Translipi back in action

Created a translipi gadget for Blogger, and deployed it in this blog.

If you’d like to use it in your blog, please get in touch. I can help you set it up.

The Master turns 78 today

It has been more than 16 or 17 years, but I still clearly remember the first concert I heard of my idol Sri M.S. Gopalakrishnan. It wasn't live -- it was, in fact, a recording of an AIR National Programme of Music. It took only one song - the very first one, the nATakuriJji varnam -- and I was a fan. And remain one to this day. The songs that he played in that concert (they are etched in my memory: rAma bhakti in zuddha baGgALa, zObhillu saptaswara in jaganmOhini, E tAvunarA in kalyANi, a sindhubhairavi bhajana) all remain my personal favourites.

I can go on and on about him, but I am in the middle of a busy work week. So here are some links instead:

• The thread on rasikas.org discussing the Master.
• MSG concert recordings from sangeethamshare.org.
• MSG concert recordings from sangeethapriya.org.

Marathi is a South Indian language

The classification of Indian languages into Dravidian and Indo-European is well known. I would like to propose a new classification based on pronunciation -- South and North Indian.

1. Pronunciation of the vowels 'ai' and 'au'
If the vowels rhyme with "why" and "cow" respectively, the language is South Indian. If they are pronounced like "way" and "cause" respectively, the language is North Indian.

2. Pronunciation of the conjunct consonant 'jJa'
If it is pronounced as 'gya', the language is North Indian.

3. Pronunciation of the aspirate 'pha'
If the consonant is pronounced as F, the language is North Indian.

4. Extent of eliding the vowel 'a'
This criterion is more of degree than black-and-white. The extent of elision is close to 100% in North Indian languages.

In the case of Marathi, it meets all the criteria except the third. Observe how a Marathi speaker pronounces the words vaidya, gaurava, jJAna. Also note the non-elision of the vowel 'a' in the names Ranade, Thackeray and Fadake, and in the Varakari chant 'viTThala, viTThala.'

By the same token, Sanskrit is a South Indian language too.

Naming the NRI progeny

Indian names are tough to pronounce correctly. Even by other Indians. Countless are the people to the north of the Vindhyas who bravely tried to make it through "Venkataramanan" or "Ananthapadmanabhan" or "Kodhandapani" but got lost in between. (Also, if the question "How do you say 'Parithi Ilamvazhuthi'?" is not already a part of the IIM or IAS interviews, it should definitely be.) And everyday in Tamilnadu, "Geet Sethi", "Hrithik Roshan" and "Vajpayee" are brutally dismembered in public sight.

So, it is needless to mention the extent Indian names are mauled abroad.

Considering the huge exodus of Indians (mainly to the US) in the last decade and their need to label their offspring, this knotty problem deserves to be examined in some seriousness. What kind of nomenclature can the proud NRI parent bestow on the child such that the name, when it comes out the American mouth, is recognisable? Or to ask the question differently, how does the American manage to tear to shreds this seemingly unmispronouncable name? Is there a method to his madness?

Given the nature of the English alphabet, it is impossible to guarantee that any particular name, however simple, will be perfectly pronounced. But reducing the possibility of mispronunciation will in itself be a laudable goal.

Stress

Purushothaman and Thripurasundari, San Jose, CA, are blessed with a beautiful daughter. They decide to name her Uma. Just three letters, what could go wrong? It's even the name of a Hollywood actress. Alas, the name gets mangled to Oo-muh. Subramanian, professor at a reputable Texas university, scarred by the experience of being addressed as "Submarine-man", decides to give his son a very short name - Siva. Unfortunately, it becomes See-vuh.

In English pronunciation, all words have at least one syllable that will be stressed. Catalysis. Technology. Algebra. So if the name has all short syllables, such as Ravi, Guru or Siva, it will surely be mispronounced, since some syllable will be elongated due to stress ("Raavi", "Gooru"). And with feminine names, if they end in A, you need some syllable other than the last to be long. This is because, in most English words, the last syllable is not elongated -- especially if it ends in A. (Contrary to the common misconception in our country, the stress in the word "India" is on the first syllable, not the last. Same with "China".) So names such as Uma, Sarika or Lathika will nearly always go wrong. But we can take advantage of this fact with Sanskrit masculine names -- Rama (rAma) will work well, but not the feminine Rama (ramA). Partha should be fine, too.

Even if the name does have a long syllable, the spelling must clearly indicate it. For English words, the native speakers have an idea of which syllable to stress. But for foreign names, they are not quite aware. For long I (I), use EE. For long U (U), use OO. Soorya rather than Surya. Praveen instead of Pravin. Sreenath instead of Srinath. (Since I spell my name "Srikanth", an American colleague pronounces it "srik-ANth".)

AB and AJ

If an NRI is addressed as AB, what is his name likely to be?

1. Atal Behari
2. Amitabh Bachchan
3. Aravamudhan Balakrishnan
4. None of the above

The right answer is, of course, 4. AB is how "Abhi" will be pronounced. And AJ is how "Ajay" will be.

As in "abiotic", "asymmetric" or "asymptotic", the A-prefix will be pronounced as E, not a (as we do in Indian languages). So Arun, Ashok, Amar, Akash, Aditya all suffer from this disadvantage.

Tom/Thomas

There are two main conventions in India for romanising the consonant "ta." In the south, it is "tha" with an H. In the north, there is no H. While the latter will be correctly pronounced by the Spanish or French, the former is handled better by the native English-speaker. Note the difference in pronunciation between tin and thin, tree and three. I feel that the southern convention will work better in English-speaking countries. Karthik, Shanthi, Samith, etc.

However, for the consonant "da", the southern convention (with H) works no better than the northern one. (Gandhi is always Gan-dee.) So, Adithya is better than Aditya, but Adhithya is not more useful.

English-like

Certain names that look like English names work really well. Smitha is one. ("Smith" with an A.) Laxman is a good choice too.

Beware

Remember how in the early days of Tendulkar's career, his name was pronounced by English/Australian commentators as "Sa-shin"? This was probably because the spelling is similar to the word "sachet", pronounced "sa-shey" because of its French origin. This is why Indian names of the pattern *chit, such as Archit or Sanchit, can go wrong. (Ar-shit, San-shit) If the surname is Dikshit, better get it changed to Deexit(h) or Dixit(h).

Thoughtfulness

From Sanjay Subramaniam's blog:

In my personal experience I have given several non-mic concerts. The most recent being one in Europe. The best part was that they provided mics with monitor speakers just for feedback, whilst the audience listened to the true sound as they would like to call it.

Tamil 'sha': Unicode to the rescue

In the previous post, I had argued for including the Grantha letter 'sha' in Tamil. I was very happy to find out that Unicode 4.1.0 has already done so. Its code-point is 0x0BB6.

It looks like this version of Unicode was released in March 2005. This means that Tamil fonts created before, such as the default one in Windows XP, will not have this character. If you are interested, you can download the "Lohit" tamil font, which supports the new code-point. It should work on Windows and Linux. (Not sure about Mac.)

As I feared, there were some anti-Sanskrit folks who fought against this character. From a Unicode mailing-list thread on this subject:

Sanskrit is always seen a wanton intrusion [sic] to destroy all Indic languages and cause confusion. Tamil has been defending itself for hundreds of years.... Unicode is not the entity that should decide the demise of the ancient and sophisticated Tamil, like the demise of all other Indic languages.... 0BB6 must be deprecated. 0BB6 was encoded illegally by Unicode.

I am pleasantly surprised that, inspite of this, 0BB6 made it through.

Right now in translipi, I use ச to transliterate 'sha' into Tamil. This is fine for the cases where it is accompanied by a vowel. However, when it appears as a pure consonant or together with other consonants, ச is conventionally pronounced 'cha' in Tamil. This is not very satisfactory; the grantha 'sha' letter fits the bill perfectly here. However, since not many fonts support it yet, translipi will go along with ச for 'sha' for some more time.

One more character for Tamil

Most Indian scripts, as we know, are derived from Brahmi. This is true of the Tamil script also, but in its case, it somehow seems as if one person sat down and customised the alphabet to suit the Dravidian language, before making it public:

• There are no characters for aspirates.
• A single character is used for both voiced and unvoiced sounds. E.g., the character க represents the guttural sounds 'ka' and 'ga' (and also 'ha'). The character ச is used for the sounds 'ca', 'ja' and 'za' (and sometimes 'Sa').
  

To represent certain sounds from other languages unequivocally, it borrowed a few characters from Grantha, the script used for Sanskrit in Tamilnadu. ஜ for ja, ஷ for Sa, ஸ for sa, ஹ for ha. These additions mostly sufficed, even for Arabic/Persian loan-words and Muslim names.

But not anymore. A large fraction of the current generation of Tamil-speakers bear names that are Hindi-like. Venkatesh (veGkaTez) where the traditional version would have been Venkatesan. Shankar as opposed to the traditional Sankaran. Satish or Akash, which were never prevalent in the previous generations. And there is no Tamil character which can unambiguously represent the za sound.

As of now, we make do using ஷ (Sa) which is not the same sound at all. I feel time is ripe for Tamil to make space for one more character from Grantha () to represent za. (In fact, this character is already present in Tamil in the symbol for zrI.)

However, given the anti-Sanskrit leanings of Tamil scholars, I am not sure if this will happen.

Sri Santhanam

From today's Hindu:

On one occasion, while introducing Maharajapuram Santhanam to the audience at a felicitation function at the Music Academy, [Semmangudi] said: “He is my guru’s son. When he was a little boy, I would toss him up in the air and play with him, but now [sizing him up with his eyes], I can’t quite manage that.” [Link]

A related observation from the Music Season of 1990:

Still the person who attracts most crowds is Maharajapuram Santhanam and the present theory in Madras is that this attraction is purely gravitational. [Ramesh Mahadevan]

It's been long

In Japan, employees occasionally work themselves to death. It's called Karoshi. I don't want that to happen to anybody in my department.

The trick is to take a break as soon as you see a bright light and hear dead relatives beckon.
— Pointy Haired Boss, in a Dilbert cartoon

Things were (and still are) tough at the workplace for quite a few months. Many times, it is the Dilbert cartoon I have quoted above that has helped me retain sanity. This is the main cause of my long silence.

Till I can post next, here is a mp3 version of a classic shellac recording of M. Balamuralikrishna with my idol M. S. Gopalakrishnan on the violin, for your listening pleasure. Any further words are redundant.
- - -

I am also pleased to inform you that sahityam.net is coming along well, with both the content and the traffic increasingly slowly but steadily. It has received some good words and has also attracted a few contributors. The bulk of the content is due to the sterling efforts of Sri V. Govindan. (An example: Nada sudha)

On Kannada

Yes, yet another post on Kannada. But this time, it's on the raga -- not the language.

Kannada is a vakra janya of Sankarabharanam. The ArOha-avarOha: SGMDNṠ ṠNṠDPMGMRS

The avarOhana indicates that we can descend to D only from NṠ. Therefore, ṘṠD is invalid. It should be ṘṠNṠD. Of course, the same applies when we have to descend to R — we have to pass through GM first.

Here is a transition diagram of the notes. (Click on the diagram for a bigger version.)

(The notes in green are the rAga-chAyA swaras.) This diagram immediately reveals the important cycles of this raga. GMG, MDPM and ṠNṠ. This is an advantage of this representation. The cycles may not be readily apparent from the mere mention of the aroha-avaroha. This can be helpful for improvisation. (E.g., MDPM-GMDNṠDPM-GMRS)

As we saw in the avaroha, there are two 2-note cycles present - MGM & ṠNṠ. In addition, the raga permits three more 2-note cycles, which are however not "compulsory" (it is not mandatory to traverse these cycles): SRS, MPM & PDP. Indeed, this raga is wickedly vakra:


I have used dotted transitions to indicate that they are "non-compulsory" and can only form a 2-note cycle. That is, they cannot be used for forming a longer non-cyclic path. For example, the sequence MPDNṠ is invalid. But MPMDPDNS is legal. It is difficult to indicate such features using just the aroha-avaroha.

Some Kannada pieces:

• bhajarE bhaja mAnasa by TR Mahalingam [MP3]
• inta kaNTE kAvalenA by Subhashini Parthasarathy [MP3]
  

Kannada for the North Indian (Part II): Nada to Kannada

We now present the Spoken Kannada Bootstrap post. This takes you from a non-Kannada speaking person (a Can't-nadiga) to a Kannadiga in a single post. In this, we take advantage of the liberal definition of Kannada in the cities. We will discuss here the minimal disguise needed to pass off as a native speaker.

Wildcard 1: mADi

mADi is the respectful imperative "do" (kIjiyE). Words of any language, when combined with mADi, become Kannada. Scenarios:

• You are on a bus and wish to get down at a signal; but the door is closed. How do you ask, in Kannada, to open the door? Ans: "Door open mADi."
• You are a Hindustani-speaking owner of an FM channel. What Kannada slogan do you devise that urges your audience to enjoy themselves with your channel? Ans: "Mast majaa mADi."
• You are in an autorickshaw and notice your boss a little distance in front of you. How do you harness your indepth knowledge of Kannada in order to avoid him? Ans: Say to the driver, "U-turn mADi!"

You can Kannadise your phrases a little further by throwing in the word swalpa ("a little") as in, "swalpa adjust mADi," or "swalpa A/C reduce mADi."

Wildcard 2: hOgi

hOgi is the respectful imperative "go" (jAyiyE). This is the magic word without which you should not hire an autorickshaw.

• "Right hOgi."
• "Left hOgi."
• "Straight hOgi."

I just realised that, of the languages I can speak, I don't know the native word for "left" or "right" (or even if know the words, am not sure which means "left" and which "right") in a single one.

Wildcard 3: koDi

koDi (the vowel is a short O) is the respectful imperative "give" (dIjiyE). Useful for shopping.

• "Dairy milk chocolate koDi."
• "[Your favourite movie] DVD koDi."
• "Nair, singal cup tea koDi."

You can substantially enhance the Kannada quotient of the koDi-sentences if you know the Kannada numbers. (Click here for a guide.)

"eraDu kilo apple koDi."

If you know the numbers, you can even eliminate koDi sometimes.

"Shivaji Nagar - mUru ticket." (Three tickets to Shivaji Nagar.)

Interrogatives

In Kannada, all questions that elicit a boolean response end in the vowel -A. This fact can be exploited as in the following cases:

• To ask "Is a day-pass allowed on this bus?" -- Bus pass allow-a?
• To ask "Does this bus go to Majestic?" -- Majestic-a?
• To ask if lunch/dinner is available at a hotel -- Meals ready-a?

Of course, to understand the responses to your question, you need to know the Kannada for "yes" (haudu) and "no" (illa). And you must now be able to guess what the friendly Udupi fast-food person means when he asks you "Idli sambar-a?"

The A-suffix is also used in framing multiple-choice questions, as below:

• To ask if someone is coming by bus or auto -- "Bus-a, auto-a?"
• To find out the mode of payment -- "Cheque-a, cash-a?"
  

Okay-a?

Yehudi chala sukhama, Paganini sannidhi seva sukhama

I have read about the Western classical violin maestros: Yehudi Menuhin, Jascha Heifetz, David Oistrakh and others. Today I was absolutely thrilled when I found their videos on YouTube.

Yehudi Menuhin playing Paganini's Perpetual Motion. It simply takes your breath away.

More Menuhin delights.

Jascha Heifetz playing the Paganini Caprice No. 24.

More Heifetz videos.

I always thought of the violin virtuosi as thin folks with long and lean fingers. With Menuhin and Heifetz, I was proved right. However, when I found David Oistrakh, I realised chubby multi-chinned people could be maestros too.

More videos of the Ranatunga of the violin world.

Other maestros:

• Mischa Elman
• Nathan Milstein

* * * *

A couple of days back, I came across the show Italian: The Language That Sings on NPR, which said:

Even when it isn't sung, the Italian language sounds like music...

This programme reminded me immediately of the position of Telugu in Carnatic music. Telugu is also considered a musical language and has been hailed as "the Italian of the East." The poet Subramanya Bharathi famously called it sundara teluGgu.

The musicality of the two languages has been attributed to:

... the fact that most words end in a vowel. Not only does this make it a very suitable language for opera, it also means that once you are familiar with its rhythms, it is a comparatively easy language to pronounce. [Link]

On coming to Bangalore, I observed that Kannada words end in vowels too. Sample:

nArAyaNA ninNna nAmada smaraNeya sArAmRtavenNna nAligege barali [mp3]

Doesn't that sound as sweet? Does it not bleed when pricked?

Probably, their vowel-ending does not fully explain their status as musical languages. On Italian, the NPR programme explains:

So many of these musical forms—sonata, cantata, aria—started in Italy," Hoffman says.

"Plus, Italian musicians were in positions of prestige all over Europe, so it became the lingua franca."

Possibly similar reasons exist for Telugu too?

Introducing Sahityam.net

As the frequency of posts would indicate, the last six months was a tight period at work. This had forced me to shelve (among other things) a particular pet project of mine. During a lean stretch, I was able to work on translipi, the embedded-text transliteration tool. (See the sidebar to try it out.) Though worthy of an independent existence, translipi was originally conceived as a component of this project. Finally, it is now ready enough for release: Sahityam.net (Beta).

Targetted at Carnatic Music enthusiasts, students and professionals, Sahityam.net is a wiki for all things concerned with Carnatic lyrics, usually called sAhityam. Its goal is to facilitate accurate pronunciation and understanding of the lyrics as well as to serve as platform for everybody to collaborate in creating such a repository.

While the software is ready to use, there isn't enough content and documentation yet. This can be built up over time together with everyone interested. I invite your participation in the wiki. Anybody can edit a page, but creating new content requires registration (which is a simple process).

So, please do have a look and let me know any comments for improvement.

Kannada for the North Indian (Part I)

A reader Sohan Mahanto submitted the following comment at my post Language Tidbits:

I wish you could help new Bangaloreans like me on how to pickup the local language (Kannada). Some basic practical examples like talking to autodrivers, busconductors, maids, the dukaanwalah etc. Most of my colleagues are North Indians or non-locals and are all in the same boat. As for the locals, they all know Hindi. So [there is] no chance for people like us to learn Kannada.

I was myself planning to put up a Kannada tutorial sometime. Sohan's comment spurred me on to actually get down to the task.

Disclaimer: Kannada is not my mother tongue. (Fortunately, that turns out to be an advantage since I can then suggest ways to learn the language as a non-native.) And I am no scholar either. So if you try the "Kannada" learnt by supposedly following my tips on your maid-servant and get slapped on the cheek, you have my sympathies; but I assume no legal responsibility.

I plan to do this tutorial in a series of posts; and these are targetted primarily at the folks from the northern states. But fellow peninsular Indians may also find something of value.

So here we go.
- - - - -

Kannada is a part of the Dravidian family of languages. North Indian languages, as we all know, belong to a separate clan, the Indo-European. Now, this might give an impression that Kannada is very different from the North Indian languages and that learning it might be a daunting uphill task. This is not true: I would like to point out that it took (in 1816) the scholar Alexander Duncan Campbell 30 whole pages of his grammar text to demonstrate that South Indian languages are a different family vis-a-vis the North Indian languages. If it took so much effort to distinguish the two families, there must indeed be a lot of similarities between them. So even if the task of learning Kannada is not easy, it may not require a Himalayan effort. Perhaps just a Vindhyan one.

While the Kannada language may belong to a different family-tree, the Kannada script is descended from the same ancestor as are all the other Indian scripts — Brahmi. And this is where we will begin our study from. I will compare the Kannada script with Devanagari to highlight the similarities, but the same can be done with any other northern script too.

The Kannada Script

The Kannada varNamAlA is represented in the same format as the Devanagari one. First the vowels a to au, together with the anuswAra and the visarga. Next come the consonants falling into different rows - beginning with ka, ca, Ta, ta, pa, ya, za and terminating in ha.

The extra letters (not present in the northern scripts) are:

• the short vowel e (pronounced like the E in "get")
  
• the short vowel o (pronounced like the O in "poetry")
  
• the retroflex consonant La (equivalent of the Marathi ळ)

A large number of Kannada characters bear such a close resemblance to their Devanagari counterparts that I believe that the script can be learnt in a week. Only a little amount of imagination is needed to discern the similarities.

Let's consider, for instance, the Kannada character ka (ಕ). First, take the Devanagari ka and remove its "helmet." Next, rotate it by 90 degrees anticlockwise.
And lo behold, the Kannada ka!
Character kha is as easy. Take the Devanagari kha, remove its inner circle and its helmet too. Next, circle up the bends.

And here it is:

Some more examples: Ga.

cha:

Ta

Na

na

Va:


You get the idea now. I leave the other characters as an exercise. (Link: The complete alphabet.) As I said before, all that is needed is a little imagination.

Using other mnemonics:
ma:

ha:

(1) In Devanagari, a number of letters are formed out of the following shape:
... such as:
Similarly in Kannada, the following template:
... gives rise to:
(2) In Devanagari, some letters are written the same way, except for the fact that in one, the "head" touches the helmet, and in the other, it does not. For example, in the letter म (ma), the head touches the helmet. But in the letter भ (bha), it does not. Otherwise, they both look alike. Another example is the pair, घ (gha) and ध (dha).

Similar cases exist in the Kannada script too. The letters na (ನ) and sa (ಸ) are written alike except that the latter's head does not touch the helmet. So also, the letters va (ವ) and pa (ಪ). In the non-touching cases, note the small circle in Devanagari and the dot in Kannada.

(3) When the letters get together to form words in Kannada, their helmets do not merge into a common roof (as it happens in Devanagari). The helmet of each letter retains its independence. That is:

व + न = वन (The helmets merge.)

But,

ವ + ನ = ವನ (The helmets do not merge.)

(4) A very important note on pronunciation. In Indian scripts, every letter has an implicit "a" sound. क is "Ka," not "K." But in North Indian languages, the letters sometimes lose this vowel depending on their position in the word. E.g., in the word सोमवार, pronounced somvaar, the letters म and र lose the implicit "a" vowel.*

This does not happen in Kannada (or any other South Indian language, for that matter). In the example above, the correct pronunciation in Kannada would be so-muh-vaa-ruh.

For a lot of North Indians, this tendency to clip off the implicit A vowel is a difficult habit to unlearn. But practice, practice. Every time you catch yourself saying Kor-mang-laa, go to your company pantry and punish yourself by consuming a cup of caffeine. And then say aloud a hundred times, Ko-ruh-mang-uh-luh.

As another example, consider the following word:

ವನ

It is correctly pronounced va-nuh. Not van. The word means, as you may have guessed already, forest.

Exercise: What's written here?
ಜಯನಗರ

Vowel Marks (mAtrAs)

The Kannada vowel diacritical marks. These are quite simple too. There isn't much for me to say here.

Conjunct Consonants

(1) In Devanagari, when two consonants combine, it is the first consonant that is modified. The second remains unaffected. For example,

ध् + व = ध्व

In Kannada, the opposite is true. The first is unaffected:

ಧ್ + ವ = ಧ್ವ

The second consonant is written as a subscript to the first; but otherwise there is no change in its form.

(2) Besides becoming a subscript, some consonants have a totally different form when participating as the second. These are listed here. Some examples:

• ದೊಮ್ಮಲೂರು (dommalUru or Domlur)
• ಬನ್ನೇರುಘಟ್ಟ (bannErughaTTa or Bannerghatta)

In their modified forms, these consonants resemble their Devanagari counterparts much more than in their simple forms.

(3) As in Hindi, the anuswāra is used as a substitute for nasal consonants. E.g.,

• ಇಂದಿರಾ ನಗರ (iMdirA nagara)
• ಬನಶಂಕರಿ**(banazaMkari)

- - - - -
Other parts of this series:

• Part 2: Nada to Kannada: Basic introduction to Spoken Kannada.

---

* Bengali and Oriya are probably exceptions. jana gaNa mana, Bengali names like Aurobindo, Subroto and Oriya names like Satchidananda Mohanty, etc. suggest a Sanskrit-like pronunciation.
** In Dravidian languages, words do not end in a long "I" vowel.

The Anuswara (or) How usability trumps grammar

The anuswAra is a curious beast. Though it is grouped with the vowels in the alphabet, it is not one. Nor is it a consonant. It is non-aligned, taking no sides in a bipolar world.

In our epics we have read of celestial beings that can assume any form according to their whim — now a hideous monstor, now a bewitching damsel and now a piece of rock. The anuswAra has turned into such a creature. Sometimes it seems like Ga (gaMgA), sometimes Ja (paMcAyat). Elsewhere it sounds like Na (pAMDava), or na (zAMti) or ma (paraMparA).

The anuswAra has now ended up as a wildcard placeholder for any nasal consonant. Correctly, in all the examples above, the respective nasal consonant should have been used. (gaGgA, paJcAyat, pANDava, zAnti, paramparA). In fact, in Tamil, where the concept of anuswAra is absent, this is how these words are written*.

So then, what exactly is an anuswAra and where should it be used? Being neither a vowel nor a consonant, the anuswAra does not have an independent existence. It is a product of sandhi. (This implies that it cannot be used at the end of a sentence or a stand-alone word.) Let's explore this with some more examples.

sam +
gIta = saGgIta
cAra = saJcAra
darbha = sandarbha
pradAya = sampradAya

That is, when m is followed by any consonant from the first four rows of the varNamAlA, it (the trailing m) is converted into a nasal of the same type as that consonant.

It is only when combining with the remaining consonants (semi-vowels, sibilants, etc.) that the trailing m becomes an anuswAra.

sam +
yOga = saMyOga
rakSaNa = saMrakSaNa
vatsara = saMvatsara
sAra = saMsAra
zaya = saMzaya
hAra = saMhAra

How does the anuswAra sound like? In other words, is it Simha, Sinha or Singha? None of the above. The pronunciation is as follows:

The anuswAra is an after-sound, a nasal sound following a vowel. It is sounded through the nose only and should be independent of mouth position. [Wikner (PDF)]

The anuswAra is one of the simplest symbols that can be written (or read) — it is represented in most Indian scripts as either a dot or a circle. Since it is also a nasal sound, it has become a comfortable substitute for all the nasal consonants: It is easier on the hand (and the eye) and one doesn't have to remember which of the four (Ga, Ja, na, Na) to use in a particular context.

Usability wins everytime.

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* Therefore, this post may not make sense when viewed with Tamil transliteration.

PS: I owed Manjunath a post on anuswAra for a long time. (See the discussions at these posts: One, Two, Three.) Finally, here it is.

Introducing translipi

English is inadequate to correctly represent Indian-language words. This problem is especially painful for me, since this blog often deals with subjects whose vocabulary abounds in Indic terms. "Mayamalavagaula." "Kadanakutuhalam." "Nadanamakriya." I rest my case.

I could write these terms in (say) Tamil, but this would put non-Tamil readers at a loss. The script each of us is most comfortable in, is different.

This problem is now solved.

translipi (see the side-bar, if you have not noticed it already) transliterates these terms into the language you are most familiar with. For now, there is dEvanAgari, kannaDa, malayALam, tamizh and telugu. For folks like me who are most comfortable in English, there is also the Roman script with enough diacritical marks stuffed in to specify (almost) every Indic character uniquely.

Do let me know your thoughts!

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A doubt: Is the pronunciation of the Tamil characters ந and ன identical (as I have always believed)? If so, is there any grammatical rule which specifies when to use one and when the other? For instance, ன is never used at the beginning of a word and ந never at the end.
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Update [3 Mar]: Once Ambarish (see the comments) pointed out how ந and ன are different, it seemed so obvious and logical that I wished to kick myself for not figuring it out before. So we use:

• ந at the beginning of words (நலம்) and when immediately followed by a dental consonant (தந்தை).
  
• ன elsewhere (தினம்).
  

But on further cogitation, I am a bit confused. Now, by the rules above, how do we explain குடிநீர் (which is unlike தன்னீர் — or is it தண்ணீர்)? Help!

Audava-Audava Raga Sangraha

The mELa-karttA classification system has served the sampUrNa rAgas well. However, the janya rAgas are still a wilderness; they deserve a Periodic Table of their own.

I have put up a scheme for the Audava-Audava (pentatonic) ragas at http://srikanthsubram.googlepages.com/audava.

Update [19 Feb]: A question. Can anyone tell me the basis on which a (janya) raga's parent is decided? E.g., why is the janaka-rAga of nAgasvarAvaLi considered harikAmbhOji and not, say, cakravAkam or zaGkarAbharaNam?

Intonation in Carnatic concerts

The term Intonation in music means, put simply, producing notes that are in tune. It is what we would call zruti zuddham. (Or, in other words, being a "suswaraM Ramjhi.")

The most important factor for producing a note in tune is possessing an accurate aural perception of that note. Once this is present, intonation is developed by practising to match the note we produce with this standard. (In Carnatic music, of course, we do not have an "absolute note" -- they are all relative to the chosen reference SaDja.) Thus, for perfect intonation, a keen sense of hearing is absolutely essential.

When performing in large halls, musicians hear their own instruments only very faintly. And there isn't enough echo either.* So, intonation becomes a big challenge. Now, an accompanying Carnatic artiste has a tougher problem -- he needs to be able to hear the main performer as well. Furthermore, an instrument that is initially tuned perfectly to the taMbUrA, may go out of tune during the course of the concert; and the musician needs to be able to detect when this happens and correct it based on the taMbUrA that is droning some distace away on the platform. (And, to repeat, "I can't hear no nothing!")

Usually, to enable the performers to hear themselves, a speaker system (called a monitor or "fold-back") that is directed towards the platform is provided. However, I have never seen one in a Carnatic concert. In addition, few concert venues are actually auditoria built with necessary acoustics for a music performance. Many are just open spaces with asbestos roofing (Ayodhya Mandapam, YGP Auditorium, etc.).

Given all these hurdles, I am amazed how our musicians perform with perfect intonation. They are practically performing deaf.

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* An extreme case would be a recording studio, whose walls are built to expressly prevent any echoes. This is why (as we have seen in movies scenes featuring a studio recording) the artistes are supplied with headphones.

Update (20 Dec): I have found a related Wikipedia entry -- Foldback. Excerpts:

The provision of foldback (or monitor) speakers is essential to performers, because without a foldback system, the sound they would hear from front of house would be the reverberated reflections from the rear wall of the venue. The naturally-reflected sound is delayed and distorted.

... On stages with poor or absent foldback mixes, vocalists may end up singing off-tune or out of time with the band.

Update 2 (26 January): A post from an excellent blog (by Ramnarayan) I stumbed upon says:

Young vocalist Savita Narasimhan clarifies that the musician on the stage rarely asks for the volume to be turned up for the listeners. He or she is actually asking for help with the feedback (or fallback) so essential for the performer on stage. “Often the vocalist cannot hear the percussionist or violinist and vice versa. The musician’s request to increase the volume of the monitor is misunderstood and the technician increases the volume for the audience.”

Decongesting Usman Road

In Madras, the Usman Road/Panagal Park area (in T. Nagar) is a major bottleneck for vehicular traffic. The volume of traffic is itself high, but the place also has a number of popular shopping centres to add to the problem. During festive seasons, the place can rival the Kumbha Mela or the Mahamakham for the sheer mass of humanity that descends here to shop. And as we know, in India, festive seasons are spread all round the year. The situation has turned even worse since Saravana Stores opened a new branch, its second in T. Nagar, on Usman Road this year.

Saravana Stores is a huge shopping centre that sells everything -- clothing, footwear, home appliances, kitchen utensils, jewellery, sweets, etc. etc. etc. All at a low price. The (lower?) middle-class loves this shop. People flock to T. Nagar from all round the city (and from suburban areas too) to shop at Saravana Stores.

Decongesting this part of T. Nagar has been a tough question so far. The roads are too narrow to contruct any flyovers. Not that the Corporation (or is it the CMDA?) is interested in solving this issue, for it has permitted construction of huge shops here with no provision for parking.

But it looks like there is still some hope left: Walmart is coming to India, in partnership with Bharti Enterprises.

Some Indian blogs have been looking at Walmart as another grocery supermarket (like FoodWorld), but it's much more than just that. In my opinion, shops like Saravana Stores are a better approximation. If Walmart sets up shop in Madras in a well-connected place (maybe close to another local rail station) Saravana Stores is up for some competition. This is likely to draw away some percentage of the shoppers from T. Nagar.

Of course, "Walmart" is not the right name to have in Tamilnadu (Vaal = tail in Tamil). An alternative that can't go wrong is "Bhar(a)ti Murugan Stores" -- both Bharati and Murugan being immensely popular figures in the state. They can even have a logo with a laughing Sam Walton in it and call him Sami Annachi.

"Yaha to bilakula theeka hai"

Spoken languages tend to clip off syllables for ease of pronunciation. Hindi comes to mind immediately for its propensity to drop the lagging A's. somvaar (Monday), kalpnaa (imagination), din (day). But, this can be seen in other languages too, including the south Indian ones. In Tamil, eppadi (how) becomes ep'di and saayangaalam (evening), saay'ngaalam. No Kannadiga calls his capital Bengalooru, it's just Beng'looru. And in that city, any autodriver will gladly take you to Basavan'gudi.

However, the literary (or even plain written) language does not permit this latitude. The Tamil signboard on Dor'saami Road in Madras will only say Duraisaami Saalai. In Bangalore, the common man's Dom'looru is still, on paper, Dommalooru. The integrity of the syllables is maintained in the formal language.

Except in Hindi.

The Hindi newsreader will elide the lagging A's as eagerly as the rickshaw-wallah. The student at a college canteen and the scholar declaiming on a podium would both say, "Yeh to bilkul theek hei." Why is this so?

In my opinion, it's due to the influence of the Persian- and Arabic-speakers who migrated into northern India. And it's not so much due to their language as due to their script.

The Semitic scripts all share an interesting property -- they have no vowels. Their words are represented using only consonants. Such a script is called an Abjad. The word "Hindustan" (e.g.) would be written HNDSTN.

Contrast this with the Indian scripts: We do have vowels. In addition, every consonant character possesses an implicit vowel A. क is not K, but Ka.

Now let's take the word Mehel (as in Taj Mehel) and transcribe it in an Indian script, but with an Abjad spirit:

Mehel --> MHL --> Ma-Ha-La (महल)

Or take Neher (canal):

Neher --> NHR --> Na-Ha-Ra (नहर)

Or, Matlab (meaning; not the software):

Matlab --> MTLB --> Ma-Ta-La-Ba (मतलब)

Such a practice might have started with Arabic/Persian words, and eventually caught on with all words in Hindi.

Because of the Abjad influence, the letters, when at the end of a word, lost their implicit A vowel. And elsewhere, they picked up new sounds such as the short E vowel - as in Mehel or Neher. This vowel sound was not present originally in any north Indian language.

But for other vowel sounds already available in Indian scripts (such as i, e, u) the Persian/Arabic words must have been written in the traditional Indian way - Bi-La-Ku-La (बिलकुल).