam is Unnai tutu anuppinën (I sent you as my messenger) where the nayaki finds the sakhi returning from her meeting with the nayaka covered with teeth marks, smeared makeup, etc. 45I

Weaving of Akam and Puram Elements

terminology. The songs of Group C, then, appear to be closer to the core of the padam repertoire, while those of Group D appear situated more toward the periphery. While at the periphere from the point of view of padam, the songs of Group D seem to be closest to the core of the bhakti poetry repertoire described by Cutler. Although the composer/speaker identifies himself only sometimes (through the use of a mudra such as Papavinasa for example) the direction of address is still directly from the devotee to God.

4.18 Weaving of Akam and Puram Elements

The akam-influenced pallavi almost never mentions the nayaka’s name (a good exception is Velavare [B4]); this is the province of the puram-influenced anupallavi which, as we have seen, often gives extensive epithets regarding the nayaka, his father (if a human patron), and/or his place of residence. Among the caranams, the first two deal with the interior, akam, themes such as the very common mode of beginning by referring (in Group A) to the youth of the nayaki, when she first fell in love and/or gave in to the advances of the nayaka. When a third caranam is available, we see that often the composer gives his name there as mudra (signature), and sometimes additional reference is made to the nayaka as well. In the third caranams of Kavikunjara Bharati’s padams, we have seen Murugan conquering the demon Cur, and his happy domestic relationship with his wives Devayanai and Valli described; and in Ghanam Krishna Ayyar’s third caranams, we sometimes see references to Vishnu as Murugan’s uncle, or to the greatness of a particular patron. This could have its ancestry in the phalasruti, the signature verse tradition in Tamil bhakti poetry described by Cutler: “Phalasrutis operate in a different rhetorical register from the other verses of a patikam, for in a phalasruti the poet speaks of himself in the third person. In this sense the phalasruti verses are metapoems—poems about poems. A phalasruti brings the verses it follows into “earshot” of a historical audience, and it makes an explicit connection

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between the narrative voice heard in the poems and a quasi-historical author.”47

Indeed, in some of the third caranams of Tamil padams (either in the last few lines or, rarely, throughout the whole caranam), there is a change of register—it seems as if the nayaki or sakhi who has been speaking from the beginning steps back, and the poet himself or herself emerges, speaking in the third person—to say, as in, for example, Nan ange varuveno [A11] “the true devotee Subbaraman’s song is blessed by Velavar.” We feel for a brief moment we are indeed here in the middle of a bhakti poem, with its attendant emphasis on the identification of a historical author with the speaker, and on direct devotion expressed to God.

4.19 Conclusion

“Perhaps you could call Murugan more a lover, and Nataraja more a dancer.”

—T. Viswanathan48

We have seen that among the nayakas, the songs of Groups A, B, and C favor Murugan (unless the padam is on a human patron) while those of Group D favor Siva as Nataraja. This ties in with the picture we are drawing of central and peripheral elements to the padam repertoire, and fits with historical sources which tell us that Nataraja was not a nayaka in the central or core sense of lover, to the traditional devadasi dance community. Indeed, Murugan is the nayaka par excellence for the Tamil padam (as Krishna is for the Telugu padam). The burgeoning of popularity of songs using Nataraja as the subject (avoiding the term nayaka for the moment) beginning in the late 1930s49 testifies to the changes 47N.

Cutler, 1987:27–28. The patikam is the ten-verse decad format used in much of bhakti poetry, to which is sometimes appended an eleventh verse, the phalasruti. Whether a given phalasruti is part of the original poem or a later addition by persons other than the poet is a matter of scholarly debate. 48T. Viswanathan, personal communication, 1992. 49Natanam adinar [G1] and Kalaittukki [D2] are perfect examples of songs on Nataraja which became especially popular in dance beginning in the late 1930s.

Conclusion

in attitudes, performing personnel, and venue in the world of dance, all of which came to a head in South India in the 1930s. To call Nataraja (as he is portrayed in compositions like Natanam adinar or Kalaittukki) a nayaka is to stretch our definition of the term beyond traditional parameters which see the nayaka as a heavenly romantic lead.50 As a hero in compositions like Natanam adinar or Kalaittukki, Nataraja is praised as the great dancing god; he is not portrayed as the lover of the speaker. Murugan, on the other hand, is virtually always conceived of as the lover or potential lover of the speaker in the setting of the Tamil padam. We have characterized the body of Tamil padam as essentially a poetry of indirect communication, a quiet private, akam, place within the world of dance, which contains within it the contrast offered by puram-influenced naming of a nayaka and often of the poet. We have organized the repertoire into groups based on the direction of the address contained in the poems, and posited that Groups A, B, and C contain the core repertoire in the padam world. Groups D and onward have been seen as peripheral examples of the padam genre. Reference was made to the study of Norman Cutler which found that the core repertoire of bhakti poetry was centered around a rhetoric of direct address, while for the padams, we found the core repertoire to be, in contrast, centered around a rhetoric of indirect address. Certain other formal properties have been discussed—for example, how a pallavi and anupallavi have relatively few words and low text density, and are repeated many times in dance, while the caranam sections contain a greater density of text and a sheer number of words, and are generally passed over in “recipe” manner by a dancer, that is, just one interpretation of the line is essayed, being closely tied to the literal meaning of the text. An organization of the texts of the Tamil padam repertoire based upon groupings by rhetorical stance is, as far as I am aware, an original effort on my part. It has, I think, a significant 50Compositions,

such as the padams of Muttuttandavar (ref. Manatariyamal [A8] and Teruvil varano [A13]) and Enna ninaindaro [A5], do treat Nataraja as the heavenly lover are therefore the more remarkable, given the general non-romantic conception of this god.

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correlation to the system of the ashta nayika (eight nayakis), the psychological division of the concept of the heroine developed over millennia, in that the padams of specific groups as I have constituted them seem to fit in at least some cases into the traditional ashta nayika classification. For example, the padams of Group B (sakhi addresses nayaka on behalf of the nayaki) all imply that the nayaki is waiting for her lord; waiting is characteristic of the vasakasajjika as well as, in a different shading, the virahotkhandita. And the padams of Group C (in which the nayaki directly addresses the nayaka) manifest to a large extent an impatient and confrontational attitude on the part of the nayaki, which reminds us of the khandita or, again with a different shading, the vipralambha nayaki. The songs of Group A are a large enough group so that I don’t see them clustering into one or two specific categories of the ashta nayika but, indeed, containing the totality—all the shades—of this aesthetic-cum-psychological system. We must note that the ashta nayika classification itself was never intended to put the nayaki in one airtight category to the exclusion of others: the dancer in performance can draw on these categories as a painter on a palette of color, to enrich the portrayal of that which is most certainly one of the more complex human (and divine) interactions.

Chapter 5

The Musical Organization of Tamil Padams 5.1 Principle of Selection of Material We now move to the music of the Tamil padam, examining performances of the same group of compositions whose composers were considered in Chapter 3 and whose texts we have considered in Chapter 4. The melodic organization of the materials was conditioned by my a priori decision to choose a small number of ragas for study. That is, raga was the initial screening filter in my selection of material. My strategy in selecting songs was first exclusive, to choose a small number of ragas, and then inclusive—to find all the songs with a living performance tradition that I could, within those ragas.1 Among the resulting group of songs and performances, some strike me as sublime, some as ridiculous, many as quite moving and beautiful. I feel that the principle of selection used for this study captures a slice of padam life, a representative selection of songs from the living repertoire of Tamil padams. In order for the reader to be able to concur with this assessment, let us begin by showing the place of the three ragas presented in this chapter—Bhaivari, Kambhoji, and Todi—in 1Three

songs outside of the selected group of ragas have been added to the study because of their importance in the 20th century performing history. They provide balance, perspective, and additional representation of certain composers. These compositions—Teruvil varano [A13], Kalaittukki [D2], and Natanam adinar [G1]—will not be discussed in this chapter, as they are not in one of the ragas the study is focusing on.

The Tamil Padam: A Dance Music Genre of South India Matthew Harp Allen

Copyright © 2023 Jenny Stanford Publishing Pte. Ltd.

ISBN 978-981-4968-56-0 (Hardcover), 978-1-003-33638-9 (eBook)

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the context of the total raga picture in the world of padams (and the javali genre as well). My contention being that study of songs found in these three ragas will constitute a study representative of the padam repertoire writ large, let us consider a few statistics regarding the number of padams which are set in various ragas. In Fig. 5.1, the lists under T. Balasaraswati refer to the number of padams in those ragas contained in her repertoire, while the other listings refer to a number of padams in particular ragas by the composer. I have not given complete lists of ragas occurring in padams, only the ragas most commonly used.

Figure 5.1 Padams by raga in particular collections.2–62,3,4,5,6 2The

statistics for Telugu and Tamil padams in T. Balasaraswati’s repertoire are as published by V.K. Narayana Menon, 1963:24–27. 3These statistics are as given by Vissa Appa Rao in his Telugu language book on Ksetrayya (Reference courtesy, T.S. Parthasarathy, Chennai). 4Summary of Vaidisvarankoil Subbarama Ayyar padams in VSA, 1906. 5Summary of Ghanam Krishna Ayyar padams in U.V. Swaminatha Ayyar, 1987. 6Summary of Kavikunjara Bharati padams in KKB, 1927. From the collection of

Madura Kavi Bharati padams in the same book: 8 Begada, 5 Mohanam, 5 Asaveri.

Qualities of Raga

5.2 Qualities of Raga 5.2.1 “Major” Ragas The above tells us that Bhairavi, Kambhoji, and Todi are commonly used ragas in both Telugu and Tamil padams. These three ragas are all well known as major ragas, possessing a long history in performance (although Todi is somewhat junior to the other two in music history), ample scope7 for improvisation, and many compositions. Bhairavi, Kambhoji, and Todi were used extensively by composers of the Trinity for their kritis, so they can be heard in virtually all kacceris (concerts) of Karnataka music today. Of the other ragas we see well represented in the collections above, several others such as Sankarabharanam and Kalyani are also major Karnataka ragas.

Figure 5.2 T. Balasaraswati Javalis by raga8.

When we look at the ragas commonly used in javalis, a dance genre in some respects quite similar to padam, the picture of 7I

put the terms “major” and “scope” in double quotations because they are Indian English terms as well as American English terms; that is, these terms of English language origin are frequently heard in Tamil language musicological discourse. I will follow this practice with other such terms below. 8In V.K. Narayana Menon, 1963:24–27.

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raga usage is dramatically different.9 Figure 5.2 shows the ragas used in javalis in the repertoire of T. Balasaraswati.

5.2.2 Rakti Ragas

We see very little continuity between the ragas that composers and their interpreters10 have chosen to set padams and javalis. Among the three ragas we will consider, Kambhoji is represented by two javalis, and the other two ragas by one each. Major ragas such as Sankarabharanam and Kalyani are not at all in evidence. There is, however, one way in which the ragas—and the musical feeling, in general—of padams and javalis are envisioned as similar by Karnataka musicians and connoisseurs; it is expressed in the idea that rakti, sweet ragas, are ideal for padams and javalis. The words rakti and also raga both come from the word root ranj, that which colors the mind. The term rakti is used to mean a raga that is alluring or appealing. Rakti is not a mutually exclusive category, but a quality which, many would argue, any raga should have. The highly regarded vocalist D.K. Jayaraman asked in the course of a 1984 interview: “When do you call a place a town? Only when it has developed an identity of its own, with some streets, some infrastructure and a population. In the same way, a raga needs to be woven into kriti-s which should be sung extensively.”

9The

“I feel we should sing only rakti raga-s in kutcheri-s [concerts] by and large. They are called by that name because of their powerful appeal. Kalyani, Sankarabharanam, Kambhoji, Bhairavi, Karaharapriya, Hindolam, Suddha Danyasi, and many others. Swara-s flow easily in these ragas, sangati-s can

musician Vina Dhanammal and her descendants are known for their mastery of both these genres; one hears pada-javali used as a single term when the music of this family is discussed. 10The frequency of padams, which are performed today in ragas different than those specified in printed collections of 100–200 years ago, is quite high. Just a few examples: One song in this study, Kaiyil panam illamal [C2] has been set in at least four ragas: Saranga, Bhairavi, Todi, and Sahana. Another well-known example is the famous padam of Muttuttandavar, Teruvil varano [A13] performed in the family of Vina Dhanammal in Khamas raga; in the 19th-century book of Muttuttandavar’s compositions, the raga is given in Kalyani.

Qualities of Raga

be sung abundantly and the listener is immensely satisfied. Some singers insist on singing rare raga-s like Nabhomani, Nasikabhushani and so on. But these raga-s lack rakti. Raga is not just a combination of swara-s, an arohana and an avarohana.” 11

5.2.3 Ghana Ragas

The three ragas of this study are all known as rakti ragas.12 They are also known by another musicological term which we have seen before, in the related context of discussing a composer and his way of singing; that is, ghana (or ghanam). Bhairavi, Kambhoji, and Todi, versatile creatures are considered to be ghana ragas, weighty ragas, ragas with substantial melodic history (and therefore latent potential, always at the ready), out of which a performer can build extensive improvisational sections. Ragas possessing ghana qualities are therefore ragas suitable for performance as the main piece of a kacceri.13 Considering the terms major, rakti, and ghana all together as they are applicable to the music of padams, we can envision the padam as mediating musically between the pure classical ideals embodied in the kritis of the Trinity, and the javali, which is often discussed as being a lighter form than kriti or padam.14 11D.K.

Jayaraman in Sruti, August 1984:10:23. Another usage of the term rakti is in referring to the periya melam nagaswaram ensemble, as rakti melam. 12P. Sambamurthy calls all three “sarva svara gamaka varika rakti raga,” in 1964:345 (Todi), 1964:352 (Bhairavi), and 1964:366 (Kambhoji). See individual raga histories below. 13There is an important performance tradition (especially associated with vina) called ghana raga pancakam, the “five-weighty ragas;” they are Nata, Gaula, Arabhi, Sri, and Varali. 14A few examples of the terms in which this characterization is framed are given here. P. Sambamurthy distinguishes javali from padam by two main criteria: his view that a javali is “light” classical music, and that in javalis, there is no such convention of a dignified nayaka, as there is in padams. “The characters figuring in a javali are of a lower status.” P. Sambamurthy, 1964:214–215. Smt. K.R. Madhavi, after saying that padams and javalis share the same subject matter of sringara or love, distinguishes them by the nature of that love: “Contrasted with the padas which are songs of divine love, are the javalis, which are songs treating of light love.” Madhavi, 1960:17.

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(It is perhaps in a similar sense that thumri is commonly referred to as a genre of “light classical” music in the Hindustani tradition, although the term “light classical” does not seem to be as current in Karnataka music discourse). It is important to note that padams are, on the one hand, considered by most thoughtful observers to be at the heart of the Karnataka classical tradition—as epitomized in their performance within the family tradition of Vina Dhanammal,—and on the other hand, that it is not uncommon to hear musicians (or to see concert programs) refer to padams and javalis together in the same breath as the light portion of the program. So, there is some ambiguity in the way the padam genre is conceived, although within the family of Vina Dhanammal, I have never heard anyone use the term “light” to refer to the music of either padams or javalis. As this chapter proceeds, we will present the argument that the classicalness or lightness of a padam (as performed, the only way it can be experienced in full) depends at least as much if not more on the manner of its interpretation and presentation, than on innate properties embedded in it by its composer, textual, or musical. Figure 5.3 illustrates how the terms and genres discussed above can be mapped onto each other in a very general manner.

Figure 5.3 Perception of raga usage across genres.

Qualities of Raga

The extent or quality of the overlapping of the concepts of major, ghana, and rakti in raga15 is nowhere etched in stone: for example, I believe that the term “major” should be slightly more inclusive than the term “ghana.” I have accordingly stretched the right-facing arrow for major further to the right than for ghana. I do not mean to argue, however, that these three concepts of raga can be cleanly delineated in a simple linear fashion, and accordingly request the reader not to interpret my figure in such a manner.16 The fact that in Fig. 5.3, the right-facing arrow for major ragas stops short of javali, and that the left-facing arrow for rakti stops short of kriti, is not intended to be an absolute cutoff, but a shading out. As concepts, major, ghana, and rakti are also multivalent; one finds in lists of ragas given by scholars of Karnataka music much overlapping and little consensus on an exact definition for any of the terms. It is not possible to say that in each and all circumstances, a certain raga A will fit neatly and cleanly into one and only one of these 15While

not bringing the categories of marga and desi into the main body of my text, I would like to take note here of the importance of these terms and the scholarly discussion of their application to raga. P. Sambamoorthy writes, “Marga: ancient, as opposed to desi which developed later in the different provinces in India. Strict adherence to rules was one of the characteristics of marga. In the desi, a certain relaxation of rules was allowed.” 1971:50. Also “Desi: belonging or pertaining to desa or country. Every province of India was called a desa in ancient times. Desi sangita was the music that was in vogue in the different provinces. It developed spontaneously. It was nurtured by the intelligent and thinking folk of the land without any dictation from a superior source or authority. It was the art music of the land.” 1984:1:105. To characterize the distinction between marga and desi as one between “classical” and “non-classical,” respectively, would seem to be much too simplistic a reduction of the complex relationship through the history of these two terms. Exactly because of this complexity, I am not using marga and desi as terminology with respect to padams. 16Another possible implication, which I would hate to see drawn from the figure, is (for example) that a rakti raga is not appropriate for the main item of a kacceri, which is the core of the classical listening experience. (I agree with D.K. Jayaraman who has already addressed this). Drawing such an inference from the figure would be wrong; however, my guess would be that upon hearing a raga extensively developed as the main piece of a concert, the attentive listener might be more involved with or more deeply satisfied by the raga’s ghanam than its rakti qualities. The issue is obviously highly subjective and personal.

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categories—as we have seen, the three ragas of this study are all considered to be major, ghana and rakti ragas. What I mean to suggest is that the way these three terms shade into each other is consistent with a way in which the three genres kriti, padam, and javali can be proposed to fit into a musicological universe in which classical and light are considered the boundaries of discourse. Bhairavi, Kambhoji, and Todi, then, are three complex melodic entities which live through the concepts they are associated with—they are major ragas, heard often; they are weighty ragas, full of facets and challenges to satisfy the intellectually oriented musician or scholar; and they are alluring, attractive ragas, pleasing even upon first audition by a layperson.

5.3 Varnamettu: Setting a Tune

The subject of raga is, as many a musician will rightly aver, a “vast ocean.” In a study such as this which attempts to give an overall history of a genre of dance music, raga itself cannot be the main focus; the interested reader is referred to other studies for introductory and specialized information on raga.17 My concentration of interest regarding raga in this study has come to center around a small piece in the vast puzzle of melody in South India, a heretofore relatively obscure Karnataka musicological concept called mettu or varnamettu, literally “tune.” Prof. P. Sambamoorthy’s Dictionary of South Indian Music and Musicians gives the term an extremely brief mention, saying only “Mettu: tune; dhatu; sometimes also referred to as varnamettu.”18 In common parlance (what we might call the conservative or restricted sense of the term), the mettu of a song is just this—its melodic setting. How did an interest in varnamettu emerge? First, upon listening to many old 78 RPM recordings of padams during my period of research in Chennai in 1990, I was quite surprised to find that many padams which were in the same raga had very 17See Robert Brown, 1971; Harold Powers, 1980; David Reck, 1992; P. Sambamoorthy

(1964) and other books of Sambamoorthy’s South Indian Music series, I–VI. Sambamoorthy, 1971:62.

18P.

Autobiographical

similar tunes; for example, the full melodic settings of almost all the Kambhoji raga padams on the old recordings seemed to me almost identical. This came as, bluntly, a shock, given the history of my experience of Karnataka raga up to that point as a vast limitless ocean. Second, I came across an article published in the Journal of the Music Academy of Madras which used the term varnamettu in a way that seemed to describe the very phenomenon I was hearing in these old recordings. This began to expand the possibilities of the semantic field of varnamettu in my mind, to the point where I now use the term in this study to mean a common tune, or “a virtually identical melodic setting found in several songs within one raga.” Basically, I decided to expand the concept of varnamettu from a reference to the melodic setting of an individual composition, to the melodic setting of a group of compositions. I am aware that such an expanded usage of the term may be questioned, and would like to make it clear that the scholars who are quoted in the following pages in the service of the development of my ideas are not to be held responsible for my speculations on the subject, nor to be assumed to be in agreement with them.

5.4 Autobiographical

To someone familiar with Karnataka music in general, or the music of the family of Vina Dhanammal and padams in particular, varnamettu may seem like quite a strange choice of focus in a study of the raga. The last thing one would ever hear in the music of the Dhanammal family—a concept quite different from the “vastness” of raga—is total melodic redundancy across songs in one raga. Hence, an autobiographical note to give a perspective on my arrival at such a focus. I began my study with Dr. T. Viswanathan at Wesleyan University in 1984. After one and a half years of graduate school, I was compelled by the rules of the academy to write my Master’s Thesis, which I composed at the suggestion of my committee on the subject of raga. At the time I felt (I think “whimsically” would be the proper adverb here) that this to be one of the grand absurdities of my life to that point: I was to pronounce upon raga before I could begin to

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sing or hear it. Thanks to a supportive committee, I was able to complete this assignment. By the end of my third year of study, Viswa was beginning to teach me second and third compositions in particular ragas; that is, I was learning my second or third composition in ragas such as Bhairavi, Todi, and Kambhoji.

5.5 Astonishment at Recognizing a Phrase

At this point, I would find myself totally overcome with joy if I so much as recognized a single phrase in common between the various compositions in the same raga that I was learning. Raga was for me completely and utterly that vast, limitless ocean. This impression was enhanced by the literature I was reading on Karnataka music theory and history, and by conversations with musicians and listening to many kacceris (concerts) when on my first two brief trips to Chennai.19 There is great depth to raga and tala historically, theoretically, and practically, as there is to Karnataka music as a whole. As a guitarist and songwriter not previously steeped in the performance of any tradition whose votaries call it classical, the sophistication of theory in the Karnataka musical system impressed itself upon me all the stronger in my first several years of study. I eventually settled on Tamil padams as the subject for my dissertation. I was not much aware of the differences between Telugu and Tamil padams at that point. I chose Tamil padams to study because they had been significantly less studied than Telugu padams in my teacher’s family. But when I began to spend more time in India, I realized that while my teacher’s repertoire which I was learning in the USA was largely made up of Telugu padams, the repertoires of dancers in South India were heavily weighted toward Tamil padams. In Chennai, I heard many more Tamil than Telugu padams in concerts, probably reflecting the 19During

my first two trips to Chennai at age 35 or so I remember feeling special collegiality with the numerous 12- and 13-year-old boys one meets at places like the Tyagaraja Sangita Vidwat Samajam in Mylapore who are studying Karnataka music and playing quite well at that young age. They have been hearing since age zero and learning since age five or so; they very graciously would share their knowledge and excitement about Karnataka music with me.

Astonishment at Recognizing a Phrase

fact that Tamil is the primary language of most people living in the state of Tamil Nadu. Through the evidence of my growing musical involvement with the family of my teacher, I became aware that padams are considered (along with javalis and other genres)20 one of the most valued genres of the Dhanammal family. I concurrently was learning that my teacher’s family were famous hereditary Karnataka musicians and dancers; as the musicologist, T.S. Parthasarathy told me, “They are the royal family of padams and javalis.”21 I set out to study a repertoire that I expected would illustrate, along with whatever else I found, the hugeness of raga. My continuing study of Karnataka music with Sri Viswanathan began to focus on the dance music repertoire, and I began to sing for the Bharata Natyam dance performances of his niece Lakshmi Shanmukham Knight. This experience was entirely in consonance with my previous impressions of the majesty and vast scope of raga, while at the same time I was coming more readily to be able to recognize major ragas upon hearing them performed, and to be able to hear more correspondences between raga phrases in songs that Viswa would teach me in the same raga. Then I heard the old 78s. During the course of a research fellowship from the American Institute of Indian Studies in 1989–90, I came upon the excellent collection of 78 RPM recordings of Sri V.A.K. Ranga Rao, a dancer, scholar of dance, and record collector in Chennai. Sri Ranga Rao prepared for me cassette copies of over one hundred songs, most of them Tamil padams. After re-dubbing them so that all the songs in each raga would play sequentially, I sat down to listen. I was amazed at what I heard. After much listening and thinking, I decided to organize my discussion of the music of padams around the idea of varnamettu. It is not at all that I think raga is best or primarily characterized as consisting of varnamettus, but the opposite. It is precisely that 20Such

as Tamil viruttam settings of the poetry of Tayumanavar, Sanskrit slokas, and also the family’s traditions of interpretation of the kritis of Muttuswamy Dikshitar and Syama Sastri. 21T.S. Parthasarathy, personal communication, Chennai, 1990.

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it seemed such an anomaly to find varnamettus in a genre of classical music, which led me to this focus. My astonishment was evidence to me that this phenomenon was worthy of close investigation. I hope this short autobiographical apologia will speak to the reader who at first glance finds varnamettu a strange choice of focus.

5.6 The “Border Lines”

We have seen in Fig. 5.3 above a sliding scale or continuum posited to connect what is classical and what is light or otherwise not classical, in different music genres. It is not a particularly new or controversial idea, indeed it seems to have the force of a truism, commonly accepted and stated, that classical music is of course related to non-classical music of Southern India. But there has not been a great deal of discussion in the scholarly literature on the specifics of the relationship, what the components are or how the flows might be seen to move between the classical and non-classical. The musicologist B. Chaitanya Deva addresses the issue very well, I think, in one of the few passages I have found in the literature which goes beyond simple affirmations of the existence of a relationship between the classical and the other in India. Beginning the sixth chapter entitled “The Border Lines”, he says: “The raga-s, tala-s and forms so far described [in the first five chapters] are more on the ‘classical’ side. With a grammar to mould and restrict, they are usually considered very ‘high brow’, somewhat high flown like the literature of Kalidasa. But there is a vast amount of musical material in the country which does not have such strict rules of structure but which can be as beautiful. Indeed, thumri, tappa, javali, because of levity of its mood and a certain freedom taken with grammar, forms a border line of music, between the highly classical on one end and the totally tribal on the other... “It is in this area that a proper perspective is necessary, especially in the context of what Western scholars have called ‘Comparative Musicology’ or ‘Ethnomusicology.’ It

Product and Process in Genre

has so happened that with the development of harmony the ‘classical’ music of the West for the past few centuries, has become so different from their own folk music that the latter is almost a separate system. But not so in India. The difference between tribal and folk and concert music is a matter of grammatization, not of dimension. The snake charmer’s tune on the mahudi [double reed instrument] becomes raga Punnagavarali, the simple ovi-s of Maharashtra are the nuclei of highly developed raga-s.

“Somewhere between the two extremes of gradation, lie many regional musics with more or less strict grammar. Particularly, these have been connected with religious festivals, monasteries and temples... There is no general word for this class: more recently it has been called ‘traditional’ music. This, of course, is begging the question, for whether folk or classical, Indian music is highly traditional. But there does not seem to be any other suitable word!” 22

One observation in response to this passage is that for Prof. Deva, grammar is a primary quality of what is classical; a degree of freedom from strict musical grammar is a characteristic of a “border line” music. Also, in this passage fluid movement across the border lines (of genre, perhaps of interpretation) is noted, at least in one direction: the snake charmer’s tune can become raga and a folk genre of a Maharashtrian song (ovi) can form the nucleus of raga. (See also Allen, 1998).

5.7 Product and Process in Genre

I propose that the classicalness or non-classicalness of a musical experience resides as much in performance as it does in a composition.23 My ear finds elements of both the classical and 22Chaitanya

Deva, 1974:79–80. of “classical-ness” or lack of same may also reside significantly in the

physical and psychological settings of performance. The dance form previously known as nautch or sadir underwent a change of name to Bharata Natyam in the 1930s. It underwent a change of setting as well, moving onto the concert stage under the patronage of organizations such as the Music Academy of Madras.

23Perception

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the non-classical present in even sometimes one and the same padam. Listening to the recording of, for example, Padari varuhudu [A12] by T. Viswanathan, I would say to myself “that’s purely classical, of course;” but when hearing some of the 78 RPM recordings of the same song, my ears balk—are those also classical? Figure 5.4 attempts to articulate a continuum between extremes of performance, correlating musical-aesthetic criteria (including the concept of varnamettu) with classicalness. Having mapped non-classical and classical to relatively fixed products, let us now map them with respect to performance, that is, relatively fluid process.

Figure 5.4 Varnamettu and performance.

Figure 5.4 is meant to imply that in a less-classical performance setting, varnamettu is liable to be more present and audible; and in a more-classical performance situation, absent. That is, I argue that varnamettu is obscured by the presence of musical criteria which make a performance seem classical—slow Musicians who accompanied dancers, who formerly had stood and moved back and forth and forth following the dancer’s movements, stopped this practice (also during the 1930s) and from then on have been seated on stage during dance performances. All of these non-musical factors contributed to the dance being perceived as classical by the public.

Three Ragas

tempo, heavy ornamentation, emphasis on phrase rather than scale—all factors which would tend to obscure the audition of a melody (a sequence of svaras or tones in linear progression).24

5.7.1 Opening up the Notion of Genre

An examination of the padam as performed allows us to see the padam genre itself embracing both the classical and nonclassical, taking a step toward constructing a dialogue between the different worlds of music in South India. As we concluded in the previous chapter that the Tamil padam as a genre has “fuzzy boundaries” textually, so it now appears, it might have musically as well. I would like to introduce the three ragas of this study to the reader by way of a brief descriptive and historical summary. Following that, I will return to the subject of varnamettu, tracing the history of the use of the term in Karnataka musicology and other traditions (such as Terukkuttu, street dance, and some border line music traditions).

5.8 Three Ragas 5.8.1 Bhairavi

Bhairavi raga is, in the words of the pioneering musicologist P. Sambamoorthy, “the best of the rakti ragas.” He states that it became a regular bhashanga raga (containing a “foreign tone”) over 1,500 years ago.25 A very thorough historical summary of Bhairavi (and five other ragas including Kambhoji and Todi) is that of T. Viswanathan. Regarding Bhairavi, he writes that it is equivalent to the Kausikam pan of Tevaram,26 and he documents 24This

is a loaded figure in the sense that I am presenting one view of what it is to be “classical”, a view held by partisans of the vilamba kala (slow tempo), of the

elaborate gamaka (ornamentation), which is made possible by a slow tempo, and

of an emphasis on a sancara (phrase)-based rather than a scale-based approach to

raga. Adherents of this school of thought tend to be attracted to padams (as well as

to the kritis of Muttuswamy Dikshitar). 25P. Sambamurthy, 1964:352–6. 26Pan is the Tamil term closest corresponding to raga; while the repertoire of music is described as being set in raga, the Tevaram is described as being set in pan.

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the fact that musical treatises have contained references to Bhairavi raga consistently since the 11th century A.D.27 In Venkatamakhi’s system of 72 Melakartas, Bhairavi is classified today as a janya (family member or derivative) of the 20th mela, Natabhairavi.28 Its pitch set (or scale) is in contemporary practice bhashanga, that is, it contains a “foreign tone,” in this case two da-s.29 In current practice, Bhairavi raga has a catusruti da (natural sixth degree) in the arohana (ascent) and a suddha da (flat sixth) in the avarohana (descent), corresponding in terms of pitches to the (European) dorian mode in the ascent and the aeolian mode in the descent. Here is a diagram (Fig. 5.5) of the pitch set of Bhairavi raga:

Figure 5.5 Pitch set, Bhairavi raga.

According to Viswanathan, evidence suggests that Bhairavi was originally a upanga raga, that is, it did not contain a foreign tone. The catusruti da (natural sixth degree) of the ascent was a later addition, having entered the practice of the raga by the time of the Caturdandi Prakasika of Venkatamakhi, who served in the court of Vijayaraghava Nayak of Tanjavur (1633–1673).30 Among the pitch sets given by scholars to describe the arohana (ascent) and avarohana (descent) of Bhairavi, some contain vakra (crooked) passages, i.e., they depart from a straight 27T.

Viswanathan, 1974:61. a good summary of the melakarta system see Reck 1992:256–257. This does

not imply that Bhairavi raga is derived from, or derivative from Natabhairavi raga; Bhairavi, as many old and venerable ragas, have been placed in the niches in the recent melakarta scheme based on pitch set. 29Dr. N. Ramanathan feels that Bhairavi is “really an eight-swara ragam,” that in this it “defeats the present system of theory which likes to see seven as the perfect number, and ragas with more or less swaras as 7 + 1 or 7 – 1.” The melakarta system is based upon the idea that a sampurna (full) raga contains (the same) seven swaras in both ascent and descent. Personal communication, Middletown, 1991. 30T. Viswanathan, 1974:61. 28For

Three Ragas

scalar ascent or descent. For the arohana, two vakra variants have been collected by B.M. Sundaram in his reference book Palaiyazhi: Arohana (ascent) of Bhairavi Raga Ex. 1: sa ri ga ma ni da ni śa Ex. 2: sa ga ri ga ma pa da ni śa

And two variants for the avarohana, one of them vakra, are given: Avarohana (descent) śa ni da ma ga ri sa śa ni da ma pa ma ga ri sa31

5.8.1.1 The music academy of Madras

An event that was to have far-reaching significance for the future of music and dance in South India occurred in 1927, when the Indian National Congress party held its annual session in Chennai. Dr. Arudra writes: “It was customary in the North to hold an All India Music Conference along with the annual Congress Session. Music enthusiasts in Madras, who had already met in 1926 and resolved to establish an institution to foster classical music, wanted to avail of the opportunity to hold an All India Music Conference, the first of its kind in the South. A reception committee with Dr. U. Rama Rao as Chairman and E. Krishna lyer and P. Sambamoorthy as Secretaries was formed on 12 October 1927 and entrusted with the work of organizing the conference. The conference started at about 12 noon on 24 December, and lasted for eight days... On 22 January 1928, the Reception Committee consisting of a President, eight Vice-Presidents, three Secretaries and 15 other members met and resolved among other things that “an Academy of Music be started at Madras.” ... The Music Academy of Madras was inaugurated by Sir C.P. Ramaswamy lyer in August 1928 and it was registered

31B.M.

Sundaram, 1979:11.

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formally under the Societies Registration Act in the following year. Initially the annual conferences used to be held during the Easter week, before they were switched to coincide with the Christmas holidays in December. The Academy started to publish its own quarterly Journal from 1930 onwards.”32

In its first quarter-century of existence, the Music Academy of Madras sponsored a series of continuing discussions on raga lakshana (science, grammar) and raga structure, in addition to presenting concerts and commencing the publication of a scholarly journal.33 An Experts Committee consisting of musicians and scholars was constituted and guided these discussions; the committee was a necessarily revolving cast of characters, as the time span involved in the raga lakshana discussions was about three decades. Somewhat retrospectively, the Appendix to the Journal of the Music Academy in 1952 stated: “It was in the discussions relating to raga lakshana that the conferences of the Experts’ Committee of the Music Academy displayed greatest interest. These indeed form the most important part of the transactions of the Experts’ Committee. A synopsis of these discussions on raga lakshana in the last 25 conferences is given hereunder. Some ragas were reconsidered at subsequent sessions at the suggestion of some members, and the results of the reconsideration are also given here.”34

The discussions with respect to the lakshana of Bhairavi raga were extensive and extended. The 1952 Appendix referred to just above states that ragas Bhairavi and Saveri were considered “with great elaboration” in 1929. 32Dr.

Arudra, 1986:17–18. Science or Grammar; used with reference to a raga, tala, or musical form. The lakshana of a raga means the various factors that go to determine its melodic individuality, like its (l) arohana and avarohana, (2) jiva svaras, (3) nyasa svaras, (4) raga ranjaka prayogas, (5) vishesha sancharas, (6) subtle srutis used, (7) rasa, (8) time of singing, etc.” P. Sambamoorthy, 1971:2. 34JMAM XXIII (1952): Appendix, pp. 1–14. Contains summaries of all ragas discussed. 33“LAKSHANA,

Three Ragas

5.8.1.2 Raga classification as a living process I have not been able to find a description of the discussion of Bhairavi that year, but I did find summaries of the reconsideration of Bhairavi in both the 1937 and 1938 Conferences of the Music Academy. These discussions reveal that there was some variance in the understanding of the raga, especially the swara da (sixth degree of the scale), in both the arohana and avarohana. I will cite here a portion of the summary as reported in the Journal of the Music Academy. In addition to giving the flavor of the Music Academy discussions in the early days, it shows us a living tradition of the process of raga classification, some of the debate around an issue which becomes mute, forgotten, once resolved to a static-looking collection of fixed pitches. The 1937 discussion involved great musicians of the day, and was apparently quite lively. We note right at the beginning of the passage the division of the participants into “professionals,” i.e., performing musicians, and scholars/amateurs, by the President:

35His

“The President [Mangudi Cidambara Bhagavatar] suggested that two professionals might sing lakshyas and two persons learned in the lakshana might explain the latter. Mr. Tiger

Varadachariar said that Bhairavi was a sampurna raga. ‘Sa

ga ri ga’ and ‘ni ga ri ga’ were prayogas which bring out the

raga bhava very well. Both da-s occur. He sang the raga. Mr.

Mudikondan Venkatarama Ayyar next spoke and explained

where the different da-s were in use. Mr. Mudikondan Sabapati

Ayyar35 stated the Sastraic theories of the raga and said that it should be regarded as a janya of the 20th mela. Mr.

Anantakrishna Ayyar stated that even in ‘pa da ni sa’ suddha

da was used according to the old sampradaya, though now the

higher da has come into vogue. Mr. Vinjamuri Narasimhacharlu and others also took part in the discussion. The President

stated that Bhairavi was an ancient raga that existed prior to

the melakarta classification. There was authority for use of both the da-s in [the treatises] Sangita Sudha and Caturdandi

Prakasika. The da will be higher when it compounds with the

ri which is higher, and in other prayogas, it will be suddha. A

recording of Nadamadi tirinda [D4] made in the 1930s, is documented in the Performance History (see Appendix).

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discussion then arose as to whether Bhairavi could be said to be a janya of the 20th mela. The raga is anterior to the 72 melakarta scheme and is now grouped under mela # 20 only for scientific completeness of classification. Vidwan Sabhesa Ayyar36 wanted to know what da should be admitted in the prayoga ‘ni da ni da ni da’. He stated that suddha da was the right rendering and that even in ‘pa da ni sa’ where sa is short it is only suddha da. It is only when sa is long in ‘pa da ni sa’, [or] in ‘pa da ni sa ri sa’ [that] higher da is admissible. Mr. Mudikondan Venkatarama Ayyar and others agreed with this view. This was adopted by the conference on the motion of Vidwan Sabhesa Ayyar.” 37

The discussion the following year revolved around the same swara da: “Bhairavi raga was taken up for consideration. The discussion was as to the admissibility of catusruti da. P.S. Krishnaswämi Ayyar stated that the use of catusruti da cannot be exactly defined and limited. It must be learnt only by practice. He sang ‘Viriboni’ and said that in ‘ni da ni’, catusruti da was used by some. L. Muthiah Bhagavatar said that he was not for defining the exact prayogas in which the two da-s occurred. Musiri Subramania Ayyar38 was for retaining the decision already come to, and permit catusruti da only in the prayoga ‘da ni sa’, and that in other prayogas only suddha da should occur. Semmangudi Srinivasa Ayyar agreed with this view. Jalatarangam Ramanayya Chetty was

36This

is Sri T.S. Sabhesa Ayyar, Professor of Music in the 1930s at the new Annamalai University College of Music just outside of Cidambaram. Sabhesa Ayyar had learned many Ghanam Krishna Ayyar padams and kritis from his guru Maha Vaidyanatha Ayyar. Sri S. Natarajan, a student of T.S. Sabhesa Ayyar, learned ‘Made avar” [A 10] from him at the Annamalai University in the 1930s. 37Journal of the Music Academy of Madras (henceforth JMAM) IX (1938):13–14 (1937 Conference). This is meant as a suggestive passage; I will not explain all the theoretical terms used here. The point I wish to bring out is that the form of Bhairavi was not a fait accompli in the 1930s, and indeed today the area around the swara da can be wonderfully fluid, liquid. Listen for example to T. Viswanathan sing the phrase ‘ni da ni da’ (to the text manatinil) from the second line of the pallavi section of Made avar [A10]. 38The song Taye Yasoda [E2] remains tremendously popular today and many commercial recordings of it are available.

Three Ragas

of the same opinion. Lakshmana Pillai was of the same opinion, but he said that in ‘ni da ni’, both the da-s occur. [ ...discussion continues...] The conference was [of the] opinion that in arohanam, catusruti da occurred when the sancara was ‘da ni sa’ when the sa is long, and in all other sancaras, and in avarohanam, suddha da occurred. Discussion of other aspects of Bhairavi was adjourned to the next day.” 39

The summary in the Journal gives hints that under the surface, indeed sometimes right on the surface, disagreements were percolating not just over the structure of particular ragas but over the idea itself that raga should be standardized (See Allen, 2007). The summary reveals no information about continuing consideration of Bhairavi the next day or during any remaining session of the 1938 Conference. We will hear, among the recordings of Bhairavi, a rendition of Mukattai katti [D3] from the 1930s on the voice and vina by Smt. Madurai Shanmuga Vadivoo, in which the suddha da (flat sixth degree) is prominent; this is perhaps a look back into older traditions of playing the raga.

5.8.2 Kambhoji

T. Viswanathan notes that Kambhoji is one of the oldest ragas, mentioned as early as the Brhaddesi of Matanga, in the 9th century A.D.40 Its corresponding pan in the Tevaram tradition is Takkesi. P. Sambamoorthy states that in the Kathakali music of Kerala, Kambhoji is known as Kamodari, and notes that Kambhoji is “useful for being sung at the commencement of concerts.” 41 The set of pitches used in Kambhoji corresponds to the Euro–American mixolydian mode, using all the pitches of the major scale except for the seventh which is flatted (kaisiki ni). It is classified as a janya of the 28th mela, Harikambhoji. In the arohana of Kambhoji the ni is skipped, and in avarohana a kakali ni (the natural as opposed to a flatted seventh degree) is used in some phrases, especially ‘sa ni pa da sa.’ There 39JMAM

X (1939): 5th Day, 227 December, 1938. Viswanathan, 1974:76. 41P. Sambamoorthy, 1964:366–368. 40T.

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is evidence that this usage is archaic: “Although Kambhoji is originally described with the higher kakali ni, Raghunatha mentions the adoption of kaisiki ni (Sangita Sudha, 1614) which gradually thereafter became the more stable svara. It should be noted that kakali ni is not totally omitted from kambhoji today, but still appears today as a reminder of an earlier convention.”42 The basic movement through the set of pitches used in Kambhoji is given here (Fig. 5.6):

Figure 5.6 Pitch set, Kambhoji raga.

All the sources compiled by B.M. Sundaram give the same scale for Kambhoji raga as contained in this representation in svara notation: sa ri ga ma pa da śa - śa ni da pa ma ga ri sa43

As with the da-s of Bhairavi, the ni-s of Kambhoji have occasioned their share of discussion through history. In 1930 M.S. Ramaswamy Ayyar reported a venerable disagreement on the usage of the swara ni in raga Kambhoji, between the 17th-century scholar Venkatamakhi and his predecessor of a century, Ramamatya.44 Ramaswamy Ayyar’s wonderful account begins: 42T.

Viswanathan, 1974:76. Sundaram, 1979:74. 44I am indebted to Dr. N. Ramanathan for making me aware of this contestation spanning the centuries. In Ramanathan’s view, this might have been representative of a rivalry between the two Telugu courts of Vijayanagar, where Ramamatya was patronized in the 16th century and wrote the treatise Swaramelakalanidhi, and the court which patronized Venkatamakhi in the 17th century, and saw the creation of his Caturdandi Prakasika. “Such was maybe the rivalry between 2 Telugu courts. So, maybe they were both right. It must have been difficult to decide on which swarasthana to be assigned to the swara. A swara in South Indian music is a combination of dynamic (moving) and static forms of sound. When the static form becomes elusive it is difficult to pin down the swara to one of the swarasthanas.” Personal communication, Middletown, 1991. 43B.M.

Three Ragas

“Ramamatya [said]: ‘The mela of Kambhoji consists of these swaras, viz., suddha sa, pancasruti ri, antara ga, suddha ma, suddha pa, pancasruti da, and kakali ni.’ Venkatamakhi [replying, a century later]: ‘Does not even the maidservant of a vainika know that Kambhoji has kaisiki (and not kakali) ni? [Venkatamakhi (17th century) criticizing Ramamatya (16th century)].” 45

Ramaswamy Ayyar diplomatically states that both Ramamatya and Venkatamakhi should be regarded as having been right in their own time, but then, showing his colors, he sides with the helpless (because dead for over a century when his critic wrote) Ramamatya against Venkatamakhi’s attack: “Living as I do [says Ramaswamy Ayyar], three centuries after Venkatamakhi who insisted in having only kaisiki ni for Kambhoji, I may repay the author of Caturdandi Prakasika in his own coin and retort, ‘Does not even the cook of a vainika know that the Kambhoji of the present day has not only kaisiki ni but also kakali ni as in the case of the phrase ‘sa ni pa da sa’? ”

Our early 20th-century commentator now gleefully moves on the attack by criticizing Venkatamakhi for his characterization of the arohana of Kambhoji: “Again in your chapter on ragas, you dared to write: ‘Kambhoji raga, though sampurna, leaves out in the ascent ma and ni.’ From this heinous sin, O Venkata, you cannot escape even though you go on a pilgrimage to Tirupati, the abode of Lord Venkatesvara. For whether your Kambhoji corresponds to our Kambhoji or our Harikambhoji, the ma is never left out, though Kambhoji leaves out ni in the ascent. Surely then, Venkatamakhi threw stones at Ramamatya, while [he] himself was living in a glass house, and his strictures on Svaramelakalanidhi are unjust, uncalled for, and even offensive to a degree.”46

45M.S.

Ramaswamy Ayyar, JMAM I (1930):4, p. 257. (This citation applies to this and the following two passages quoted). 46Here Ramaswamy Ayyar plays on the similarity between the name of the scholar Venkatamakhi and that of Lord Vishnu as Venkatesvara at the famous pilgrimage temple of Tirupati in Andhra Pradesh.

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5.8.2.1 Yadukula Kambhoji: A fellow janya

Kambhoji raga has a close relationship with the raga Yadukula Kambhoji (Yadukulakambhoji), as a fellow janya, family member, of their mutual melakarta parent Harikambhoji. (Being a melakarta means that Harikambhoji must use all seven swaras both in ascent and descent, without any vakra, crooked, passages.) The pitch set or scale of Yadukula Kambhoji is given by all the sources compiled by B.M. Sundaram as: sa ri ma pa da śa - śa ni da pa ma ga ri sa47

While Dr. S. Bhagyalekshmy, in her ‘Ragas in Carnatic Music’, gives for the scale of Yadukula Kambhoji: sa ri ma pa da śa - śa ni da ni pa ma ga ri sa48

She adds that in the tradition followed by Muttuswamy Dikshitar (as preserved in the 1904 Sangita Sampradaya Pradarsini of his grandson Subbarama Dikshitar), ga is contained in the arohana. The only difference between Kambhoji and Yadukulakambhoji in the descriptions collected by B.M. Sundaram is that ga is missing in the arohana (and even this is not the case if we follow Bhagyalekshmy with respect to Dikshitar school traditions). Given this similarity of scale (which however does not imply a similarity of key phrases or other non-scalar melodic factors), it is reasonable to expect some overlap in the melodic worlds of the two ragas. This issue has in fact come up while studying some of the music examples (stated to be) in Kambhoji for this study. T. Viswanathan feels that the song Nadamadi tirinda [D4], for one, is an example of a melodic setting that is on the border between Kambhoji and Yadukulakambhoji ragas.49 Dr. N. Ramanathan of the University of Madras, upon listening to some of the 78 RPM recordings of Kambhoji padams with me, said: “In Kambhoji you have to be very careful when starting on sa, to proceed up to pa before pausing, or else you run the 47B.M.

Sundaram, 1979:206. Bhagyalekshmy, 1990:362. 49T. Viswanathan, personal communication, 1992. 48S.

Three Ragas

risk of slipping into Yadukulakambhoji.” 50 The varnamettu which I will sketch below for Kambhoji raga may need to be seen as, in some respects, a composite tune of Kambhoji and Yadukula Kambhoji ragas.

5.8.3 Todi

As a historical musical entity, Todi raga is certainly junior to Bhairavi and Kambhoji. In the 17th century, Venkatamakhi wrote that Todi was an auttara raga (of northern origin), a statement which Sambamoorthy reports while adding his own qualification that this “can’t be justified.”51 There are, however, other traditions that also place Todi as a raga imported from the north of India, or indeed further: Turushka Todi—Turkish Todi—is found as early as Sangita Makaranda (12th century A.D.) as a descriptive name for the raga.52 On the other hand, some scholars connect Todi to Tamil tunes, possibly suggesting a connection to the pans of the Tevaram hymns. P. Sambamoorthy wrote that “the tune called Mattakokilam is in this raga.”53 S. Bhagyalekshmy states “Nattakokilam [sic] of Tamil music is similar to Todi”54 and the summary of a presentation by Smt. R. Vedavalli states that she “traced the history of Todi from the days of ancient Tamil music in which it was known as ‘Vilarippalai.’ It was mentioned in many later Sanskrit treatises with different lakshanas and descriptions.” 55 In addition to assigning Todi an origin outside of south India, some scholars feel that Todi was not early on a truly classical raga. Dr. N. Ramanathan said regarding Todi in past days, “They used to say, it’s pamara priya; the common people like it. Todi wasn’t an uttama raga at the time [of Ramamatya.] It didn’t have good potentiality.” 56 50N.

Ramanathan, personal communication, 1991, Middletown. Sambamoorthy, 1964:347. 52T. Viswanathan, 1974:105. 53P. Sambamoorthy, 1964:346. 54S. Bhagyalekshmi, 1990:344. 55R. Vedavalli in JMAM LIV:42, 1983. 56N. Ramanathan, personal communication, Middletown, 1991. Dr. Ramanathan said that in the tripartite scheme of uttama, madhyama, and adhama ragas, Todi and Turushkatodi were classified as adhama. (Given in Swaramelakalanidhi Chapter 5, verses 13–14.) 51P.

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In the present day, Todi is a major and extremely popular raga, like Bhairavi and Kambhoji. T. Viswanathan writes that the Todi raga padams of Ksetrayya are likely the oldest surviving examples of the raga,57 and Smt. R. Vedavalli states that “by the time of Tyagaraja it had become a formidable major raga,” noting that Tyagaraja composed approximately 30 kritis in Todi.58 Today Todi raga is classified as the eighth melakarta, Hanumatodi. It is considered a sampurna (full) raga, with straight movement up and down in arohana and avarohana. The pitch set of Todi corresponds to the European phrygian mode, as shown in Fig. 5.7.

Figure 5.7 Pitch set, Todi raga.59

Of the three ragas considered in this study, to my ears, Todi is the one that least resembles the sounds of the pitches it supposedly corresponds to. While I can often recognize with my American-trained ears a combination of dorian and aeolian modes in listening to renditions of Bhairavi, and a mixolydian mode in listening to Kambhoji, when I hear a Todi raga composition in the family of my teacher any evocation of the phrygian mode is completely out of the question. This is, I think, primarily because of the handling of the swaras ga and ni (both in arohana and avarohana) in this raga. In terms of Euro–American music notation, we will come closer to at least the actual swarasthanas (pitch levels) of the raga, as shown in Fig. 5.8. 57T.

Viswanathan, personal communication, 1992. Vedavalli in JMAM LIV, 1983:42. 59The standard Euro–American notational convention is followed here, indicating

that the descending notes ni, da, ga, and ri are flatted tones (they do not have natural signs in front of them, which would neutralize the flat signs given in the ascent.) 58R.

Three Ragas

Figure 5.8 Approximate Swarasthanas, Todi raga.

While I have found a good number of examples of the occurrence of strong varnamettu (in its extended sense of common tune) in both Bhairavi and Kambhoji ragas, this has not been the case with Todi. There does appear to be a strong melodic resemblance between two Todi compositions in misra capu tala in this study, Collum vakai [A1] and Yarpoy colluvar [A14], but there are simply not enough examples available to take the idea of varnamettu further with Todi raga at this time. Therefore, when we turn to a close examination of varnamettu in the musical examples, it will be an examination of Bhairavi and Kambhoji ragas, not Todi. Perhaps if more examples come to light in Todi raga such an analysis will be fruitful to undertake in the future. “I’ve always thought that ragas were abstracted out of existing tunes.” —Dr. N. Ramanathan “There is something special about those varnamettus.”

—Dr. Ritha Rajan60

In the early part of this chapter, I referred to an article in the Journal of the Music Academy of Madras which suggested to me that the term varnamettu might be useful in articulating what I was hearing in old recordings of padams. Let us now move to a review of the literature in which the term varnamettu has occurred to date in South India, both in what one could call its conservative and extended usages. Before discussing this article and a subsequent conversation with its author, Dr. Ritha Rajan, let us see a few examples of what we could characterize as a conservative use of the term. 60Both

quotations personal communication, Chennai, 1990.

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5.8.3.1 Conservative usage First, T. Viswanathan provided a couple of instances in which he felt the term varnamettu would occur in normal discourse among Karnataka musicians: “People normally say nalla varnamettu anta pattukku (that song has a good varnamettu) or inta sahityattukku oru varnamettu potunkal (compose [literally “put”] a varnamettu for this text).” 61 We can see that in both these instances the term clearly refers to a single musical composition. The other example we will consider is in a summary of a talk by Prof. R. Srinivasan on the “Original Varna Mettus” of Gopalakrishna Bharati’s Nandanar Carittiram and Arunacala Kavirayarts Ramanataka Kirttanas at the Music Academy ca. 1960. In the words of the printed summary, in his talk Prof. Srinivasan “confined himself to change of whole varnamettus, not just certain notes,” that is, to situations where a song which had been set in raga A receives a new setting in raga B. One example cited by Prof. Srinivasan is Yaro ivar yaro [F 1], the composition of Arunacala Kavirayar: “Yaro ivar yaro was in Saveri (which was appropriate to it), and was changed to Bhairavi. The President of the conference said it was because no there was no sishya parampara to safeguard the varnamettus; S. Parthasarathi countered, saying that change happens to even the compositions of Tyagaraja where there is strong sishya parampara.62

Here the term varnamettu is (as in the examples from T. Viswanathan above) used to refer to the musical settings of individual compositions. It is contrasted to “certain notes”, i.e., a varnamettu is seen not just as a note or a phrase, but rather as the whole setting of the melody of a song text. Neither Arunacala Kavirayar or Gopalakrishna Bharati had a true sishya parampara, a lineage of disciples to whom the original melodic settings 61T.

Viswanathan, personal communication, 1992. Srinivasan in JMAM XXXII (1961):72 (parentheses in original). Prof. Srinivasan,

who taught for many years at the Travancore University, was the person from whom Smt. Madhavi Rajagopalan learned the Kavikunjara Bharati padam Etu kanum [C 1].

62R.

Three Ragas

of their compositions were passed (Arunacala Kavirayar, we will remember, is reputed to have had not much of a voice and requested professional musicians to set his texts to raga and tala). Of course, as S. Parthasarathi points out, even having a bona fide tradition of disciples does not ensure that melodic settings of one’s compositions will not change over time.

5.8.3.2 Expanded usage

Earlier in this chapter I proposed that varnamettu be taken to mean in an expanded sense “common tune”, that is, a virtually identical melodic setting found in several songs within one raga. The nature of the expansion proposed is that the term be used to not refer solely to the melodic setting of an individual composition, but to a greater melodic entity, something which somehow lives outside or transcends the individual song - and yet something which by no means begins to exhaust the potential inherent in the term raga. In this view one or possibly more than one varnamettu might live inside a raga.63 In terms of a progression from small to large in melodic elements—leaving the idea of an individual composition aside for the moment—let us begin at the level of the swara, itself quite a complex entity comprised of sruti (pitch) and gamaka (incompletely but commonly translated as “ornament”) occurring over time.64 Swaras can be seen as being combined into prayogas or sancaras, phrases.65 In turn varnamettu—as the melodic setting 63For

example, T. Viswanathan says that the “oldest oral existing mettu” for Bhairavi raga is one in a lower register than the varnamettu evident in the padams of this study. He cites the Tevaram composition Katalaki of Tirugnanasambandar as an example of this most archaic mettu for Bhairavi. Personal communication, Middletown, 1991. 64In my master’s thesis I tried to articulate the relationships between sruti, gamaka, swara and prayoga/sancara. M. Allen 1986, especially pp. 19–20. 65It is at the unit-level of sancara or prayoga (phrase) where I have most often heard comparisons of melodic material between compositions, alapana and/or musicians. Musicians talk about special raga phrases as transferable (and admirable) melodic properties, for example, how a padam phrase may be borrowed and used in alapana: T. Sankaran tells the story about how Trichy Govindaswami Pillai (Violin) would go to listen to Vina Dhanammal in the afternoon, ask her, “Please, Amma, play that Todi padam I love so much”, and then in his evening concert the proverbial fly on the wall would hear the same raga phrases Govindaswami Pillai had heard from Dhanammal performed in

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of an entire composition - is logically larger than phrase, therefore in some way can be conceived as containing phrases (plus, perhaps, non-phrase filler material) strung together. Finally, we understand a varnamettu in its expanded sense not as equal to raga, but as one possible route or tune contained within raga; raga is seen to contain varnamettu amongst its totality of possible components. This prose description can be simply summed up in Fig. 5.9, where the various elements are seen containing or englobing each other:

Figure 5.9 Englobing of melodic elements.

In this Figure, we could almost substitute the term “song” or “composition” for varnamettu; that is, just as a varnamettu is comprised of swaras and phrases (sancaras or prayogas) and lives inside of a raga, so does a song live within a raga. The difference between the two terms varnamettu and song in this limited context is one of the absence or presence of sahitya (text), respectively. As a song is therefore a more restricted entity than varnamettu, “localized” as it were by its links to one and only one text, we might expand upon the Figure just above in this manner: his Todi alapana. In this type of story, it isn’t said that the swaras, or the whole raga itself, would be the unit borrowed and imitated, but the phrase (sancara). T. Sankaran, personal communication, 1990.

Three Ragas

Figure 5.10 Melodic with compositional elements.

It should be noted that these figures are quite preliminary and speculative at this point. Upon seeing an earlier draft of this chapter, Dr. N. Ramanathan suggested some revisions to the Figures, notably removing raga from the linear progression of elements, and reversing the relative positions of song and varnamettu:

song)

varnamettu)

prayoga/sancara)

swara

“Song is the core from which you get varnamettu etc., through each stage of the analytical filtering. While all these four are “concrete”, raga is only a theoretical abstract or a concept and hence has to be accommodated not within the eclipses but in some other sphere.66

In another reaction to these figures, Prof. Harold Powers stressed his feeling that varnamettu and raga are ultimately incommensurate qualities: “Varnamettu is really a tune, not a raga. You can sing a varnamettu, while you can never sing a raga.”67 However far apart varnamettu and raga are today, Dr. N. Ramanathan raises the possibility that historically they may have at one time been more similar qualities or entities: 66N.

67H.

Ramanathan, letter to the author, April 1992. Powers, personal communication, 1992.

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“I would say that the term raga interpreted, today, variously as ‘melodic possibility’, ‘melodic matrix’, ‘melodic mould’, ‘melodic abstract’, etc., seems to denote this sense only from around the 11th century A.D. and onwards. Its early usages, in the context of the drama (natya) of Bharata shows that ‘raga’ perhaps stood only for a varnamettu and only since the 12th century or so has ‘raga’ come into the sphere of classical music. So the notion of raga being associated with varnamettu has perhaps a very long tradition.”68

Whether, then, we can ultimately posit varnamettu as some kind of intermediate unit in the recent historical past (bounded for the purposes of this study by the beginning of gramophone recording in India ca. 1904) between discrete physical-acoustic phrases of music known as sancara and the abstract theoretical entity with infinite potential known as raga, must remain an open question. It is clear to me that varnamettu is in some sense a compounding of phrases; and as we will see, several scholars feel that such a compounding results in our being able to have an image or vision of raga. It seems wise to take the counsel of Drs. Ramanathan and Powers and to clearly stop short of suggesting that varnamettu begins to approach raga as an abstract concept; varnamettu seems to remain clearly grounded in tune, visualized as a composite of phrases (and perhaps filler material of here-undefined composition.) With this caveat, let us proceed to consider the proposed expanded definition for varnamettu as stated previously.

5.9 Varnamettu in the Literature and Musicians’ Conversation

Holding this picture of the interrelation of musical elements within the world of raga, let us now move to a consideration of an article by Dr. Ritha Rajan of the Queen Mary’s College, Chennai. Her paper “The Musical Structure of Padams,” presented during the 1983 Conference of the Music Academy of Madras, was published in the Academy’s Journal the following year. 68N.

Ramanathan, letter to the author, April 1992.

Varnamettu in the Literature and Musicians’ Conversation

In this article, I came upon the usage of the term varnamettu which I had not seen before. Dr. Rajan made several striking points, speaking of varnamettu in a much more inclusive and suggestive way than I had previously been exposed to the term, having the effect of expanding its semantic field for me. She states: “Many padams are in identical Varnamettus. This has led to the standardisation of certain tunes in Karnataka music. The padams of Ksetrayya, Sarangapani and Govindasamayya were composed at a time when the art of musical composition had not reached its heights. Hence we find plural sahitya for the same tune.”69

The argument that composers of padams are either earlier composers (a chronological-evolutionary argument which would not apply to most of the composers of Tamil padams) and/or less resourceful composers (a virtuosic-artistic argument) than the great composers such as the Trinity (late 18th to mid-19th centuries) is an argument I have seen made by other scholars in addition to Dr. Rajan. According to this line of thought, rather than come up with new melodic settings in certain ragas, padam composers would draw on an oral stock of reference tunes, available varnamettus. This line of thought bears a close similarity to that advanced by Richard Frasca regarding the composition and transmission of melody in the Terukkuttu ritual folk theater form (literally “street dance”) of Tamil Nadu, which will be considered below. From this point, Dr. Rajan continues her account of the varnamettus of padams by saying that even though relatively simple and less artistically ingenious in their composition, the padams with their standard tunes were extremely appealing to later composers, including the great Trinity of Karnatak music composers themselves: “The great composers were very much captivated by these tunes and adopted them in their compositions.”70 We have a growing picture of varnamettu, then, which seems to embody different types of characteristics. On the one hand, a standard tune is seen as the recourse or refuge 69Ritha 70Ritha

Rajan, 1984:168. Rajan, 1984:168.

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of the middling composer; while on the other, it is seen as simultaneously something extremely beautiful, so captivating that great composers want to use standard tunes at least occasionally in their own compositions.

5.9.1 Composer or Artisan

Part of the complexity of this emerging picture is that here the use of the term “composer” must itself be called into question when referring to compositions the melodic setting of which is perhaps more a known given rather than a new creation. Instead of a composer, something like a “taker of existing melodic materials” seems more to the point. In this connection, we recall the discussion at the beginning of Chapter 3, where it was mentioned that one of the terms used to refer to composers of Tamil padams is Padakkarar, literally padam-maker. This term lays stress more on artisan-like craftsmanship rather than concepts such as virtuosity or original inspiration in the compositional process. I have never heard a term such as Kritikkarar applied to any composer of kritis, let alone to the Trinity, all of for whom the term Vaggeyakkarar seems to be the most commonly used term. “In my grandfather’s day, they knew varnamettus, not raga names.” —Dr. Ritha Rajan

After reading her article, I had the opportunity to speak with Dr. Rajan about varnamettu and other musicological topics. I was especially interested in asking her how she thought varnamettu might have come about, as in her article it is mainly treated as an extant phenomenon to be used by musicians and composers. Beginning by saying that varnamettu is “a function of history,” she amplified this by saying “for varnamettu in the extended sense to exist, the particular raga must have been sung by many; it must have scope and stability.” This implicitly reiterated one of the points of her article (a point that she repeated explicitly in our talk as well) which was that the concept of varnamettu does not apply to every raga.71 71Citations

this paragraph all R. Rajan, personal communication, Chennai, 1990.

Varnamettu in the Literature and Musicians’ Conversation

5.9.2 Varnamettu Vis à Vis Phrase and Alapana Speaking with Dr. Rajan, I tried to see from what angles the concept of varnamettu could be put into perspective and context, and how varnamettu could be visualized relative to other musicological concepts. Firstly, regarding the phrase, Dr. Rajan felt that while a phrase is something that gives one enough information for raga identification, it is “disconnected” compared to varnamettu. Varnamettu is “a complete tune, to an extent. You can see a complete idea about the raga; you can see the raga picture or form.” It seemed to me that, while wanting to affirm that varnamettu is indeed a whole in some respect, she stressed that varnamettu is not the same kind of whole as is raga. She was careful to characterize varnamettu as a vantage point from where one can see a complete picture of raga, varnamettu as a complete idea about raga, but not as raga.72 “They used to sing only varnamettu for alapana”

—Dr. Ritha Rajan

Dr. Rajan also drew out a second relationship, that between varnamettu and raga alapana, a form of melodic improvisation in free rhythm which usually occurs at the beginning of the performance of a song form such as kriti, ragam-tanam-pallavi, or in some cases padam.73 She said that for some ragas “alapana is done in the pattern of varnamettu; it shows the influence of varnamettu. They used to sing only varnamettu for alapana.” Also referring to a time earlier in the 20th century, Rajan said “In my grandfather’s day, they knew varnamettus, not raga names.” 74 72For

his part, Dr. N. Ramanathan felt similarly that “varnamettu is like a clear, small-screen image of raga.” It was his opinion that a varnamettu is much clearer, and more easily perceptible, in a madhyama kala tempo (moderate tempo) as opposed to a vilamba kala (slow tempo) composition: “If you get a vilamba kala piece, it will depart from a mettu.” As did Dr. Rajan, Ramanathan stressed that the whole idea of varnamettu applies only to certain, by no means all, ragas. (Personal communication, Middletown, 1991). 73For a detailed study of raga alapana in Karnataka music, see T. Viswanathan, 1974. 74Personal communication, Chennai, 1990.

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5.9.3 Varnamettu and Hindustani Chalan Extending the sphere of discourse involving varnamettu to include improvisation (such as alapana) could form the basis for a detailed study in itself; the possible ramifications could include a relationship between varnamettu and the idea of calan (or chalan) in Hindustani music. In a 1980 article, Harold Powers characterizes calan as a kind of recipe as to how one might “walk through” (literally) the structure of a particular raga in time.75 Powers states: “Calan means ‘procedure’, from the verb calna meaning ‘walk/go’ (the relation is that of ‘marche’ and ‘marcher’ in French), and it designates an outline epitome of the important configurations in a melodic type.”76

A calan, though drawn from one particular composition, could “serve as a summary for many other compositions in darbarikanada raga. Further, upon observing some qualifications and restrictions the calan “would be valid for nearly anything in darbari-kanada.” Powers concludes his discussion of calan by stressing: “More important, though, it can serve as a guide in making new melodic renditions in darbari-kanada, be they composed pieces to be memorized like khayals, or extemporizations in one of the improvisatory genres like alap.” 77

The possible correspondences between North and South Indian music are striking and potentially quite exciting: as described by Powers we see the concept of calan as source material for both composition (khayal) and melodic improvisation (alap) in Hindustani music; might we also begin to articulate 75The

term “recipe” is mine, not Professor Powers’. In conversation, Powers confirmed that he saw calan as entailing melodic configurations unfolding in time. 76H. Powers, 1980:4–6. Ashok Ranade states about this term (spelling it chalan): “A characteristic way or movement of organizing tonal/rhythmic material in musical manifestations of all kinds. A very inclusive term, chalan may allude to grammatical peculiarities of rhythmic/tonal groupings or changes introduced in them out of stylistic considerations.” Ranade, 1990:59. 77H. Powers, 1980:6–7.

Varnamettu in the Literature and Musicians’ Conversation

the concept of varnamettu in a similar fashion for music in South India, as a source of melodic material for kriti (or padam) and alapana. A study by someone well versed in both Hindustani and Karnataka traditions could address this issue.

5.9.4 Varnamettu and the Folk

Returning to the United States in August of 1990 to begin the composition of my dissertation, I continued to dig for references to varnamettu in the scholarly literature. Notable in the references, I found that varnamettu is almost always invoked in a discussion of “folk” arts or of “folkish” elements within “classical” arts. This first passage to be considered is from the summary of a talk by Sri Sandhyavandanam Srinivasa Rao during the Music Academy Conference of 1962: “Sri Rao said that some 1000s of the Padas of the Dasas in

Kannada were in print, and there was hardly any interest

in the musical settings. Owing to the greater attention given to the words and element of devotion, the varnamettus

of these padas has been slowly lost. But as in the case of

Kshetrajna Padas in centres in Tamilnad, where there had

been patronage of music, the musical settings of Telugu and

Kannada songs had been preserved. It was an interesting

exercise for him to contact and by enquiries find out from unsophisticated Haridasas and old ladies who had been

singing these Padas, a number of basic tunes of these Padas

in which the correct forms of several Karnataka Ragas were

preserved, though in a simple form. Sri Rao said that the basic

or key tunes of the Padas could be used to teach students

of music the correct outline forms of the different Ragas.”78

There is much we could speak about in this passage; we see right at the end, the idea introduced that varnamettu,—in addition to being a basic or key tune—can also be the correct tune for a raga, albeit in a simple form, so much so that some educators think students ought to learn raga via inculcation in varnamettus. We will see in a minute that one respondent, the 78Srinivasa

Rao, Sandhyavandanam, 1963: 45.

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eminent vocalist Sri Semmangudi Srinivasa Ayyar, found this a worthwhile suggestion. Secondly, we see the culture bearers of the varnamettus characterized either as unsophisticated male Haridasas (Vishnu devotees) or as old ladies—that is, the speaker seems to consider himself as having gone to the folk in search of what he feels to be the original tunes of these compositions. There is also a subtext beneath Sri Rao’s statement that due to a lack of interest in melodic settings and greater attention given to text, the melodies of such songs tend to be lost over time. In another Music Academy presentation, Sri Rao spoke directly to this point, expounding a position widely held by scholars and performers of Karnataka music that the truly classical or art situation in music performance is one in which the sahitya, text, is subordinated to the sangita, music: “In all forms of high class music there should be a minimum of words and a maximum of music. ... This unfortunate trait of listening to sahitya and trying to get food for literary thought even while listening to art music made the listeners unduly sahitya-conscious... I appeal to all lovers of art to listen to raga and tala in music primarily and bestow only secondary thought to words while listening to their musical rendering. ... Examining the text[s] for their import should be a secondary study.” 79

When the emphasis goes the other way, toward concentration on the meaning of the words, the performance tends to be considered as stressing more the devotional than the aesthetic aspects. This is of course another fluid situation, because paradoxically—and this is an equally often-voiced fact of music—Karnataka music is per se devotional music; its great composer Tyagaraja is considered in no uncertain terms to be a Saint. The ironies inherent in the combination of devotion (in text) with virtuosity (in music) are pointed out by Raghava R. Menon: “Even in the Karnatak school where a great deal is made of the saintliness of its composers, music has never been a

79Sandhyavandanam

Srinivasa Rao in JMAM XXXIX (1968):48–51.

Varnamettu in the Literature and Musicians’ Conversation

direct means of formal worship. With the utmost care and circumspection the Karnatak school preempted the use of music as a means of formal worship by grammarising it root and branch. So that even during an Arangetram, vis-a-vis with the deity, Karnatak music continues to remain a performance in which technical virtuosity is the chief preoccupation of the qualified student. The sad despairing call of Tyagaraja becomes a frond of leaping Solfeges, syncopations and cross-rhythms, masses of intricate Gamakas and exploding Arpeggios.” 80

The overlapping relationship between devotional and artistic expression is also at the root of the semantic overlap between the two terms kriti and kirttana; one and the same song may be called a kriti in a concert solo-virtuosic setting, and a kirttana in a setting of congregational devotional singing such as bhajan.81 Sri Rao thus adds the idea of devotional to that of folk (as opposed to classical) in his presentation. Returning to Semmangudi Srinivasa Ayyar’s response to the presentation of Srinivasa Rao, we find the eminent vocalist responding enthusiastically to the idea that varnamettu could be used as a pedagogical tool: “Congratulating Sri Rao on his exposition and his investigation into the Varnamettus of Dasarpadas, Semmangudi Srinivasa Ayyar said that these old padas and similar compositions provided, so to say, the Raga-sketches and he would commend the advice of the speaker that these might be used to inculcate in the young students of music the correct forms of the old ragas. It was an unfortunately increasing phenomenon today that the students of music were unable to bring out in a short compass the correct outline of a raga.

80Raghava

Menon, R. 1982:v. Viswanathan notes that within Tyagaraja’s oeuvre, the compositions which are considered kritis form a distinct group from the compositions which are considered kirttanas, although he would agree that there are examples of Tyagaraja kirttanas which have come to be rendered as kritis in practice, and vice versa.

81T.

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He said that it was through compositions that the ragas could be understood.” 82

5.9.5 Varnamettu: A Snap Shot of Raga

The term used by Semmangudi Srinivasa Ayyar here about the import of the varnamettus of the Dasarpadas is that they give us “sketches” of the raga; this is a statement complementary I think to what we have seen above, the idea that varnamettu can constitute a “snap shot”, a “complete tune, to an extent”, a “clear, small-screen image” of, or a “complete idea about” raga. Keeping these images in mind, let us now move to consideration of varnamettu in a genre most observers would place completely outside of the classical traditions of performing arts in South India. In his book on Terukkuttu, a form of ritual folk theater83 of Tamil Nadu, Richard Frasca has documented extensive links across the little-documented divide between the classical and the other in performing arts.

5.9.6 Varnamettu in Terukkuttu

The term mettu is discussed in two places in Frasca’s book. First, in discussing the performance of Terukkuttu within the Tontaimantalam area of Tamil Nadu, Frasca says that its two main regional styles, vatapanku and tenpanku (northern style and southern style respectively) have different melodic as well as textual traditions. In addition to divergence in texts, he says: “The tunes used to sing these pieces also appear to be distinctive to these subregions. Performers I have met from both panku have claimed that these differences in melody actually represented two entirely different styles of terukkuttu music. This point emerged time and time again when I was in Kanchipuram, which has vatapanku kuttu. Sporadically, I would come across pieces that were labelled as tenpanku mettu, referring to melodies from the southern style. According to informants, this indicated that these pieces had been adopted from the southern style of kuttu,

82Srinivasa 83R.

Rao, Sandhyavandanam, 1963:45. (italics added). Frasca, 1990:xi.

Varnamettu in the Literature and Musicians’ Conversation

either text with melody, or just melody. ... The use of these various approaches to melody and song indicates that there exist in Tontaimantalam two distinctive traditional styles of kuttu music that terukkuttu teachers and performers are not only conscious of but also intent on maintaining. They pointedly refer to these as aitikam, indicating that they have been received through the oral tradition and by virtue of this have authority and consensus.”84

Here the references to mettu would seem to fit a conservative use of the term, simply the melodic setting of a song or songs. Later in his discussion of performing techniques, however, Frasca dramatically expands the scope of mettu in the context of how melodies of songs are described, taught, and remembered:

84R.

“The terukkuttu performer’s functional approach to music is embodied in a strategy that employs a combination of melody with meter. This involves the preservation in the oral tradition of a large library of reference tunes that are used to indicate the music for the songs in various kuttus. Each of these tunes is in a particular raga and is categorized according to the name of a well-known piece in which it is set. For example, in a text of the kuttu Palayanan Kicakan Cantai (The Battle Between Palayanan [Piman in disguise] and King Kicakan) most of the songs are preceded not only by the name of the character who is to sing it but also by a shorthand that indicates its mettu. Mettu is a Tamil term that translates into English as tune. The placement of these notations throughout the manuscript indicates in a very direct manner the way the musical pieces of the performance are to be sung. As an illustration, in the above kuttu, one of Piman’s songs in the early part of the text is preceded not only by his name but also by the term ‘mettu Narayana’. The final tag, Narayana, indicates that the text of Piman’s song at this point is to be sung in the tune of a piece with the initial word Narayana that is well known in the oral tradition in this area. Beyond the separate functional approaches to melody and rhythm, therefore, the entire system is reinforced by an oral tradition of mettu

Frasca, 1990:50–51.

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that combines both. The end result is that to this day the large and sometimes complex body of terukkuttu music is still very effectively preserved entirely in the oral tradition.” 85

5.9.7 Melody and Meter in Mettu

The thing that jumped out of this passage was the fact that Frasca ties together melody with meter in his delineation of the concept of mettu. I will defer further discussion on this to the section on tala and varnamettu. Also, the process described in this passage by which the first line of text of a well-known song is used for the name of its tune (mettu Narayana) for purposes of identification in the process of musical transmission, is found in other realms: “Frasca’s observations on mettu-s in Terukkuttu are seen to be borne out by other theatrical arts too like the Bhagavata Mela Nataka, 19th–20th century Tamil dramas, and we do come across a number of publications of song texts in the 19th–20th centuries wherein the prescription of the mettu-s of popular songs is found.” 86

As stated by Frasca, in the Terukkuttu tradition, the teachers and performers themselves conceptualize the existence of an oral library of reference tunes, and use the term mettu to describe components87 of this library. Within a raga, Frasca says here, are found mettus, song tunes, within which in turn a group of individual songs may be set. This corresponds to the structure proposed earlier in this chapter—song contained inside varnamettu contained inside raga—but here we are outside the world of music and dance, or are we? In another context, T. Sankaran has told me that he once saw a book of texts of Tamil javalis88 in which 85R.

Frasca, 1990:87–88. Ramanathan, letter to the author, April 1992. 87If we follow the metaphor, these components might be seen as categories (Library of Congress headings) into which individual books (songs) would fall. 88There are not supposed to be any Tamil javalis,—all the well-known javalis in performance today are in the Telugu language. However, Sankaran has seen this particular book, and among the 78 RPM recordings of which I received cassette copies from Sri V.A.K. Ranga Rao, two are labeled as ‘Tamil Javali’ on 86N.

Varnamettu in the Literature and Musicians’ Conversation

instead of specifying the raga in which each song was to be set, the instructions at the top of each text read “To be sung in the mettu of x”, “x” being the first line of text of a then well-known song.89 During the course of a detailed exposition of the musical and dance techniques of Terukkuttu, Frasca documents a series of specific links between classical and not-classical performing arts traditions in Tamil Nadu. He is at some pains to correct what he sees as prevalent misconceptions about the relationship between these traditions. Opening his chapter on performing techniques, he states: “Rather than supporting the tenet, prevalent in all corners of the Indian subcontinent, that these [village level performing] arts are toned down, ‘simplistic’ imitations of the classical performance forms or the opposing argument that the classical forms are nothing more than developed evolutions of the folk forms, the evidence provided by terukkuttu indicates that the relationship between the folk and classical genres in Tamilnadu is much more complex. As has been seen already ... the ritual sphere reflects the complicated avenues of reciprocity and selection existing between the village and areas outside it. The performing techniques of the terukkuttu also show that the relation between the classical performing arts, which have found primary patronage in the major temples and kingly courts, and the folk performance genres, which have traditionally received village patronage, has been one of give-and-take. The interactions between the two spheres resemble a convection current carrying material and ideas in a never-ending interchange between them.” 90

the disc itself. These are Ayya nan oru, Kapi raga, adi tala; and Enneram enmel, Paras raga, adi (or eka) tala. They were both recorded by Miss Vanajatci, before 1931. We may observe that these two ragas are certainly characteristic of javali more so than of padam. 89T. Sankaran, personal communication, Chennai, 1990. 90R. Frasca, 1990:79. [Contents of bracket interpolated from the previous sentence in his text.] In a footnote to this page in his text, Frasca cites discussions with the historian Eugene Irschick as contributing to the formulation of his ideas on the subject.

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I feel that Frasca is right; one of the things I found at first curious and later frustrating in Chennai was the apparent lack of communication across an apparently deep chasm between the different art traditions of South India (I do not claim that the situation is any better in my home country, however).

5.9.8 Tala in the Padams

The rhythmic framework of Karnataka music is inevitably present and indeed forms the vital ground over which the melody in padams may flow seemingly free of time, but in the performance of padams, the drummer very carefully restrains overt displays of rhythmic prowess which could spoil the balance between presentation of text, melody, and abhinaya of a dancer. The compositions set in the three ragas Bhairavi, Kambhoji, and Todi on which we are focusing in this study occur in the following talas as shown in Fig. 5.11.

Figure 5.11 Tala settings of Tamil padams91. 91The

rupaka tala can either be conceived of and counted as three counts, or as 6 (2+4). Of the two, seven-count tala cycles used for padams, misra capu is relatively a quicker tempo, and tisra triputa is a slower tempo. The two are counted differently with the hand, to accommodate the difference in tempo: in misra capu the full hand hits the thigh on counts one, two, four, and six; on counts one and the hand is inverted. In tisra triputa, the first three counts are counted as in Adi tala, full hand then two-finger counts; counts four through seven involve the full hand hitting the thigh, inverted on counts five and seven. While seven-count Tamil padams are always described as being “in” misra capu (I have yet to hear someone describe the tala setting of a Tamil padam as tisra triputa, although in some printed collections the designation for ata tala, a 14-count [5+5+2+2] cycle is given), most Telugu padams are

Varnamettu in the Literature and Musicians’ Conversation

Of the 30 compositions in this study, three songs are not in the three ragas chosen for examination, leaving 27. Of these, we have recordings of one (Kaiyil panam [C2]) in two ragas, so there are 28 total songs accounted for in this figure. The preponderance of compositions is set in the misra capu tala, a rhythmic cycle of seven matras, beats, or counts.92 As we will see, this is considered characteristic for padams. “The beat gives the shape.”

—Smt. Hema Ramanathan

We have seen above the statement by Richard Frasca that, in Terukkuttu, a mettu is something that comprises both melody and meter. This remark jumped off the page at me because I had heard it before, in another context. Dr. N. Ramanathan and his wife Hema both stressed in the course of conversation their feeling that varnamettu in music is contingent upon, linked to, tala. Dr. Ramanathan felt that one tala, in particular, misra capu tala, a cycle of seven matras or counts usually rendered in madhyama kala (medium tempo), divided as 3+2+2, is “the tala suited for standard melody” (the statement that seven-count talas are the ideal rhythmic cycle for padams has the force of a truism in Vina Dhanammal’s family.)93 He stated that “varnamettu will exist in a raga only in songs which have the same Tala,” 94 noting that in the examples I had played him, we had heard a similar melody, especially in the compositions rendered in misra capu. Other compositions, notably those in adi tala seemed to bear very little melodic resemblance to this varnamettu (in Bhairavi raga, the adi tala padam Velavare [B4] considered to be in tisra triputa; this corresponds to the consensus that as a repertoire, Telugu padams are performed slower than Tamil padams. 92In an earlier draft of this chapter, I was using the term “beat” for matra, the Sanskrit term to denote units within a tala cycle. Prof. Harold Powers suggested the use of the term “count” instead, as “beat” has an association with the beating of the hand, which takes place to mark the angas (limbs, subdivisions) of tala, not at every count of the tala. 93“It is well-known that this 3+4-time measure is the most appropriate for dance.” P. Sambamoorthy, 1964:213 (referring to tisra triputa tala). 94Citations this paragraph Dr. N. Ramanathan (and Hema Ramanathan inset), personal communication, Chennai, 1990.

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is a good example, sharing little melodic shape at all in common with the misra capu padams set in Bhairavi).

5.9.9 Padams Set to Multiple Talas

During the course of the research, I came to hear of two particular padams being set in different talas at different times. In one example, the Tamil padam Nerrandi nerattile in Huseni raga is known in the family of Vina Dhanammal in rupaka tala. In the course of my research, I met Smt. T.A. Sundarambal of Mayavaram, who sang it for me in misra capu tala. Another example is the Tamil padam Tattai moriyal in Kalyani raga which I learned from Sri T. Viswanathan in adi tala, tisra gati.95 Later I learned that Viswa’s sister T. Balasaraswati used to sing this padam in misra capu tala. While speaking with Dr. Ritha Rajan, I mentioned what I had heard about the re-setting of tala in padams. Hearing my tale of talas, Dr. Rajan pointed out that both examples involved a crossover between meters of three and seven, and said yes, “One can always modify rupaka to and from capu.” 96 She proceeded to give another example of a song that has been set to both these talas by various performers, the Tamil padam Ariven ayya in Atana raga.

5.9.10 Varnamettu Across Four Tala Cycles

Months later, after listening to all the recordings I had collected, I found that the varnamettus in the group of songs covered by this study seem to embrace more than two talas, although just one composition in each case represents additional talas. In addition to misra capu and rupaka, one composition in khanda capu tala (a five-count cycle counted as 2+1+2), Nadamadi tirinda [D4], and one composition in adi tala Etu kanum [C1] both fit the Kambhoji varnamettu in a striking manner. (There were no other examples of khanda capu compositions available, 95Although

adi tala is a cycle of eight counts, tisra gati adi tala is in essence a triple meter, because each count is divided into three parts. Therefore, I view this example also as a transfer between meters of seven and three. 96Personal communication, Chennai, 1990.

Varnamettu in the Literature and Musicians’ Conversation

and the other adi tala compositions in the study definitely seemed to lay outside the fold.) Hypothesis: Adding or subtracting one count from a rhythmic cycle may not be such a wrenching change as to necessarily distort the melody.

These tala cycles (adi, misra capu, khanda capu, and rupaka) contain eight, seven, five, and three counts, respectively. I was puzzling through the relationship of these numbers with respect to varnamettu and tala, when a friend reminded me that rupaka tala is considered a six-count as well as three-count cycle. That allows these numbers to fall into a consecutive sequence97: eight, seven, six, and five. A hypothesis regarding the mechanics of this could go as follows: adding or subtracting one count from a rhythmic cycle over which a melody plays itself out may not be such a wrenching change as to necessarily distort the melody. While it can only be a speculation, these are the exact terms by which in retrospect I reconstructed to myself the process by which I learned “7/4” time as a young guitarist—not by conducting a thorough study of this strange new meter, but by subtracting one count from every familiar eight (every two bars of 4/4, that is).98 Adjustment between rupaka and misra capu talas necessitates, then, only the subtraction or addition of one count. And adjustment from either rupaka to khanda capu, or from misra capu to adi tala, requires an additional adjustment of one. This places adi and khanda capu at the periphery of this world of tala relation, leaving rupaka and misra capu the central players, as is borne out in the statistics regarding the frequency of occurrence of varnamettu. The relationship between the talas mentioned in this discussion is shown in the following chart. Two points of explanation: first, note that rupaka tala is given twice, as a three- and six-count 97I

am indebted to Dr. James Cowdery for observing that 2 times 3 equals 6. was in listening to jazz à la Dave Brubeck and Don Ellis, long prior to my experiencing Indian music, hence I deliberately say “7/4” rather than “a seven-count cycle.” One musical game still played amongst friends is to set old chestnuts in new meters, and chance operations have also been known to occur;

a guitar student of mine came into his lesson one day playing (and singing

the melody up to the bridge) his latest lesson “The Girl from Ipanema” perfectly

in 7/4.

98This

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cycle; when the thought of as a six-count cycle, rupaka is divided into angas (limbs) of 2+4. Secondly, while adi is the name of the eight-count cycle, divided 4+2+2, the four-count cycle in music is called catusra eka tala.

Figure 5.12 Tala cycles.

In Fig. 5.12, the talas found in the music examples for this study are shown. The edited examples of padams in Bhairavi and Kambhoji ragas, documented in the Transcriptions (see Appendix), are organized to follow the organization of Fig. 5.12. For example, in Kambhoji raga the one example in adi tala is presented first, followed by the examples in misra capu tala, etc. One line99 of text is taken for each song in turn; this enables the 99The

“line” is a somewhat subjective although very commonly-used term in the discussion of Karnataka music; in this situation, the safest definition for a “line” is some number of cycles of tala of music, observed consistently from song to song in the transcriptions. One notable exception is the pallavi section of Padari varuhudu [A12] where, as I perceive it, the varnamettu moves at twice the rate it moves in the other compositions. Therefore, I have transcribed the pallavi section of Padari compressing two cycles of tala into one.

Varnamettu in the Literature and Musicians’ Conversation

reader to follow the transcriptions vertically in sequence, that is, to hear each artist sing the same line in turn.

5.9.11 Music

It is time to music about music, to borrow a phrase from Charles Seeger. All the discussion, arguments advanced and points raised in this chapter are meant to be in preparation for coming to understand and enjoy the music and its history.

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Chapter 6

Conclusion Broadly speaking, my study has made three disciplinary excursions, starting with history (in Chapters 2 and 3), moving through language and literature (in Chapter 4 and the translations of the Appendix), and arriving at music (in Chapter 5). Three times we have approached the Tamil padam, from three directions. Again, broadly speaking, the book works in a diachronic mode in Chapters 2 and 3, considering kings and composers in a basically chronological sequence. Chapter 2 gives a historical sketch of the Rajas of Tanjavur and their patronage of the arts. Here, I was particularly interested in considering the accounts of historians alongside those of musicologists. Chapter 3 is a similarly diachronic historical treatment of the major composers of Tamil padams. Chapter 4 considers classification and is based on translation. In order to prepare an organizational scheme for texts, I translated a lot of padams and also crowdsourced the assistance of at least a dozen colleagues, who were incredibly generous with their time. Above all, I owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to Smt. G. Sulochana, my teacher T. Viswanathan’s cousin sister, and her family. The translations in the Appendix are intended to be open worksheets, generating multiple possibilities of interpretation, rather than finished authoritative renderings. In translating, I have tried to open up meanings rather than nail them down. I feel that this is in the spirit of the interpretation of padam by a dancer in her or his abhinaya, gestural language. Dancers whom I have spoken The Tamil Padam: A Dance Music Genre of South India Matthew Harp Allen

Copyright © 2023 Jenny Stanford Publishing Pte. Ltd.

ISBN 978-981-4968-56-0 (Hardcover), 978-1-003-33638-9 (eBook)

www.jennystanford.com

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Conclusion

with unanimously prefer to dance padams whose texts are sparse and suggestive (interdependent qualities) rather than densely packed with syllables and words. Too dense a text, too many words coming too fast, inhibits the possibilities of interpretation, tying the dancer to a single literal rendering of a text. It becomes like following a recipe, in the words of one dancer. In Chapter 4, I also introduce the idea of a genre containing core and peripheral repertoire elements, separated by fluid ‘fuzzy’ boundaries. Here, the song is found to be the basic unit of classification: each (relatively fixed) song text fits in one of several groups, based on the rhetorical structure of an address. Chapter 5 is a description of the musical universe of padams, and further development of ideas about the genre introduced in Chapter 4. Here, my basic preparatory activity was learning to sing compositions with my teacher T. Viswanathan and his cousin Smt. T. Muktha. This, together with a lot of listening, brought me to the concept of varnamettu as a vehicle to organize the music of padams. And I began to look beyond the confines of the world of art or classical music for evidence that would help me understand changes to padams over time, leading me to stress especially the processual performative aspects of the genre. The process of researching the Tamil padam has convinced me that classical and non-classical music were similar a century ago to each other in sometimes surprising ways, while today there seems to be a widespread assumption of their basic difference. This study has further shown me that genre classification is sometimes manipulated for the ideological purposes of one group or another. Viewing music as a static product frozen in a box makes it difficult to see processual connections which may be flowing around and through everything (see S. Natarajan, 1991; Allen, 1998).1 An approach that sees the genre as a process as much as a product is a key to understanding the challenges posed for genre studies in the early 21st century. The musicologist, Jeffrey Kallberg writes about the Chopin Nocturne in G Minor: “While often construed as a concept inherent in musical compositions alone, genre is better perceived as a social

1Natarajan,

Srividya, 1991:17.

Epilogue

phenomenon shared by composers and listeners alike. The distinction is basic. The literature abounds with efforts to define particular genres according to the music itself. Hence the need for genre studies to look away from the immanent characteristics of the music: without a broader focus, the meanings of genres will continue to elude us...” and “in reality genre is much less of a pigeonhole than a pigeon.” 2

This book explains padams as a genre of texts and music, tracing their development from a pre-history in Sangam and Bhakti poem hymns to maturity in the margam of Bharata Natyam in the 19th and 20th centuries. I have approached my study equally as one of the genres of texted music and sung poetry. I have tried to balance these two ways of seeing the genre.

6.1 Epilogue

Now, I prepare to figuratively put my pen back in its holder on my desk, to move on to new projects and return to postponed ones. Since I first encountered and tried to make sense of the social history of Karnataka music and Bharata Natyam dance, a considerable amount of time has elapsed. When I wrote my dissertation, I was just beginning to become aware of the complex history of music and dance as it has been long bound up in South India with caste, class, and classicism. Since I wrote the doctoral dissertation upon which this book is based, I have had the opportunity to go into greater depth in several publications (Allen, 1997, 1998, 2004a, 2004b, 2012) all of which emerged in one way or another from the foundational research I conducted for my Ph.D. As many of those ideas are already in print in a more developed form, I won’t rehearse all those arguments again here in detail. But I would like to sum up the main thoughts of the book at this point. The Performance History and translations in the Appendix give us a suggestive picture of how 30 compositions have fared in the public world of performance in the 20th century.3 There 2Kallberg, 3By

J., 1988:242. “public” here I refer to the performance that is advertised to an open audience,

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was a radical dislocation and relocation of the padam genre as with all dance music genres, involving significant shifts in the performance venue and performance personnel. Presentation of performances of dance at the fledgling Music Academy at the beginning of the 1930s at a time of crisis for hereditary temple artists, foreshadowed the removal of dance from the temple, court, or salon into the public sphere of the ticketed concert in an auditorium. In the 1930s, the traditional community of dancers began to be replaced in performance by non-traditional communities, mostly young women from Brahmin families. Between the years 1940 and 1973, I found documentation of only one dance performance by women from the traditional community, with the towering exception of T. Balasaraswati.4 Balasaraswati virtually alone from the traditional community continued to dance; indeed, she became an ambassador of Indian culture to the entire world. For non-traditional communities, dance had become an acceptable and soon a desirable social grace for a young woman to acquire on the path to marriage, while for the devadasi community, it had become something to leave behind.5 This is a huge subject about which there are many conflicting understandings, to which full justice cannot be done here. Centering on the decade of the 1930s, some women of hereditary for which a ticket admission price is charged. We see the term used in a different sense below by V.K. Narayana Menon in speaking of dance performances (likely at temples, festivals, or weddings) early in the 20th century. 4That exception is the performance of Smts. Rajalakshmi and Jeevaratnam at the Music Academy in 1956. According to T. Viswanathan, E. Krishna Ayyar was helping this dance, duo in their performing career in the 1950s. 5Amrit Srinivasan (1985, and personal communication, 1990) speaks of a Mahanadu, a caste conference of the devadasi community, which took place in 1948, in which the community reconstituted itself as the Isai Vellalar, literally “farmers of music.” (The Vellalar community of South India is an established and respected community of landowning farmers, from which come many of the leaders of the Saiva Siddhanta monasteries as well.) Srinivasan said that at this gathering, which took place the year following the official legal ban on devadasi dedication (1947), the consensus of the meeting (especially the male delegates) was that the women of the community should no longer dance. The prominence of the Isai Vellalar community in 20th-century Tamil Nadu political life has been addressed by Eugene Irschick in 1986.

Epilogue

background continued to perform, not as dancers but as vocalists in music concerts or the cinema. Many left the performing arts entirely—my teacher T. Viswanathan got his bachelor’s degree in economics. The devadasis’ practice of the performing arts was of course intimately intertwined with their hereditary occupation as female ritual specialists, which was made first the subject of public scorn and then finally legally outlawed in 1947.6 The larger social movements that enveloped the devadasi community have been addressed in several excellent studies, and are outside the scope of the current study.7 The documentation in the Performance History of the 30 padams of this study may be seen as a local manifestation of larger social and historical movements. A study of the Performance History will reveal, for example, that compositions on Nataraja became extremely popular for dance by the end of the 1930s (see especially Kalaittukki [D2] and Natanam adinar [G1]). Everyone I have spoken with agrees that Nataraja was not a love god of the devadasis. The taking up of Nataraja as a new nayaka for padam—songs such as Natanam adinar were specifically called “padam” in dance programs of the 1940s8—was itself a reflection of currents moving through society at large. Nataraja was enlisted to serve as a symbol for the new dance. The art historian Ananda Coomaraswamy provided a critical essay which told a particular story to Indians about the Indian arts. His “The Dance of Shiva” would help the Indian public make sense of the transformation of dance occurring right before their eyes: 6See

S. Kersenboom-Story, 1987: xxi for the text of “The Madras Devadasis (Prevention of Dedication) Act, 1947,” passed on November 26, 1947. 7For thorough studies of the traditional dance community from different perspectives see especially Amrit Srinivasan, 1984; Frédérique Marglin, 1985; and Saskia Kersenboom-Story, 1987. For a study of specific legal issues see also Kay Kirkpatrick Jordan, 1989. 8Kumbakonam Banumathi’s dance program for the Cennai Sankita Vitvatsapai Sankita Mahanatu on December 25, 1940 is one example. Here, Natanam adinar is listed as the first padam after the varnam. See also Kay Ambrose, 1950:57, which gives Natanam adinar as an example of the padam genre. Many more such examples could be given.

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“So far I have… endeavoured only to translate the central thought of the conception of Shiva’s dance from plastic to verbal expression, without reference to the beauty or imperfection of individual works. But it may not be out of place to call attention to the grandeur of this conception itself as a synthesis of science, religion and art… How supremely great in power and grace this dancing image must appear to all those who have striven in plastic forms to give expression to their intuition of life!” 9

In the early 20th century, the devadasi and her dance were also being framed from another, a colonial, perspective: Was the hereditary dancer a prostitute or a nun? Nataraja was not, of course, a new god in the 1930s when he was taken up by the newly named Bharata Natyam as its patron deity; we have seen that Nataraja’s cult at Cidambaram dates back at least a thousand years. But he was an appropriate symbol for the new image of dance being advanced by a revival movement, led in Chennai by the Theosophical Society (which gave birth to the internationally known academy of the arts, Kalakshetra). Amrit Srinivasan places the writings of scholars like Coomaraswamy in the context of colonial discourse, a discourse which came to bear directly on the performing arts:

9A.

“The deep involvement of the Theosophical Society with the resurgence of the devadasi’s dance as a national art illustrates in one particular instance the manner in which it mediated the cultural and the organisational tasks of Indian unification. Eminent personalities such as Rabindranath Tagore and A.K. Coomaraswamy and E.B. Havell, who had in their writings encouraged the restoration of a ‘cultural’ freedom and identity for India and not merely the winning of her ‘political’ freedom from the West, were conspicuously associated with Annie Besant [suffragette and later Theosophical leader] and her circle. It is not surprising that it is these very thinkers who are most associated today with the propagation of cultural theories which glamorise the cohesion, harmony and mysticism of India’s traditional beliefs and practices.

Coomaraswamy, 1957:77.

Epilogue

A.K. Coomaraswamy’s interest in Platonian metaphysics and the Romantic aestheticians of the nineteenth century, clearly influenced his approach to Indian art as inner vision and yoga. Just as Havell’s emphasis on the artist’s spiritual intention justified the overcoming of subject/object distinctions in Indian traditions, which had so far borne the brunt of Western criticism... In both cases the interlocutor remained the West, which was now being offered theories that emphasised the spiritual, civilisational advantages of Eastern philosophies and techniques.”10

According to Srinivasan, two groups of influential, highly educated Indians argued two quite different solutions for the devadasi “problem” in the early decades of the 20th century in South India. The would-be revivalists of dance, epitomized by the Theosophical Society (the anti-official European faction in colonial Chennai), characterized the devadasi as a pagan nun, while the reformers, epitomized by the Protestant missionary and official British government presence in Chennai, characterized her as a prostitute. While the debate took place on Indian soil, Srinivasan argues that its terms were framed in Europe: “The Anti-Nautch movement of the 1890s, although articulated chiefly by educated Indians was really a carry over of the social and religious reforms that had earlier been attempted extensively by the missionaries and British officials themselves. More particularly it formed part of the whole complex of reforms relating to women such as the ban on suttee and female infanticide, the encouragement of widow-remarriage and the raising of the Age of Consent that had come within the purview of government legislation...

10A.

“Given the dual role of the British, both as administrators and legislators, there was a premium on social issues being presented in a language understood by them, on which their reform actions could be based. Those, on the other hand, who opposed the British regime, simultaneously repudiated the western, rational, scientific and moral structure on which its authority was based. This is important to remember when

Srinivasan, 1984:22–23.

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we consider the distinctive sources of legitimacy and verification cited by the adversaries in the devadasi debate. In the case of the ‘reformists’, it was the currents of rationalism, empiricism and neo-Protestantism which informed their practice, whereas in the case of the ‘revivalists’ it was the currents of Theosophy, Evolutionism and Tractarian High Church doctrine which informed theirs. Vis-a-vis India, however, both Theosophy and official science remained products of the same social forces that had initiated the British presence in India in the first place...

“Put very simply, the reformers presented the extant temple-dancer as a prostitute in order to do away with her; the revivalists presented the ancient Hindu templedancer as a nun in order to incarnate her and her dance afresh. The alien rationality at work here encouraging the apprehension of the living devadasi as irrational and having two contrasted and mutually antagonistic strands to her person is not dissimilar to the one that played up the apparent contradictions of Indian social life in general...

11A.

“Categories such as prostitute and nun can tell us nothing about the devadasi as a creature peculiar to Hindu Bhakti sectarianism. But they can and do tell us a lot about how the reformers and revivalists were so successful in achieving their political aims. In the context of a colonial government, it was the advertising of the moral grotesqueness of the devadasi, the confusion in her person of categories normally kept apart which permitted, even compelled, social action in fundamentally opposite directions. Quite clearly the reform and revivalist programmes were presented in terms of argumentation that were not indigenous. In the process, the wholeness of the devadasi’s person, her art and her life, certainly had to go - the contradictions of her office could not otherwise be eliminated. It is the devadasi who effectively demonstrates the peculiarly destructive effects of colonialism and its forms of rationality on Indian society in general. The imposition of alien categories, such as prostitute and nun on the devadasi’s traditional life and praxis, altered them ineradicably.”11

Srinivasan, 1984:24,27,32,35.

The Hindu of Madras

It is a main argument of Amrit Srinivasan’s dissertation that the devadasi was in the context of pre-colonial Indian society “no anomaly, but a product of cultural innovations that have shaped Tamil society as a whole.”12 The Tamil padam was her song—one of her songs, to be precise, as her repertoire encompassed many genres—written for devadasi performance by male composers whose lives we have glimpsed through the course of this study. In the 20th century, the padam had to adjust to fundamental changes in the performance venue, performance personnel, and discourse about performance, alluded to above. The boundaries of the genre have certainly been stretched as a result.

6.2 The Hindu of Madras

Some of the sources that have been used in compiling the Performance History are themselves very rich in potential for analysis, perhaps most of all the visual images which we begin to see in the South Indian print media by 1930. Images such as Plate 6.1 helped me in a straightforward sense, to verify the year in which Rattiri porutenke [C3] was recorded by Tirugokarnam N. Manikkam. Other advertisements from this period in The Hindu of Madras such as Plate 6.2, announcing the release of new recordings by Vina Dhanammal, contain a wealth of information about performance practice and attitudes at the time. Note in Plate 6.2 the appeal to resist the harmonium. It is hard to imagine today that it ever posed any kind of threat to Karnataka music; in South India, I have never seen a harmonium perform either as a solo or supporting instrument in a kacceri. However, The Hindu newspaper provides corroborative evidence, such as Plate 6.3, showing us that the harmonium was being marketed actively to the Chennai audience as “the perfect instrument” for South Indian music (by a Calcutta company!) and eliciting a spirited reaction from its opponents. 12A.

Srinivasan, 1984: Abstract.

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Plate 6.1 Tirugokarnam N. Manikkam, The Hindu, December 17, 1932.

The Hindu of Madras

Plate 6.2 Vina Dhanammal, The Hindu, December 9, 1932.

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Plate 6.3 Harmonium Advertisement, The Hindu, January 29, 1930.

Dance Programs

6.3 Dance Programs According to T. Sankaran, the first dance programs, including details about which items, pieces, were performed in the course of a dance concert, were published at the beginning of the 1930s. We may see this as another aspect of the movement of dance into the world of public performance and patronage, in addition to the adoption of a new patron deity, discussed above, and a new name, to be discussed below. Over the years, the Music Academy has been the only sabha (concert-presenting organization) which has consistently printed programs of dance performances on which names of compositions to be performed were given.13 Most of the dance programs I was able to see are those published in the Souvenir of the Music Academy of Madras. Questions about the adoption of a new name, Bharata Natyam, for the dance form which had been earlier called by the names Nautch, Sadir, and others, may be addressed through examination of dance programs published in the early 1930s. Two early dance programs (kindly made available through the courtesy of Smt. Nandini Ramani) illustrate that the advent of the new name was a gradual process. Plate 6.4 is the earliest printed dance program I have found, from January 3, 1932. The dancer “Srimati Gowri” is Mylapore Gowri Ammal, who was a close friend of the family of Vina Dhanammal and one of the main inspirations for the young T. Balasaraswati to take up dance at a time when it was strongly discouraged, even in Balasaraswati’s own family where none of the women had danced for at least two and maybe three generations.14 13It

should be stressed that most sabhas in Chennai do not follow this practice, and some of the musicians and dancers who perform at the Music Academy do not provide the Academy with detailed programs. In the case of dance, even when a program is provided, sometimes after the varnam and the interval (intermission) the annotation for padams and/or javalis is generic, that is the program says only “padam” instead of giving the name of particular padams to be performed. 14After Vina Dhanammal’s grandmother Kamakshi, who was known by the family to have been a court dancer in Tanjavur, there is no word of any of this Kamakshi’s descendants dancing until Balasaraswati took up the art in the 1920s.

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Plate 6.4 Mylapore Gowri Ammal Program, January 3, 1932 (courtesy of Smt. Nandini Ramani).

Dance Programs

Plate 6.5 T. Balasaraswati Program, 1933–34 (courtesy of Smt. Nandini Ramani).

We notice that on Smt. Gowri’s program, the recital is entitled “Bharata Natyam.” Now moving to Plate 6.5, the cover page of Balasaraswati’s performance for the Music Academy in late 1933 or early 1934,15 we see that it is described as a concert of “Sadir Kaccheri.” The juxtaposition of Plates 6.4 and 6.5 is noteworthy: the old name of the dance (Sadir) and its new name (Bharata Natyam) overlap here by approximately two years. Gowri Ammal’s performance in early 1932 is heralded by the new name, while Balasaraswati’s concert two years later retains the traditional name. Scholars have spilled a fair amount of ink trying to verify the claims of several contestants to have been the first to use the term Bharata Natyam.16 These plates both date that usage at least as far back as the beginning of 1932, and tell us that the name Sadir continued to be in use for several years after the name Bharata Natyam started coming into vogue. 15Dr.

Arudra states that Balasaraswati danced under the auspices of the Music Academy of Madras on August 26, 1933, and February 1, 1934. Arudra, 1986/1987:21. 16This issue is summarized in Arudra, 1986/1987:30–31.

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6.4 Old and New Worlds One final example may serve to summarize the relationship between what I have characterized as the old and new worlds of dance and of the Tamil padam. Plate 6.6 appeared in The Hindu on August 26, 1933. This picture plus its accompanying text encapsulates much of the 20th-century debate over dance and dancers. In the picture, a dancer is performing in a temple setting (note column in front extreme left). This tableau represents an old world of dance. The text plays in National Enquirer fashion upon public perception of the devadasi, in order to sell storybooks in this case. The dancer’s musical accompanists are portrayed standing, following her as she moves. Evidence that this is indeed descriptively accurate of performance practice at that time is provided by V.K. Narayana Menon, who could almost describe the scene shown in Plate 6.6: “Reform was certainly necessary not only in the social attitude to the Dance, but in the practice and presentation of the art itself. Public performances of Bharatanatyam in the early years of this century were somewhat crude. Recitals often lasted the whole night. The music was hardly ever of good quality. Bagpipes (!) were the order of the day for drones. Three or four male singers dressed in green and red turbans stood on one corner of the platform, the drummer often standing behind the dancer and walking up and down the stage. The Nattuvanar and the musicians began to sit on the platform and they dressed soberly. The bagpipe gave place to the tanpura. The dress and the make-up of the dancer (who used to be over-dressed, over-made up and over-ornamented) were improved. The dignity of the platform was sternly maintained and overtures from the audience severely snubbed.”17

By the mid-1930s, the musicians who accompanied dance had ceased standing, and were now seated on stage. Male musical accompanists for dance gained the right to wear a shirt instead of having to perform bare-chested. Dance ceased to be performed 17V.K.

Narayana Menon, 1963: 18 (parentheses in original).

Old and New Worlds

as part of temple service altogether. Looking to the inset in the upper right corner of the picture, we see Nataraja, the symbol of the new world in dance: the future is literally hovering in the corner. The image of Nataraja is today placed on almost every stage when a dance performance takes place, and dancers perform their obeisance to Nataraja before beginning their performance. Yet all my sources agreed that Nataraja was not a god of the devadasis, that he was not an option for Love Raja. Nataraja was one of the powerful images of the new world of dance. New patron deity, new name, new performance venue, comportment and personnel, the adoption of a rhetoric of classical—all mark the progress of dance and of the Tamil padam, in the 20th century in Tamil Nadu.

Plate 6.6 “Devi the Dancer,” The Hindu, August 26, 1933.

In this conclusion after recapitulating the main points of the book, I have given a brief sketch of the context for the performance of Tamil padams in the 20th century. It is only the beginning of an approach to contemporary performance studies and to larger social issues in which artistic performance is naturally nested. As I have come to the end of my own dance

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with words, here I make the gesture of mangalam, benediction. This is the end of one performance; hopefully, there will be other and better ones to come.

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325

Appendix I

Performance History

328

Appendix I

Note on Sources Presented here is a “Performance History” for the thirty padams we have come to know in this study. It consists of all the documentation I found for each padam having either being recorded or performed in dance between 1904 (approximately when the first gramophone recordings were made in India—see Pekka Gronow 1981) and 1973 (the last documentation I found for the performances of T. Bālasaraswati in India). It can only be suggestive and hopefully representative of what the actual total performance history of these thirty compositions is, not an exhaustive accounting of that totality.

The information about dance performances was gathered from (1) various issues of the Souvenir of the Music Academy of Madras (courtesy Library of the Music Academy and T. Viśwanāthan) and (2) individual dance programs (courtesy Smt. Nandini Ramani and T. Viśwanāthan). Cassette copies of 78 RPM gramophone recordings as well as the information regarding catalog numbers and approximate dates of recording of these disks was provided by Srī V. A. K. Raṅga Rao. The 78 RPM recordings mentioned in the Repertoire History cover a period of time from ca. 1904 to the 1950s, while non-commercial cassette recordings were made between 1989 and 1992.

329

Appendix I

Collum vakai

[A4]

Eilkumayamana

Recordings: T. Sarik:aran (organized group recording) ca. 1985 (non-commercial cassette) Dance Performances: in Taiijaviir Temple until ca. 1950 T. Balasaraswati production ca. 1954

Recordings: Tiruccendiir Shanmuga Vadivoo before 1930 HMV P1240 Dance Performances: Not known.

[A2]

Recordings: T.A. Sundarambal 1990 non-commercial cassette Dance Performances: Not known.

Ella arumai

Recordings: M.S. Subbulakshmi 1935-40 Twin Ff 2032 oc 2402 K.B. SundaramMl 1932 Columbia LBE 26 WEI 914 T. Muktha 1990 non-commercial cassette Dance performances Kumbakonam Balachandra 1937, 38 T. Balasaraswati 1970

[A3]

Eilke iruntalum

Recordings: Salem Godavari before 1931 T. Viswanathan 1990 Dance performances: T. Balasaraswati 1955,57, 60,66

(notavailable) non-commercial cassette

[A5]

[A6]

GC-8-13816

Enna ninaindaro~ ~@;fiDiflf lfiJ0;UrT~ vallar puka[ taficaic carapeji greatpeople praise Tafijavur Sarabhoji {S arabhoji Maharaja of Tafijaviir, praised by great people}

tfliPIJrT~rl

makarajar Maharaja

Ulml~§Jffi@) ~&l)lf~@Gltb §11§1 1t ~mfl~rTIP manattukku icaintitum initllka tUtu nr in his mind/heart will be pleased sweetly message you {will be pleased when you sweetly tell him my message}

Gl6Zir&!l

KRM.

T. Viswanllthan (1990). (Salem Godavari, before 1930, not available) Smt. Kupparnmal, toT. Balasaraswati & T. Viswanathan.

~®d>~nwt..O

~®[email protected] irukkum

Caranam #1

!Jjn6rir 8!6l..lIYJ ~®d>!D !JiEID(!5161l>lll nan avarukku na~antu irunta nar!!iyai I to him behaving being devotion (he will never be able to forget my devotion to him, aQi}

Vaidisvarailkoil Subbarama Ayyar. Kambhoji. Riipaka. T. Viswanllthan; VSA; GSKA\KRM.

u ruru61ll Pallavi

G"T!GJC:a;

[A3:2]

2..Lmr

an.~q

sakikka:r5 he can't tolerate

~n~&!l

QlfuJ§lffi

Qa;n6!ltil(i)l

tane emphasis

ceytuk doing

koJ.lW doing

f>l6Zir&!l

Q1fuJ@iC:6l..l6rir

enna what

ceykuven will I do?

~®d>!D C:un~wtil

evarkal utan leO~ irunta p5tilum which woman with together being-time (=even though) (even though he is together with some (whichever) woman}

G"Tmr

C:unru

&~6l.JQJ,ffi@i

ffi161llLffi@iC:LOn

en p51 avarukku kitaikkumo like me to him (is someone) available? {is there anyone like me available for him? Go, aQi!}

C:un~q

po~

go,ati

3Throughout, T. Viswanathan uses "-ar" (respectful/plural) masculine verb endings while VSA uses "-an" (familiar/singular) endings to refer to the nay aka. 4This is TV & GSKA text. VSA is nan avanuk:ku ceytu na@i ivvulaka uUa nal ajavu m~akkan.- He could never forget for a single day in this world (my devotion to him.) 5QSKA- itu varaiyil arai nimishamum pirintu irukkar- until now, he could never be separated from me even for half a minute. VSA- itu varaiyil napyum pirintu iruk:kan­ for even a nap, an hour of twenty four minutes, he couldn't be separated from me. 6From Telugu & Kannada- moti. arrogance; way, manner, air, style; grandeur, exhibition, disagreement, deceit. - Lex. 7VSA- iruk:kinran. Also, 1906 text only jumps from here to irunta patilum, skipping one of the eight lines.

343

Appendix II

[A3:4]

[A3:3] 60llHil

QlfrTffi@j

Car an am #2

!!Jn&nuJlru

~~

6ll"lio

~L.tq.

ati na:!aiyil kai tani8 first day, in hand patting {on that fJTSt day, he made promises to me} ~26oolffi@j

~O&RiJLd>lil

- nEmffi@ilf

QlfrTmTEm

- enakkuc -tome

conn a saying

QlfuJ~rTmr

l!Qaikku iraQtakam ceyya:rati9 lover's vows, to two cannot do {he could never break into two those vows he made to me I

- 816lJQ!Jffi@j

- avarukku -to him

nmr · .@tb

inimti avarukkum hereafter to him & (from now on, between he and I...}

kZ6001 nil 10 rr §I

'"'rorffi®Lil eoakkum tome&

&lilt

iJ)ruikatu a~ consenting, complying, friendship (&neg.) al&rruJ 81600fl!i;!'5rrC:@J @6lJ6lir!'5rraiJ etukkliy at)intiini:i ivantlin which-ly was he decorated like that? him & emphasis (why was he adorned in that way? is he himself my lord?} Qg:tiJ!'D !JirT 6lir a=rr$1~ n!ln ceyta clitittu done bestowed, spoken !(my) (has he come as a result of my prayers?}

!'561JU

tavap6 prayers

nail en my

UUJ@)W payanliy as a result

LDi6JE!lll& mailkai woman LDI@E!lll& maitkai woman GlU(!9LDrTC:@) perumano lord? 6lJ di!'Drr C:@) vantiini:i did he come?

4Maftkai- woman or girl between 12-13 years old- Lex. D. Hudson- "This likely is a reference to the 3 goddesses who are associated with VishQu. The three women with him are probably Bhu-devi at his feet (perhaps depicted as emerging from the ground), Lakshmi-devi at his side, and Sri-devi on his chest (the srivatsa mole on his right breast that signifies kingship)." 5The tulavarn or tu!asi is a small green leaf, sacred to VishQu. &rava- Sanskrit tapas.

I&LDbULi:J Qa:l@a:;wrutil a:;rrL.LQ. !iillrfl!iJ!'D fiill~lf virinta kamalam ceilkamalam7 vi.[ic katti fully blooming lotus showing eye red-lotus (displaying the opening lotus, displaying the gazing red lotus ...&}

a:;rrL.LQ.u kanip showing

Qurr®!iJ§I a:;wrul@ l..l6lJElll C!Jl6dr~Lil y,~ poruntu puvana milfl!Um piltta kamalam join, unite,[fight] worlds three flower lotus (and displaying the blossomed lotus in which all three worlds reside9)

a:;rrL.LQ.ffi kanik showing

1£>0!5§1 @161@) 6lJ@Jc£1®61ir 1&(!92mol !'D!i>§l81(!961i$16lir(!!)Erir karantulO Uiku varukifan karuQai tantu aru!kinrlin in disguise here he is coming compassion he is giving/blessing (he is coming here in disguise; he is giving blessings with compassion}

niDI @®!51'5 bi~Q"rTI&~ ~®If c: g: E!ll6lJ irunta en etirlikat tiruccevai being tome directly in front holy service(darsan) {coming directly in front of me, he gives me dar§anll}

!'5®$1C!!J6lir tarukirlin he gives

7D. Hudson - "Two of the three lotuses may refer to flowers held by two of the goddesses and one the eyes of the milrti of the male. The first lotus, one that is opening, may be not-fully-opened lotus held in one hand, probably in the hand of the standing Lakshmi. The fully blossomed lotus may be another flower held in another hand, probably in the hand of Bhu-devi at his feet. The red lotus that is open and gazing (vi!i) refers to the eyes of the miirti himself; the hero's eyes are said to be "red" in the sense of having red streaks; they signify the resolve (sankalpa) to complete and act (kriya, a ritual performance), for example, to bring forth the universe and protect it." BD. Hudson's translation of the line. 9D. Hudson's translation of the line. 10o Hudson- Disguise is suggestive of Vishnu in the form of Aragar during the Citrai festival at Madurai, as he comes disguised as a KaUar from A[agarkoil to Madurai's outskirts- passing through KaUar territory. 11D. Hudson- "He allows me to serve him auspiciously."

352

Appendix II

[A7:4] B'!J mmtiJ Caranam #3 12

lO ror ffirffiw fT 11)

~B'n~ (!Jl~ @rulliJCDci= GIB=nlimmffi @)&llYJ$1> coti mu!i 13 ila1ikac col1)ak kll!.~it bright head shining gold (swal1)a) eamng {his head is brightly shining; his golden earrings are shaking} ~ LO§J@)

c£16llliJ c£1600f\

~ LO CD Cru

@&n LLillru

metuku kil)kii:Ii mekalai itaiyil excellent/precious small bells jewelled girdle on the waist {precious small bells shake on the jewelled girdle around his waist}

o~nt.Ouu$i>&n~u

[A8:1]

~unfr~~u

~uli

~®~nLntiJ

prtamparattail4 p()rt~ip per tiruna:mam gold cloth, brocade weanng big Tirunamam {he is wearing gold cloth: he has a large Vaishl).ava mark (on his head))

§JbU~CD

tulailka shaking

®WIIilCDu kulmikap shaking

Manata[iyamal. Composer: Rag am: Ta!am: Text sources: Music notation: Recording: Source: Discussed in:

ru MuttuttaQ(Iavar. KambhOji. Adi. MT, TKC, KH, KRM. KRM,KH. K.R. Madhavi Rajagopalan (1990) Smt. Lakshmi (disciple of Alattiir Subbulu) to KRM. p. 108-109.

ururucll Pallavi .!FfTfr~~ci; cllrttik placed

CDn~ru .91YJCDii ~un~ru CDIT8ii) ~~®61i IYJfr~ klltal ar.akarl5 pOle ka:ksi tantu aru! murtti love beautyNishl)u just like darsan giving/blessing lord (form) {just like Klltal A[akar, this murtti is giving darsan and blessings (Could it be the lord himself?)}

Lnmr§J

81!6'wnLnru

&nLOwru

QCDn60cil~um

- QCDrr6001L

manatu ariyamal maiyal kol).ten - koiJta my heart not understanding love/confusion I did -having done {without understanding him (whether he is good, bad... ) I fell in love}

&n LOW Q1J ffi@) n tmElll U ru6riT maiyalukku enna palan love, for what profit, fruit, efficacy {for my falling in love, what result did I see?}

CD 6001~ L 6riT kal)ten did I see?

81@! urur.ucll Anupallavi

12o. Hudson- this caraQam describes the milrti, the processional image of the deity, now sitting in front of me. 13Muti- head, or crown of the head, or tuft of h air on the he ad. 14pmimparam- Gold cloth which Vishl).u wears. -Lex. Also D. Hudson- gold is suggestive of the golden utsava (processional) image ofVishiJu, in distinction from Katal A[agar (in the final line.) 15D. Hudson - "The term katal arakar no doubt alludes to Kutal Ala gar (Madurai), Kallar Alagar (Alagarkoyil) and..Kuttalagar (near Srivilliputtur)." Further, "The term could also refer to Krishna as the embodiment of Kama, god of love. Alagar, this name of Vishnu in the Madurai area, is a Tamil word for Sundarar, beauty. Sundarar is the name of Siva who is married to Minakshi at Madurai. So both of the 'great gods' have a local name meaning purely 'beauty', as does Murugan, whose root Muruku is related to Araku."

~Ell! (!j) tiJ $1 (!!J&ll u Lj rf1LLJ til tinamum k:irupai puriyum daily grace/mercy being able to {he always blesses his devotees ... }

lf16lJCDfTt.Ol civakami

Sivakami

LOi£l[b!i;§] @Q))tiJ maki[ntuitum

rejoicing-giving

~~8'fr

necar lover/friend/devotee ~® ~L!JfT~fr tiru natarlljar

holy Nataraja

{holy lord Nataraja, who pleases (his wife) Tillai Sivakami}

- ~ruc.ruci=

- tillaic - Cidambaram

353

Appendix II

[A8:3]

[A8:2] IF!J &Rllti.J Caranam #2

IF!J 6001ti.J Caranam #l

w!f,)

!51T(!i)6l.J§J bl&iTGOT Qa;rr(!i)ro>wC:wrr mati nawvatu enna ko~umaiyo mind seeking (noun) what is it crueVwrong? {the fact that I seek him, is there any wrong in this? l

LOGOT~ru ~rruJffi@j QGlJQ")JULj ~8:C:IF mana til taykku ve!lJppu 1 acce heart/mind, in mother, of fear, confusion came about! {my mother became scared (because I was in love without knowing him)}

lD ru li If. a; 26ool Q IFWW 1§1 Q")J@) malar kll.Qai ceyya nuruku2 flower arrows to do threaten/att ack {Maran's flower arrows attack me - I cannot bear it!}

@§1 Gl.J(J Gl.J(J ~8:C:IF ~8:C:IF ini vara vara ni ~~i!rap pecce furthermore gradually harsh/cruel speech indeed! {as time passed on, gradually (she began to speak) harsh words} @am~§J

Qa;rr60li!Lrrru ninaittu k01)\al thinking if I do {when I think of it, I have to sigh }

Q U (!;C!Jl8: C: IF

perumocce sigh, long breath indeed!

U(!;Gl.J C:!51i @liDy)WrTiiffi@j @§1 paruva ner ifaiyarkku itu young woman, adorned with jewe ls this {to an innocent young girl (me) all this has happened}

b1 rururrC:LO ella me all!

- lDIT(J&iJ -maran - Maran (god of love)

~8:C:IF

acce happened!

lT. Viswanatha n suggests the sense of detest, disgust, aversion; giving "It created an aversion in my mother's mind."

IF!f,)ffi ®u5lru Bn.Gl.J§J Gurrw

nan anke varuveno turai tan ilike I there will I come? lord himself here (should I go there, or will the lord himself come here?)

[5W!i;§]

6lJ !b!i!>EIDL.il G lfuJ E§J 6lJ 60l!lflil $1 ~® !iJ E§J Lil vantanam ceytu va!}aliki iruntum reverence, adoration doing (I am) yielding being, even though {even though I'm always reverently worshipping him, always yielding to him}

LDQll§l

1,!) IT ffir ,g)j r6J ~ a; 6lJ (I"?~ 6lJ ~ @) Nan alike varuveno.

~ucfl

UlEIDEm(Zi

~!!5J!!;§]

6lJ(!:!J6lJrT~IJfl

- 616liTI!Jl

varuvaro will he come?

- en!:U -saying

6lJrTLq (6lJrT ~UrTLq)

nayantu 1 peci manatai arintu vati (va poti) tactfully speaking (his) heart/mind understanding (go and) come, adi (speaking gently, sweetly, coaxingly, find out his mind/heart and come, adi) ~wururuGill Anupallavi

6lJfT60lll6lJfi U600fll.ljLiJ ~61J®il (Zi&fllru 6lJ60fi Q)l~~ffi@jLO~IJifft ll§J va:!)avar pa!)iyum ve!iir tanil va!ar muttukkumatecar mitu devas/celestials bowing Ye!Ur rightin dweller Muttukkurnara on(him) (all the celestial beings come and bow before Muttukkumara, the dweller of Ye!llr... ) anLDwru

~@i~

~&lll

(ZirT60rr~

LDrt~EID

~LQ-

~!l>~EID

maiyal a:kutu ini ta!atu mane ali tene love/infatuation came more cannot bear o gazelle! a'Jcflcoror C:>'Jcflcoror

Bfilluru

[email protected]

!!iLrilLJrf1

tecikan ampala var.um3 natampuri guru, teacher hall(Cidambaram) residing dance pose {the great teacher, the great dancer who resides in the great hall ... }

~®ULJ!J~&»>'JlJ.1ril

~®r..i:H..fl ~®r..i:H..fl mfl utan eri ceyta natana instantly burning doing dance {.. he instantly burned, that king of dance}

6lmTffi@j

rajanai veliene king (& accus.) will I not win? {will I not win the king who holds the sugarcane bow?}

oru viJ:iyotul tiruppurattaiyum one eye, with all the three cities {with his third eye, all the three "sinful" cities ... }

mflmfl

C:!!ilFLOnw

C:>'Jcflcoror

8!6!DJUrurucll Anupallavi cll!!51'J6lln~ C:>'J6llW cfl>'JrilU!J !!in>'J®tevliti tevan citampara nlitan first god god Cidambaram Lord {first among the gods, the Lord of Cidambaram!}

2MT text: kar.ai. Pole, sugarcane.- Lex. 3MT text: val)a. Dweller. - Lex.

365

Appendix II

[Al4:1]

[A13:3]

wrrli

lf!J mtb Caranam #2

~UIJ§l

~UIJffi~kiJ2ru~w

p5katillaiye ttme goes not! {time moves not at all ... }

~tu

®!iJ~tb ku!Iam fault

Composer:

9®

oru (even) one

G8' 11 ru w61JIJ rnru 2ru ~ w

§II §I

tiltu colluvarillaiye message he does not send (say)! {he sends not even one word as a message to me}

fF§l

8l!Di!!;~~6llflru2ru~w

Ito a[intenillaiye this I do not know {I don't understand why ... )

WIJ§l

&~mr

~Lllru

en on

mel me

Discussed in:

®!iJ~tb ku!Iam fault

~tillo(!Jltb

$&)o611

yetanum malum milv ayiramum4 tira!a Brahma & Vishl)u & three thousand & assembling {Brahma, Vishl)u, and the three thousand Drkshitars assemble ... )

~umillf

&~mrror &~mrror

GIFilli>@J6lJilil

Ull~Wr

atiya patan dancing feet {worshipping his dancing feet) 4The "three thousand" refers to the group ofDikshitar Brahmin priests who conduct the worship at the Siva Nataraja temple in Cidambaram. See B. Natarajan 1974, John Loud 1991. 5MT text: to.r.a. From to.r.u, to worship, adore. - Lex.

&~mrror

anname nan o swan! I {o my swan, what will I do?)

Gill600J 8j 6lJ n 2.. L mr an.llt vii) avar u(an ku(i5 heaven he with together {together, worshipping the heavenly one ... ) ~fltlll

SubramaQia PaQQitar (late 19th, early 20th century) (RRI attributes to Ghanam Krishl)a Ayyar.) T(i:Jffi~6ll

Qu61lrif

(5L UUrT6fl

aparupama:na pel) umakkf!kave natappa! unique, beautiful woman just as you ask! she will behave [she is a unique, special woman; she will behave according to your wishes) .!l)jG»~~§J 6ll(ILQ))LDrT

lfrTu51

aiaittu varanuma may I bring (may I bring her to you, lord?)

cami lord

lMahl!rajapuram Viswanatha Ayyar (henceforth MVA) 78 RPM- atipatiye. 2This is one of the names for Tirukkarukuf.!!am, also known as the Eagle Mount, near Chingleput. Site of a famous temple to Siva and Murugan, eagles come to nest there at a particular time of ye ar. S.V. Seshadri: "Tirukkarukull!am is equally a Siva and Murugan sthala." On Tirukkaiukllll!arn as it is known as "Veda Mountain" (Vedagiri, Vedapuri), see also Kamil Zvelebil1991:42. Mahl!rajapuram Viswanl!tha Ayyar, who recorded this song, lived in Tirukkarukllll!am for several years. 3MVA- vetacalap pon malai pataitta cukamay.

368

Appendix II

[B1:4]

[B1:3] CFQ'6rn)JLO Caranam CK.R. Madhavi. Swarnasaraswati)

CF!J 6rn)ltiJ Caranarn (Maharajapuram Viswanatha Ayyar)

a:!l;~u

cantra muka moon face {her face shines like the

LD~60'>1f> aJ6l.l61i !f;)u&lril® wn~~tnn (1Jl6illu&lril® maiJkailO ava! tirantull matamo miivirat:~tu woman she pub~rty how many months? three times two {she just became a woman (having her first menses) six months ago)

uua;nlf) auuau~ru 2..rurungfl prakaci4 sarasattil5 ullasi6 brightness in sociability entertammg moon; in her very social way she will make you happy)

~W6l.lmi.J 2..t.iluS1u.i.J ~ulf)~ ~nair ~®uurr61i tayavay ummi~am pecit tan iruppal with grace to you speaking ! she will (she will speak so gracefully to you! (please love her))

- ~\!ilf) - neci7 -love

~!li~un600flc6® ~6l.l6h 6l.lnlf) ~6l.I~Gnn Gl6l.l@) LDID[Jngf) intranikku8 ivat vaci ival veku makaraji to Indral).i she belongs is she not? much blessed woman {this young woman belongs to Indrat:~i; she is blessed, wealthy, queenly)

nrorQlT y,~n uru~@ @®6l.l®ffi®t.il oa;unlf) erma puja palano iruvarukkum ekaraci9 what pnja's efficacy, is it not? to (you) two abundantly united {what efficacious piija someone has done! you two should be together) ~~41~tnnffi~6l.l a:~£~tiJ iilkitamakave caiLk:Itam sweetly music {she will sweetly sing music (for you)}

un(!j6l.ln6h paruva! she sings, will sing

01(1)!\i§J 01(1)!\i§J

01(1)!\i§J

01(1)!\i§J

01(1)!\i§J 01(1)!\i§J

01(1)!\i§J 01(1)!\i§J

vayato ani 12 rat:~tu vativato kll!:kat:~tu what age? five (times) two body, is it not? rock candy (she is only ten years old- o lord, her body is sweet rock candy, is it not?)

Gla;n~60'llf> wruru160'>1f> Ga:&lril(5l an.ir QS\y51a;61i If>® 6l.l&lril(5l koilkai mallikai 13 cel,llu 14 kiirvirikal karu val,llu breasts jasmine bunch sharp ·eye~ black bee (her full breasts are bunches of jasmine; her sharp piercing eyes are jet black bees)

Bn.llf@ru 01(1)!\i§J ®~uu unc&41wLil ~6l.l[l)l 2..60rir® kiitinaJ15 pirantu kupera pakkiyam verul6 UQ.tu iftogether born?? lord of wealth luck in addition ex1sts {coming together with her will bring you great wealth and good luck (or, she was born of the lord of wealth ... ))

u~a;tiJ ~rurun§J ~ail aJ~Emlf> ~air SJII:iJa;Li:J palikam illatu in ai!kai in ai!kam deformity without this palm, hand this body (her hand, indeed her whole body, is without any defect at all}

4To shine, radiate, be brilliant or resplendent, illumined. Skt. prakasa. -Lex. Scaracam- courteousness, sociability, joking, banter, amorous gestures. Skt.- Lex. 6Ullacap patuttu- to make one gay and merry, to entertain. Ullacam- mirth, gaiety. Skt.- Lex. G. Sul6chana- possible added implication of ... "even though she has all these (unwanted) worries." 7G. Sulochana suggests "You please love her." 8Jndral).i- wife of Indra. Devayanai is also known as the daughter of Indra and lndrani. See Ratna Navaratnam 1973:85. 9G. Sclochana- it could also mean that the two are similar in many ways. Literally 'new moon' (Lex.), a good time for uniting.

10Mai!kai- woman, girl between 12 and 13 years old. -Lex. llColloquial for tiranu (noun)= teru~tu; puberty of girls.- Lex. 12'Relaxed' pronounciation of aintu, five. 13Jiimalayan heart-leaved smooth jasmine, Jasmin urn anestomosans.- Lex. 14G. Sulochana -just like 'made to order.' 15Kutu- to come together as rivers meeting. -Lex. 16G. Sulochana- In the sense of, in addition to her beauty, she is wealthy.

369

Appendix II

[B2:2]

[B2:1]

WFifl6TlLiJ

Paccilam temal.

Ghanam Krish!)a Ayyar. TOQi Riipakam. UVSA Not available. T. Viswanathan (1992) Lakshmiratnam performed. p. 204-205

Coinposer: Rag am: Ta!am: Text source: Music notation: Recording: Source: Discussed in:

C:~LO ru

u ui d;~

W IDfi@)JW ~IF(i!>W ffi@)JW varum kal)um cerum kar;mm come! (colloquial) join her! (colloq.) {come on now, and be together with her!}

~1Ffr(5§J

cerntu joining

6illrf1d>!!i

Ufl(i!>W IDfi@)JW !5®tiJ IDfi@)JW parumkal)um nrrumkal)um see what happens! (colloq.) you will see! (colloq.) {just come on, and see what happens! You will see!} ~)2jfi(J &lllll1lfl 6lfi&»a; t.l:l@rofl~ru t6rana malikai13 mitini!e pala~e, m~nsion right in {right in your palatial mansion ... }

§11~@)

L1l~a:~@rof1~ru

turiku maiicattini!e sleeping mattress, cot, (on)! {on a sleeping cot..}

~ron ini further

virinta big

§'® oru a

.9![!1£lW

afakiya beautiful

L1lrru&ir 2._L1lrr u@ ~!'fi!iillllJt.O ~ffilw maran uma rati teviyum akiya Kama goddess, wife of Siva wife of Kama both goddesses being {just like the way beautiful Kama shows his affection for his wife Rati ... } 6l.Jfi~Emlf Gi511600ltq(i!>6ll@J LO(i!>6lJ~6lJ vanca1 koiJtiruvaru(m) maruvave affection doing, you two embrace! {the two of you should embrace affectionately, now!}

13Toral)as or tombais are large hanging cylindrical colorful decorations.

374

Appendix II

[B3:6]

[B3:7]

CF!J61lllltO Caranam#3

~61llli~ID

a;ct:Jua;6l.Jrur.Ul

B~llir26m

@)Lflri!Jn

B~lrurunlil

mannar mannavar ella:m prince prince all {all the great princes worship you ... )

6l.Jtq C:6l.l C: ru

wtilleru LL.J61i

tirli o great one!

6l.J61llll~@jt0

tflllila;nu

val)ailkum worshipping

ciilka:ra erotic, romantic

unffiffilwC:w

- ~6112611

- ~6112611

6illL.(5l

cukirta pll.kkiyame - iva!ai (v)inu good blessings, luck! - her (accus) taking {all her praises and thoughts for you cannot but bring you blessings and good luck! I ~>~llirmr

lflrun ffiffilwC:w

-!En

~ntrir

&tq

enna cilll.kkiyarne - nrr tan kuti what greatness, privilege, fame! -you emphasis together (association with her will bring you great renown!} 14Karragavalli . At Mylapore, the name of goddess Parvati as the consort of Kapalrsvara (Siva). 15Referring to the story, notably associated with the Murugan temple of Swa:rnimalai in Taiijaviir District, where Murugan teachers his own father Siva (guru-guha) the "om" mantra.

w&ir6llf1

CFtHfwnwffi

konnik konnip pinnip pinni upariyill7 softly talking chatting braiding, weaving intertwining love making, in {softly chatting, intertwining in love ... )

a;ru!t§J a;ru!t§J

wn&ir

conna vakkiyame avaj ceyta said speech! by her done {she speaks of you in just such a manner! These are her words!) a;$ln~

w&ir6llf1

8!Q!J~$16llf1~ru

aruilkinifel8 vannarn gold, color rareness, in! {she is a precious golden jewel! I

81 ~a;n !J n

- ~6112611

u&ir6llf1

@)61llilt5l6llflru@)61llilt5l6llflru @)61llilt5l6llflru @)61llilt5l6llflru @)61llilt5l6llflru

vativele mayilaiyul atika:ra Murugan! in Mylapore o reigning Lord, leader! {o beautiful Murugan! 0 Lord ofMylapore!)

unffiffilwC:w unffiffilwC:w

u&ir6llf1u

pannip panni manni manni caracarnayk praising, singing saying forgiving, pardoning staying, agreeing sweetly (praising, singing, saying, agreeing, sweetly... )

!ifln

2-u~~

aiyar kapalrcarkku upateca Lord Kapa:Irsvara (Siva), to (you) taught {o great one, who taught his own father! 15)

~wnffiffilw~w

i.J:!ailka yokkiyame16 to embrace what fitness, appropriateness, purity, holiness! (for the two of you to embrace each other is entirely appropriate!)

@)61llilt5l6llflru

8f~a;n$1w

ar.ak:akiya beauty-being ~>~C!:Qiil

81(l)lC:~nLC:6lJ

man kujarnpinil e.r:um amutotave deer hooves, in rise, swell! with ambrosia! ([reference to 'deer hooves' obscure] swelling with the nectar of love... ) lf&irGn~

81~1Dif

cannatal9 ailkaca20 temporarily possessed Kama (possessed by Kama's love sports... ) ~air

a;ru!t§J

ro?ru u51C: ru

Lfl60l!!J

lrlayife play,in!

marai in private, secret

@Q!J6lltil Q~rflll.Jlil Qan~ @amd;a;nLOru - J9160f1 enakkum teriyum efl!U ninaikk!!mal - nuni to me also is known, seen (you) didn't think of this -tip (of) (you didn't think that I knew about all your tricks (but I sure did)}

!!jnGillru na:vil tongue, on

U6Tln IFLLtil ~~ۤ1 meyyay kan iruntatu the truth (adv.) it was look! (look, lord; it was the truth in your case!}

8JWWn ayya Lord

Q~a; uc£.~ a;ir~~C:IJ 1Jffi1.-ID pakta rak~aka jeka karttare devotee- saviour world- doer/ maker! {0 protector of your devotees, 0 world-creator!}

2..L0€§1 umatu your -~§! - itu - this

unfr~~ LJ~~~wn - G6ll@) ~!!jir~~wnw ~If a; partta puttiyo - veku nerttiyay accu to see knowledge, is it? - very neatly done (is this your mentality/knowledge?l7 Nicely done (ironic), lord.}

816Tl6illru a! avii case, in ~a»amu

tannaip (emphasis)

IFnu:Sl carni lord

14This is J. Ryan's suggestion. Allav6 starts with the root 'a!' as negative, as the 'not-gender;' then adds the negative interrogative implications of the suffix' 5 ', resulting in a sort of double negative. 15With the implication of- but of course, I don't waste my time thinking of you. A masterful cut! 16Enpatu - it's a saying, it's what people say. l7With the implication- you protect the whole world, and then behave like this?

379

Appendix II

[C1:5]

[C1 :6] Qu[:!)JLil

8'6rnif(Yl

lf!J6001UJ Caranam#3

£iT~~

u~qtillru

krrtti perum cal).muka fame-possessing Shanmuka {0 reknowned lord Murugan of six faces!)

2..UJiT~

@)Wr!!Jffi@)tqtillru

6lJ61liT\5§1

patiyil uyarnta kufl!aklmtiyil va)arntul8 steps high Kufl!akkudi, on residing {living (growing up) atop the steps on high KUI!!akkll(ji mountain)

-~ru® - ilaku -shining

~ruru~an - ~Gl.Jw pann iru kai velane -tivya twelve hand, arm spear-holder! -holy {0 shining twelve-handed holder of the spear (Murugan)!)

6lltq6lJ

~lfiT\5~ at®®Lil- GurrErir Grrtq ui1Erir ru61i6TI1 G~Iilrurram vativu cernta aru!uml9 - pon koti min vaU.i teyvanai form together ausp1c10us - gold bracelets shining Valli Devayanai {possessed of holy blessed form and adorned with shining gold bracelets are VaUi and Devayanai (your two wives) ... )

Ga;tq C:lfiT

a;cl'l@@ilfULil

C:rurrruC:an

-!!>fl®UJ

lolane20 lord

-nlljum -everyday

@tqQllUJ

U~ 26w1

keti cer kavikuficaram kutiyai rak~aiJai famous Kavikuiijara family & accus. blessing {every day (you are) blessing the famous family of Kavikuiijara ... )

£iT~~

£iT~~ £iT~~

netukilum enaic cemta pati constantly withme together {instead of joyfully always staying with me ... )

uErirmfl® Qll

LOQ!>Gill LOffi1(!QtO maruvi makirum loving happily {whom you love so happily, o lord! l

£iT~~ £iT~~

(IJliT~~C:UJ murttiye form, face! £iT~~ 81Wr('51

anri21 instead

- LOc£lwrun - makirvllka -joyfully

-C:6ll[:!)J -vern

- another

9® oro

one

!firo1 rueruffi® .f\ffic£18: - ~nrulil Q8'tiJc£l!fiun'l.I!Jn nrli valaikkut cikkic - jalam22 ceyki!fr aha wicked lady net, in caught - tricks you do- aha! {you do your tricks caught in another wicked woman's net.23 Aha!)

Glflii§J ceytu doing

18J. Ryan- Lit. "growing up." 19J . Ryan- aru! here is meaningless except to express the auspiciousness, the grace-givingness of V a!!i and Devayanai. 20J . Ryan - there may be a relationship to Irian, he who possesses lrla, the play or sport of the gods (notably Siva.)

21A1:!fi- unless, except when, besides.- Lex. "Instead" is J. Ryan's suggestion for the context. 22Artfullness, pretence. -Lex. 23J. Ryan's phrasing. Could also possibly be read as "You have caught some other wicked lady in YQl!!: net."

380

Appendix II

[C2:2]

[C2:1] O@!l;~(l))[Ju.JW

C:un ...

...vacanta tiyakaraiyum p0 {Vasanta Tyagarajan (Siva at Tiruvaritr), go... [only a fragment available in mss.])

s"'Erir 6llTt.il

Q~~ffi.$@)

~Q!llf!i;~Ulq

Qa;n~s"'

812Blm!i;C:~Erir

~u$5

!!>L~60l$5

C:un@Jru

Qu60lir

inta this

LJ1~!5$!l§J

natattai behavior

c:~n"2.Li:l

ponlll if it continues

pel). woman

suffering

!!iL~60l$!)ffi@)

!!irTWr

pi!antatu to be born as

Qu60lir$5

[Dl:l] bTWr~rofl](l.DL.i:J

to~am

inta natattaikku nan peQQllyp pi!antatu mocam this behavior, to I as a woman being born bad,mistake (with behavior like this, to be born a woman is a bad mistake; it leads only to suffering)

60ru nll! kaQtatu- Specifically, the first day we met- G. Sulochana.. 7Love, affection, piety, desire (as for learning.)- Lex. &err- prosperity, wealth, beauty, greatness, paramount importance, equilibrium, balance. -Lex.

Composer: Rag am: Tajam: Text sources: Recording: Source: Discussed in:

Marimuttli Pi!!ai (RRI- Muttuttandavar). 1oQ.i. Misra capu. MP 1876,1971; TKC; KH; RRI. Not available. Nllmakkal Sesha Ayyangllr to Lakshmiratuam. p. 136"138.

ururuGill Pallavi nErirC:60ToQPLi:l

~®

a;neru~

enneramum oru kalait always one leg (you always have one leg raised) Q(!in6!llir~qffi

Qa;n60riT(5)

nol).\ik kOQ\U lame doing (why such lameness, Lord?}

§11.$$\ tUkki

raised

Qa;n60riT(5)

6lJ60)C6

OGll!l)lUil

eraiyli eraiyli

vakai way,manner

eraiyli why, lord?

SJ@!Ururu6l.ll Anupallavi QunEriri@Lii

C:un(bg;Jti:l

Q~nrueru

!!iEID@)LiJ

o~§Jti:l

~rueruu

ponnlltarl porrum tollai nannlltar ettum2 tillaip people in heaven praise ancient good people praise Cidambaram (people in heaven and the ancient good people on earth praise (you) ... }

QunErir60TLi:luru

6lln6001C:U

- ~Erir@Jti:l

!JlrT@JLi:l

2§TIEID(!91Ilru

ponnambala vllQartl - innum tllnum iill!iimal Golden Hall o dweller! -still, even now emphasis without resting {0 dweller of the golden hall at Cidambaram! Even now you are still not resting ... ) ILiterally golden-people. Nlltavar, natan- countrymen, inhabitants. Swarnasaraswati program translates ponnatar as great kings, nannatar as good people. 2RRJ text has 'errum' (to praise, also to colonise, populate, found, establish -Lex.) "To found" would support the idea that the "ancient good people" referred to are the legendary 3,000 Drkshitars who are said to have colonized Cidambaram and who form the priestly corps of this temple still today. See John A. Loud 1990. 3TKC text- tillai nanniltari!ttum cempponambala vill)ari!. (Good people ofTillai praise the dweller of the beautiful golden hall.) T. Viswanathan also remembers TKC's phrasing as how he has heard the song.

386

Appendix II

[D1:2] If(! 6001tb

Caranam #1

.-r ffiffilUJ

G!!>(!!JLH.J

S~Gillffia;!fi

~cf,a;ezir

GiiL_tq.ru

!!)LI$C:~n

ekkiya4 neruppu avikkat takkan vit!il nafanto sacrifice fire to put out Daksha house, in did you not walk {didn't you walk all the way to Daksha's house and put out his sacrificial fire?5)

moam

2.6!»~

C:Un§J

.-r~iJ

BT(.§!!,ffi@)

r;:r!]5)

Q!!)ni$C:~n

emanai utaitta ~otu etir6 culukku ~~ nonto to Yama to kick tune in front sprained rusmg did'nt you limpi {when you kicked Yama, did you sprain your leg and have to raise it, limping?7) ~cf,Qa;~C:ru

~tq.~§I~

cikkenave pitittuc firmly catching {when you fumly caught the moon ... )

lfn(!Jl60lirtq.

2.L6Zir

lfi$~!JCmr cantiranai the moon

run§Jffiffintq.

2.60lirL !!l~BT 2.Ltbl.J .-r~®Lil 2mrf1ffi 10nru ru~ rul$~~n uma naficu utampu eilkum nrik kal v~Ul~Q2.1P

a;nru~~ro

.s>~('!IEIDLO

kalattil arumai bathing (abhishekam) time, in rare,precious {at bathing time, your precious holy body... } api~eka

81~

[JIP.#1WLOntm

!DIPLLn~ru

~® tiru

holy

.s>~('!IEIDLO

meniye body!

LOEID!!Jffiffil!fjrr

ati rakaciyamana takattarel2 maraikki!'fr very secretly shield of metal you are hiding {is secretly hidden behind a shield of metal (the doors of the shrine being closed)}

6illU6lJW

!D!!i§J

[J ~d;@)tiJ

~GlJW

l.OrGJ/0611

vipavam tantu rak~ikkum tivya mailgala happiness giving protect us great,sacred auspicious {you protect us and give us happiness; you have sacred auspicious form} 6118'~

~wna;n~

un~~!J

@IU riipa form

unuclll@s:~o

vacanta tiyakati rajarel3 papavinacarel4 Vasanta Tyagaraja, frrst King! without sin! {Vasanta Tyagaraja (Siva at Tiruvarur), first among kings, destroyer of all sin}

12Takutu- metal. Tottal- RRI text, meaning palm leaf, ear-jewel, flower. -Lex. l3Vitauka tyakarajare- RRI text. D. Shulman- The RRI text is like Vrti vitankaJ, a proper name for Tyagaraja at Tiruvarar. 14This also serves as the mudra (signature) of the composer Papavinasa Mudaliiir.

392

Appendix II

[D4:1] I.!?Ll1HT lQ. ffi §1 rfl!i;§ Nadama:di tirinda.

[D4:2] !f!J 6001til Caranam

Composer: R!lgam: Tll!am: Text sources: Recordings:

Papavinasa Mudaliar. Kllmbhoji Khar.u;!a capu, MA; TKC. P.S. Subramal)ia Drkshitar (harmonium, 1930s), Mudicondan A. Sabapati Ayyar (1930s) Source: Many references, beginning with Tirukodikkaval Krishna Ayyar (violinist) performing at Ramanathapuram Court. Discussed in: p. 127-129.

unruruGill Pallavi

~®!5!i:Jm>(!Jif a;l(]~~§J nmrmr Gl!!>®Liunmr ~l(]6lf1~6lf1ru tirunrrraic4 cumantatu enna neruppana menitauil holy ash, (accus) abundantness why fiery body, right on {why did you apply so much holy (cold) ash right on your fiery hot body?5} g~6ll~~@)bU u:Si@j~~ 6.l.Jfl~ @)600l~l(]IJ crta!attinal mikunta vata kul)amo cold, due to excessive rheumatism condition, is it? {due to that excessive cold did you develop a rheumatic condition (which made you lift your leg)?} ~®6ml(]llJLmr

!!)Ll(]fltq~

~lfl~~

2-l(]ffi@j

@L§J

lf.>rTW

2-~6l.Jfll(]bU

natamllt:it tirinta umakku itatu kill utavamal going about wandering your left leg without use {you who were moving about quite well, (now) your left leg has become lame} 2-~6l.Jfll(]bU

2-~6l.Jfll(]bU 2-~6l.Jfll(]bU

mutamanatu etu ell!lJ colluvrr crippled which/why saying please tell me {why have you become crippled? Please tell me, lord}

~Wfl

aiya lord

®fl>Gillwmil

lfl(!Jrol

Gti~

markkal)tark kutaviyay mll!:aii6 vrr.a with oneness Markal)qeya helping (adv.) Yama to cause to fall {when, with determination in helping Markal)qeya, you caused Y ama to falJ1}

2-6mfl)fficolf 2-~6l.Jfll(]bU 2-~6l.Jfll(]bU 2-~6l.Jfll(]bU

l(]rTiJffia:;mrifuiffi

orumaiyu~an

ffit&ni!L~W al)~attiJI

hall, in

8'6C!>L Gilllf1~§J ~LqW6.l.JfT ~~fr .#1!i:J!f6C!>U &~!D)W catai virinu at:iyava tevar2 cifcapai3 ar_iya matted locks untied flying the gods the citsabha to witness {all the gods used to witness your dance there, with maned locks flying ... but now} lAnandam- M.A. Sabapati Iyer 78. 2M. Arlll)acalam translates ti!var as "celestials." 3Cifcapai- Hall of Wisdom, the sacred dancing-hall at Chidambaram. -Lex.

4 Tim nrr- holy water as well as ash. It is cool, the result of hot ashes becoming cold (mm). 5Here is another reference invoking the principles of ayurveda, which state that the human system is a mix of hot and cold elements, and it is only in a balance of these that good health consists. 6MA Sabapati Iyer sings "Yama." 7S.V. Seshadri states: "Siva burst out of the linga which Markandeya had embraced when Yama came to take away his life; Yama threw his lasso over Markandeya, intending to drag him off. But Markandeya in order to protect himself embraced the ling a. When he embraced it, Siva, full of anger, came out and kicked Y ama with his left leg."

393

Appendix II

[El:l]

[D4:3] UIJ6ID6l.J 816l.J61i Q~(!!> 6l.JIT8'ciJ Ulij. ~L~~~(!!) paravai aval teru vacal pa!i itaru ig5 Paravai woman street door step stumble/halt/strike (was it from stumbling on the door step of that woman Paravai?8} Q~(!!> Q~(!!>

Q~(!!> UITU~LOIT Q~(!!>

Q~(!!>

entan papamo en my sins, is it? my (or was it because of my sins? 0 my Siva!)

$ CY'J6l.lir.'6@)tiJ nr miivarkkum you of the three (didn't you used to say you were

lf16l.J~LO

civame Siva!

QP~cil6l.J6ri! &~6ri"r~(!!) mutalvan anro are the flrst didn't you used to say? the fust among the three great gods?9)

~u

w§ll600T LO- §)am .:&co mriT C5l

Peyal)(ii tanaikkal)(iu. Composer: Ragam: Tatam: Text sources: Recording: Source: Discussed in:

Gopalakrishl}a Bharati or Kavikufijara Bharati. Kambhoji.l Misra capu. UVSA; TKC; KKB 1914:29; GKB 1987:26; GSKA. Salem Godavari (before 1931). Lakshmiratnam performed. p. 266-268.

ururuGillPallavi ~uwrr6l!di117~2rord; a:.6001® ffi o60ril1176IDt.ntUru Ga:.n6l!diunil pey ilQp2 tanaik kaQtu nr eQ\1 maiyal kol}tay demon man emphasis seeing you why, ac;li? infatuation did you make? (seeing such a crazy possessed man, why did you fall for him of all people, girl?)

Qu6l!dico@>.'6@) 81\;P@) ~@)~lfln peQkalukku araku akumo3 to/for women beautifuVproper does this come to pass? (is such behavior proper for women? (that this kind of thing should come to pass)) &J@!UruruGill Anupallavi

t.nrrwrr60lii117l!i L ?.ruullru 6lln\!J6l.lrr60lii117miiyilQti cutalaiyiJ4 va.JYii1J!i5 black-magic, ac;li in the burning ground he lives, ac;li (he lives in the burning ground, doing his black magic, ac;li)

Son Siva, Sundarar, Papavinasa Mudaliar and Tiruvariir: see S. Kersenboom-Story 1987:73 (note 78); 1987:173 (note 161); 1987:167 (note 63); and 1987:182-3. Also see D. Shulman 1990. 9S.V. Seshadri: "There was a time when you went striding about, saying 'I am the chief among the three murtis,' claiming to be the greatest (compared to Vish!)u and Brahma). Why have you suddeuly become lame? It is ninda stuti."

1S.V. Seshadri and Meera Seshadri know this composition as being set in Yadukulakambhoji raga. TKC and GKB 1987 say Sarailga raga. 2PeyilQP - Crazy madman, possessed by demons - G. Sulochana. Also, peyaQ!i­ Non Brahmin Saiva mendicant." Lex. 3KKB 1914: PeyliiJti tanai veiJti nf el){i tavam ceytlfy pel)I)araciye umaiye. 4Katalaiyil- GKB 1987 [meaning obscure]. 5From this point on in the song, every line ends with "-!i".

394

Appendix II

[E1:2]

e&IT6rli

2..L&if

6l.JIT(:!illtq.

@~ITLq.

6lJ !:LJ ffie& nG\6ll n 60iii tq.

ka!i utan v!ltati6 cllt!lti7 varakkatuv!ll;ltis Kaji with arguing gambling wrangling {he disputes, bets, wrangles with the ferocious goddess Ka!i}

lf!J 60l!llil Caranam #1

umflru (!JlULfiJ!5 (:!i&ifrof1ru urueru pari! muppuram tannil pallai in the world three cities in (exactly) teeth (accus.) (he showed his teeth and laughed at the three ("sinful") citieslOJ

~~(:!ifl60rirtq.

ijitt!ll)ti9 he laughed, grinned

am

u~s: u n 60l!l ffi e& 60rir ® u~ffie& 6illy51~~rr 60rir L1t pafica p!ll)anaikII kal)tu Pll!akka vi[itt!ll)ti five arrows seemg to fly he opened his eye (seeing the five arrows (of Kama) coming toward him he opened his third eye and they flew offl2 J

81QJC!!J601il Lq.

81QJC!!J601il Lq.

81QJC!!J601il Lq.

llrllrllyp piccai etuttut from place to place alms taking {he wandered about from place to place begging for alms} u~ffie& u~ffie& u~ffie&u~ffie& urrar perrar oruvaraiyum relatives parents not even one {he had not a single relative or parentl4 J

~rf1!t(:!ill 601iltq.

tirint!ll)ti 13 he wandered about

[E1:3] lf!J 6rnllt.il Caranam #2

e&601il 60l!l uu &if

bllf !;!i - inta -this

a:;60lil L §1 kaiJtatu have seen

-muttu -pearl

e&rrru .!l)JEIDifQ.JtiJ EIDffi 81EID1fQ.JtiJ !'!)ri611~LOrr(iil ~61lllfti;§J kal acaivum kai acaivum tl!!amW~ icaintu leg moving arm/hand moving in tl!la sounding 3a){his legs and arms moving synchronized, sounding together in tl!la... j5

wnwiffi ~a:;nunruffi®Gli=iffi GllftLJU.jtil g;jnru~EID!;!iffi ~e&611Lq mayanl kopalakru~I)an ceyyum jalattaik kelati VishQu/magic Gopala Krishl)a doing tricks, about listen, aQi! {listen as I tell you about the tricks of your cowherd-born son Gop ala KrishQa!)

EID!;!iW~ru

-(IJl~§J

LDriCrul£>61i 81EID1fW~ Gl!;!i(£!1 6lJrJ1fru1ru 6lld;!;!iriW malaikal acaiyar4 teru vacalil vantlin garlands swinging street doorway, in he came (with garlands of bunches of pearls swaying back and forth as he moved, he came in our street to our door}

ururuGill Pallavi

taye yacota 0 mother! Yas6da (0 mother Yas6da!)

[E2:2]

~ru 2ru

illai not

lDark complexioned person; Vishl)u; deceitful person -Lex. 2Sung as "ammama" by Musiri, Miss Lalitangi (and Madurai Mani) on 78, and in TKC text. It's like "chi chi"- G . Sul6chana.

6l:IIJ

vara together

6l.Jrr~(@)ir~£>61i blrururrtil LDffi1YJ wrrrof1Lire&61i blrururrlil vanorkal ellam makira manifarkal ellam the devas all happy people all 3b){pleasing all the devas, being praised by all the people ... )6

L.Je&W puk:ara praising

£ru 6lJ60lil6001 ffi lb60lir6001ror ~6l.Jiffi ~ir~svtil nrla vannak7 kal)Qan ivan nirttam8 dark coi~red Krishna he dance {the dark colored KrishQa danced (perhaps a "masquerade" dance))

~tq(@)iffi

atinan danced

3Koilcu- to prattle, as children; to talk softly or amorously, as young women; to fondle, caress; to sound sweetly - Lex. 4Acai- to shake, move, stir, agitate; to dance. -Lex. G. Sulochana- swaying to and fro, as he moves. 5This line (3a) is as given in MA. T.KC 1943 text does not contain line 3 or 4. 6This line (3b) is as sung by T. Viswanathan. 7Uterally, black colored person. Also Vishnu; Saturn.- Lex. (vaQQa- Skt. varna.) 8Nirttam (niruttam), Skt. nrtta. Dancing; one of arupattunlilukalai, the 64 arts. Subs­ idiary meaning given as masquerade dance. -Lex.

397

Appendix II

[E2:4]

[E2:3] unrumr

nmr[!')l

~ncll

- 8126om~~

8126om~~~6rir

nmr?mr

pal an ell!U tavi9 aiJ.aitfen 10 - aiJ.aitta ennai boy like springing upon I embraced - having embraced, to me {thinking he was a boy, I sprang upon him and embraced him; as soon as I did... }

1.0n?.ru

~l.. L6l.Jmr

6l.Jntillru

~unru

unrumr

81ruWI!!

2..6rir

LOc~~ ~unc6Ti

n6rir6ll!

QB=w~6l.JnLOLq

nalla tavam ceytarati nllrika! enna ceyvomati good penance he did, adi we what will we do, adi? {hl;_ (Nanda; or she- Yasoda) must have performed great austerities (to receive such a son- ironic); but what will we (not including Yasoda) do, adi?} 14Same root as ninta, in nindif stuti "praise-blame" sub-genre. Defmed as reproach, blasphemy, abuse.- Lex. 15Blame, censure, reproach, ridicule; slander, sin, guilt. - Lex. 16Nantakopala- Nanda, foster-father of Krish!)a, or Krishl).a, foster-son of Nanda. Pokar- Those who live as householders; devas. (All from Lex.) So, this could refer toNanda, who did gre at penance (ceytar- masculine ending), or to Krishna himself­ Nand a Pokar, Nanda who loves the ladies- this latter is the reading of G. Sulochana, in which case Yasoda and not Nanda would have done the penance! 17Antam miku- "Most definitely sarcastic in this context." - G. Sulochana.

398

Appendix II

[£2:5] B'IJ !miLO

blllila:.61i

Car an am #3

warn

~llil@)

6l.lf1YJ

6l.J~§J

$fiGilllll!i;$!i60flwmil

wllila:na:.a:nw~

elikal manai vara vantu mailkaiyait tannantaniya:y our house living coming woman & accus. all alone {a young woman who came and stayed with us in our house, one time all alone ... )

§JIIiJ.S

W(ljl@)

!!i~

ffi 6lRiJ 6001 Gil

~Ufl&».Still~ru

tulika yamuna nati p(ikaiyile Tungabhadra Yamuna river atthattime {went to the river (to bathe); at that time, KrishQa ... )

s=Pila:na:.u.Jiil

~rurufl~

u~q

ullila:na:.a:nwci>

calikaiyum illata pali palikaiyaikl8 shame & without manner to that woman {in a shameless manner winked at that woman)

Q s= f1 Girl@6fl Q s= f1 Girl@6fl

Q s= f1 Girl@6fl

$!jfl(I!JLO

kaQQan KrishQa

a;6001@ ru

wwci>$1

kaQI)al by the eyes

mayakki19 mischief

$!jfl(I!JLO $!jfl(I!JLO

elikeilko araittuc cenru mc1 vantan somewhere ..taking her(mid)night he came {taking her off god-knows-where, he came back in the middle of the night) 2.. llila;61i

ILl ffi61i

'"'Girw

Q s= f1 Girl@6fl

- Q s= f1 Gil GlT

uilka! makal ell!U connal20 - conna your daught~r quoting he said - saying {"here is your daughter," he said; and immediately after saying this ... ) ~@j ~a:»L

[E2:6]

~Gir('51

Q61J600126001

$!jfl(I!JLO

tailku tatai inri veQQai ta:rum hesitation with-out butter give me {without any hesitation he said "give me butter." )

blGir(!!)6rir enran he said

18Palikai - lotus, Lakshmi -Lex. (i.e., woman.) 19Kal)l)lll mayakki- "He winked." - G. Sulochana. 20Context implies this should be connar, (masculine). - G. Sulochana.

U1Gir llll (l!llil pinnarum afterward

~6l.Jamci>

~n6llrit(ijl

~611

Qu!i:J(!J6l.liTffi6fl

!,!illiiGllffiW&»!JU

iliku ivanaik kaQtu i!a nailkaiyaraip here him (accus) seeing young women (accus.) {on seeing him here, parents of young women ... }

perravarka! parents

ollil$1 b16llrit &!Of1~ $fiGillc6$1Gir(!!JiT b1 Gi!Gll~Gll$!icf Qs=flru~6l.Jf1LOIQ. eilki ennit tavikkiii!ar ennattruc colvomati screaming thinking they will be distressed what about this will we say, aQi? {will scream in distress! what will we tell them about all this, aQi?) Caranam !J ~~ror (IJl til paii.kiyarkal inamum turaittanamum attendants, maids group & majestic & {together with her attendants, so majestic a sight. .. }

palittatu enna pul)f.liyamo maname happened what virtuous deeds! oheart/mind! {what virtuous deeds I most have done in a former birth to merit this, o manam!}

6160li! 6001 ~~n @J til

C!Jlffi®til

61.1 6llliJ 6001 ~~n @J til

Qu6llliiaomu