Nattakurinji Pada Varnam
Dunstan Jomphe
Musical forms are compositions which occupy a major chunk of repertoire of art music practitioners in South India. We have different types of musical forms pertaining to sacred dance, opera and art music. These are nothing but expressions which define different facets of a raga. Musical forms are thus musical expressions bound by time (i.e. tAlam) and meaningless or meaningful text.
The emergence of raga concept and the desi musical forms can be traced to the period of Matanga. Treatises like Brhaddesi, Sangeetha Makaranda, Sangeetha Samaya Sara, Sangeetha Ratnakara and Sangeetha Sudhakara describe the lakSana of musical forms that existed in their respective periods. The evolution of musical forms can be classified into the following stages:
2. The second stage could be the emergence of the kriti and kIrtanAs. This can be compared to the north Indian Hindustani music where the dhrupads are longer and metrical in structure unlike the very popular khayAls which are smaller and are in the vernacular language. The dhrupads and prabandhAs were mostly composed in Sanskrit and it was not easy for the common man to follow them. After vernacular languages became very popular, the prabandhAs went out of use/vogue and kritis started coming to the forefront.
3. The third stage was the rise of technical compositions illustrating rAgams and rAga rUpams. There were also a large number of prabandhAs still in existence. There was also a phase were all the tAnAs were notated. ThAya refers to tAnA patterns notated to tALam. There were a lot of notated tAnAs in existence. While composers were trying to realize the rAga rUpam, they needed a lot of exercises to enhance the understanding the rAga svarUpam which led to the emergence of a lot of these musical forms. An example is the emergence of ciTTa tAnAs which would have later developed into tAna varNams.
The first type of musical form which a student of music learns after solfa or sargam abhyAsa gAna exercises is the gItam. gItam has very simple melodic structure and is mostly a continuous composition without the sections pallavi, anupallavi and caranam. Some gItams have two or more sections called khanDikAs. Sometimes, the opening section is repeated after every khanDikA. gItam is sung at a medium tempo and does not have melodic variations (sangatIs)
Thyagaraja and Shyama Sastri have composed in a different style in that they have resorted to the prose order where there is lot more scope for the musical aspects and for expanding the musical composition
The architect of svarajati as a musical form is Melattur Veerabhadraiah who lived in the 18th century. His svarajati in the rAgam husEni is the earliest example of a svarajati. Shyama Sastri later composed svarajatis that are concert worthy.
Svarajatis used in dance concerts are replete with nAyakA-nAyikA bhAvA and are suitable for performing abhinaya. There are also simple svarajatis that are taught to students after they acquire a sufficient number of gItams. A svarajati is neither as syllabic as gItam, nor does it have as many vowel extensions as in a varNam. In a svarajati, the text and the tone play an equal role. Some composers of svarajatis are Shyama Sastri, Shobanadri, Swati Tirunal, Chinni Krishna Dasa, Melattur Venkatrama Sastri, Ponniah, Vadivel, Adiyappaiah, Veena Seshanna and Mysore Sadashiva Rao
The structure of a jatisvaram is also like that of a svarajati but it does not have sAhityam and comprises of only solfa syllables. There are some jatisvarams of Tanjore Quartette that have half Avartanam of solfa syllables and half Avartanam of jatis.
The first half of svarajati is performed at a slower pace and the later half is performed at a faster pace. Svarajati has more scope for abhinayam. These are the main differences between svarajati and jatisvarams.
In jatisvarams and svarajati which have pallavi, anupallavi and caraNam, the pallavi is sung first followed by the anupallavi. The pallavi is then repeated. This is followed by the caraNam. If there are many caraNams, they are sung in a sequential order and the pallavi is repeated after every caraNam.
A varNam is a musical form which has in it all the elements of gItam, jatisvaram and svarajati. It prepares the students with adequate skills to be able to learn a kriti. The first half of a varNam which has profuse vowel extensions resembles a kriti while the second half beginning with ettugaDa pallavi and caraNam swarams resembles a svarajati or a jatisvaram.
The pallavi of a varNam usually consists of 2 Avartanams followed by an anupallavi of equal length. The third section is an optional upapallavi of the same length. The theme of the text could be devotional, shringArA or in the praise of a patron.
pada varnams are also called cauka varNams. As the name implies, the tempo intended for these is caukam or slow to give scope for the depiction of bhAva. ciTTasvaram and ettugaDa swaram have sAhityA. The theme of a pada varNam is devotional, shringArA or in praise of a patron. It is usually set in Adi tAlam. Unlike tAna varNams that are sung in different speeds, pada varNams are usually sung only in slow speeds. Most pada varNams have eDuppu at samam while a few have different eDuppus. The entire varNam has the sAhityA.
tAna varnams were perhaps intended to be sung in madhyama kAlam and melodic variations (sangatIs) were not to be resorted to. Earlier all varNams had sAhitya. But may be the sAhityam presented considerable difficulty in emphasizing the tAna progression and the madhyama kAlam tempo of the dhAtu. Hence may be the idea of introducing sAhityam for tAna varnams was given up. Later composers like Patnam Subramanya Iyer, Pallavi Gopala Iyer, Veena Kuppaiyer, Tiruvotriyur Tyagayyar and others have composed tAna varnams without sAhityam for the muktAyi swarams and ettugaDa swara sAhityam portions.
The ganakrama of a varNam is different compared to that of a svarajati/ jatisvara. The pallavi, anupallavi and muktAyi swaram are performed continuously and the first Avartanam of the pallavi is sung as a conclusion to the first half of the varNam. The second half has an ettugaDa pallavi with many caraNams sung in sequential order. The caraNam begins with ettugaDa pallavi and after each caraNam swaram, the ettugaDa pallavi is repeated and is also sung as the concluding Avartanam.
Composers of varnams include Govindasamayya, Shatkala Narasaiah, Adiyappaiah, Sonti Venkata Subbiah (?), Pallavi Gopala Iyer, Pallavi Doraiswamy Iyer, Ponnaiah, Chamarajendra and Veena Kuppaiyer. Govindasamayya and his brother Kuvasamayya was known to have composed the famous pancaratna varNams in the rAgams mOhanam, kEdAragauLa, nATTakurinji, navarOj and one another rAgam that is not known today. Apart from being composers, the brothers were also dancers. Govindasamayya is considered to be the first composer of varnams.
His varNams typically have either 4 or 5 swarams in the caraNam. In his suruTTi varNam (example of a varNam having 5 swarams), the first caraNam swaram has only dhIrga syllables, the second and third ones have both dhIrga and hrisva, the fourth one has only hrisva syllables and the fifth one is long and of four Avartanam duration. In his varNams with four caraNam swarams, the first one will have only dhIrga syllables, the second will have dhIrga and hrisva, the third will have only hrisva and the fourth one will be a long one of 4 Avartanam duration.
Many of the composers before Tiruvotriyur Tyagayyar composed varNams in pentatonic scales. He was the first one to compose a lot of varNams in rakti ragams like sahAnA, darbAr, kEdAragauLa and madhyamAvati
Hi Pradeep,
I am sure her Guru knows best. The choice of the item itself may depend on the age and skill of the dancer. Here are a few that come to me off hand:-
The usual choices with scope for footwork are:-
1. Natanam Aadinar- Vasantha Raagam- by Gopala Krishna Bharathiyar
2.Ananda Natamaaduvar Thilai -Poorvi Kalyaani raagam- by Neelakanta Sivan
Slightly less common pieces
3. Ananda Kootadinar in Rishaba Priya- by some dikshathar (Sorry I aint sure here). My personal favorite
For slightly less footwork and more scope for abhinaya
4. Kalaithooki ninru aadum Deivame-yadukula Kamboji -by Marimuttu Pillai
5. Theruvil Vaarano-Kamas-by Ganam Krishnaiyer
6. Varugalaamo Aiya-Manji- Gopala Krishna Bharathiyar
Hi Deepthi,
This article was compiled by Mrs. Mallika Jayanthi.
It is most common to divide the varnams into Pada and Tana varnam category.
Chauka(slow/leisurely) Varnams are placed along with pada varnams which emphasize on the lyrical content and making it more apt for dance. Dancing to Ninnukori (Mohanam) may not be as appealing as dancing to Swami Nan Undan adiami (pada Varnam- Nattakurinji)Tana Varnams has more akaras and ukaras basically making it not as appealing to choreograph for a dance format.
Swarajathis are also sometimes performed instead of the varnam in dance performances.These are also sometimes called padajathi varnams and as you say the mukthayiswaras may have sollukattus. Sakhiye in anandabhairavi belongs to this type.
Darus are also included in the varnam format, mathe malayathwaja being a famous example
Thanks for dropping in
Regards,
Sangeetha
I am not ignoring your request. Quite a few of us are working on your request.:)
While on the outset, it may seems like an easy question, with the weapons of these Gods carrying the lance,bow and tirushool seeming to explain it all.
I have always seen that the dancer stoops when she uses the hasta (shikaram and trishoolam at the Natyarambham level) and lifts a leg to denote Muruga seated on a peacock. This picture ( -Muruga.jpg/275px-RaviLord-Muruga.jpg) probably a representation by Ravi Varma categorically shows Muruga seated on a peacock with a bow on the left and Trishool on the Right. (The hands as you have narrated).I have once heard a reviewer say that since the dancer was holding the shikara a little too high, it felt like depicting Rama. ?
Muruga is a war-lord and carries a host of other weapons apart form the famous Shakti-vel. Muruga can apart from the lance bearing usual position, can also be depicted with a trishoolam on the right hand and the left in Dola .