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.

- - -
* 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!

* * * * *

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.
- - - - -

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.

- - -
* 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).

History lovers' Paradise!

Google News Archive Search.

Moksha!

On Celestial Pachyderms

Today, I was listening to a Ragam-Tanam-Pallavi by a yesteryear vidwan. The pallavi was in Tamil and went:

ten-pazhani vaDivElanE, devayAnai maNavALanE*

The pallavi refers to the deity Muruga/Karttikeya. He is considered a bachelor in the north** but is twice-married down south. His second wife is called dEvayAni in Sanskrit and dEvAnai in Tamil. Gods and goddesses in Tamilnadu have two names - one each in Sanskrit and Tamil.

In this pallavi, the vidwan wishes to refer to the deity in relation to his wife, i.e., "O Husband of such-and-such-a-person." But he confuses the two names, dEvayAni and dEvAnai, of the goddess and ends up with the hybrid dEvayAnai, which means "Divine Elephant" (yAnai = elephant, in Tamil)!

- - - -
* தென்பழனி வடிவேலனே, தேவயானை மணவாளனே
** Whether it's north of the Vindhyas or that of Tirutthani, I am not sure.

Language tidbits

A large number of Bangaloreans can speak Tamil. But there is a simple way to distinguish the native speaker of Tamil from a Kannadiga who learnt it: Where the former will use app'DiyA ("is that so?"), the latter will say AmAvA. As in:

"nALaikki Madras pOrEn." ("I am going to Madras tomorrow.")
"app'DiyA / AmAvA?" ("Is that so?")

This is because the Kannada equivalent of app'DiyA is audA. And audu ("yes") translates to AmA in spoken Tamil.

* * *

In my opinion, a Tamil-speaker can learn Kannada easier by comparing Kannada expressions to their equivalents in formal (rather than spoken) Tamil. This is because Tamil words are often shortened when used colloquially and the similarities between the two languages may not be readily apparent.

For example, vanduviTTu ("after coming") becomes vandu'TTu in spoken Tamil, but the Kannada bandbiTTu is closer to the first form. So also, vandukoNDu (becomes vandu'NDu) & bandkoNDu; vanduviDu (becomes vandu'Du) & bandbiDu.

* * *

Did you know that in Sanskrit, the letter व which now has the sound V, was originally W?

Of the consonants in the Sanskrit alphabet, य, र, ल and व (which make up the penultimate row of the Varnamala) are considered to be "semi-vowels," as each of them is formed when two vowels combine. य (ya) arises out of the sandhi of the vowels इ (i) and अ (a). That is,

इ + अ -> य
And,
ऋ + अ -> र
ऌ + अ -> ल
Finally,
उ + अ -> व

When the vowels उ (u) and अ (a) combine to form व, as you can see, the resultant sound is better represented by W. I am curious how it evolved into a V. I find this surprising since the W sound is after all easier on the mouth than V.

And the preponderance of W's in the names of Sri Lankan cricket players (Wickremasinghe, Samaraweera) makes me wonder if, in Sinhalese, the letter has retained the original sound.

* * *

Hindi has a number of dialects - Khadiboli, Braj-bhasha, Awadhi, etc. But few may know of the existence of a southern dialect of Hindi. It's called Carnatic Hindi, the language as sung by Carnatic musicians!

The main languages of Carnatic music are, of course, Telugu, Sanskrit, Tamil and Kannada. A share of the pie was given to Hindi by the royal composer Swati Tirunal, who created 36 songs in the language. One of them begins:

रामचन्द्र प्रभो, तुम बिन
जाने कौन खबर ले मेरी!

A Carnatic musician would pronounce it thus:

rAmachandra prabhO, tuma bina
jAnE kauna khabara le mErI!

... without eliding the 'a' sounds as a Hindi-speaker would do (tum bin jAne etc.)!

And I approve of it. Such a pronunciation gels with that of the south Indian languages (including Sanskrit) that a Carnatic aficianado is attuned to.

Meera bhajans, when pronounced in Carnatic Hindi, appear an integral part of the Carnatic repository:

morE to giridhara gopAla
dUsarO na koyI...

... while a playback of MS Subbulakshmi's Hanuman Chalisa

SrI guru charaNa sarOja raja
nija mana mukura sudhAri

... runs seamlessly from that of any south Indian household regular such as the Siva Panchakshara Stotram.

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PS: I apologise to all readers for the long silence.

Good Manners and Language

Germans can be grumpy, unpleasant people—and it's not because of post-Nazi guilt or a diet filled with bratwurst, says one American researcher. It's because of their vowels. Hope College psychology professor David Myers says saying a vowel with an umlaut forces a speaker to turn down his mouth in a frown, and may induce the sadness associated with the facial expression. Myers added that the English sounds of "e" and "ah" naturally create smile-like expressions and may induce happiness. [Link]

Quite a few buses in Bangalore do not have a conductor. In such buses, of the two entrypoints, the one closest to the driver would only be open. As we board the bus, the driver himself would issue tickets. Soon a crowd would build up at the front, due to their inexplicable fascination to hang out near the doors. And the driver would be walled in by a human fortress around him, rendering him unable to issue tickets to the new passengers. And he can't resume driving until the tickets are given out. Besides, he also has to deal with the honking massive traffic build-up behind the bus. In such an unenviable scenario, the driver would plead with the people around him repeatedly, "Ulagada hogi! Ulagada hogi!" (Please move inside! Please!)

I cannot imagine such a scene happening in Madras for two reasons:

1. No driver would have agreed to the additional work of issuing tickets. All proletariat would have united in a strike.
2. Let's assume the drivers (by some miracle, or threat of arrest by Amma) consented. Now, if the passengers suffocated him at his seat, he would eliminate the problem by a simple technique of hurling a volley of expletives at them.

What is the cause for the Kannadiga drivers' politeness?

A friend took an autorickshaw from his home for a long ride in Bangalore, at the end of which he realised he was... without his wallet. Had this occurred in Madras, the aatokaaran would have combined with others of his ilk to perform my friend's last rites -- after collecting everything of value on his person. All the Bangalorean, on the other hand, did was to offer to collect the amount from my friend's house the next day.

Now, here I must add that there are many autorickshawmen in Bangalore who are quite as skilled at fleecing us as the famed ones of Madras are. But they do so with that good grace that makes getting fleeced a much less unpleasant experience.

What makes the Kannada-speaking autodrivers more mannered?

While a student, if Mysore Vasudevacharya (the celebrated composer and musician) committed a mistake in his lessons, his guru would upbraid him severely but referring to him throughout with the honorific Acharyare. (Harken gentle sir, may I declare thee a blundering moron?)

Now consider this.

In (colloquial) Kannada:

	Singular		Respectful (Plural)
Go	hogu	2 syllables	hogi	2 syllables
Do:	madu	,,	madi	,,
See:	nodu	,,	nodri	,,
Put:	haku	,,	hakri	,,

Contrast this with (colloquial) Tamil:

	Singular		Respectful (Plural)
Do:	sei	1 syllable	seyyunga	3 syllables
See:	paru	2	parunga	3
Put:	podu	2	podunga	3

or Hindi:

	Singular		Respectful (Plural)
Go:	ja	1 syllable	ja'iye	3 syllables
Do:	kar	1	keejiye	3
See:	dekh	1	dekhiye	3

or even Telugu:

	Singular		Respectful (Plural)
Go:	vellu	2 syllables	vellandi	3 syllables
Do:	chei	2	cheyyandi	3
See:	choodu	2	choodandi	3

There it is, friends. Being polite and respectful is much easier on the mouth in Kannada. For every verb spoken, you are spared 1 syllable or more, compared to the other tongues. And in addition, employing the respectful plural takes the same effort needed for the casual singular: Same price, more value.

The Chief Architect of Kannada (let's call her Kannada Thayi, or KT for short), when she sat down after a hearty meal of bisi-bele-huliyanna to create the language, must have had respectfulness as one of her major design goals. And she achieved it by the simple (yet ingenious) method of making verb plurals user-friendly.

Therein lies another important lesson for all of you: If you seek to create a language that should escape degeneration with time, keep it easy on the mouth. Yes-sir, "easy on the mouth, easy on the mouth" - that's the cry. Or you will find that the resounding "Avarai azhaithukondu varungal" ("Please bring him along" - Tamil) would end up as the tepid "Adha itnu va" in the tongues of the hoi-polloi.

Blogger stumbles upon Indian grammatical law

Today, blogger Amit Varma independently invents rules of euphonic combination, present as the laws of Sandhi in the Indian languages.

Ah, Bliss.

My room-mate and I both are from Madras; so when we go to our respective homes, we travel together. But the last weekend, he stayed put in Bangalore while I went.

On meeting him on my return,

Me: It was Ratha Saptami yesterday.
Room-mate: What is Ratha Saptami?
Me: It means my mother makes sweets. I had Chakkara Pongal and Carrot Halwa. You?
Room-mate: @#$%& you.

A Delta of Fertile Minds - Thanjavur's Contribution to Music

At different times in history, certain regions become centres of immense creative output: Madurai in the Sangam Age (Tamil literature and music), Vienna in the 17-18th centuries (Western classical music) and Bengal in the 19th century (literature, science, etc.).

Similarly, the Cauvery delta region of Thanjavur seems to have been the happening place in the 18-19th centuries, as far as Carnatic music is concerned.

Ruled successively by Vijayanagara (Nayaka) chiefs of Karnataka/Andhra and Maratha kings of Maharashtra, this Tamil area saw an immigration of Telugu-, Kannada- and Marathi-speaking people. Such diversity resulted in a glorious cross-pollination of culture, one of whose fruits is the Carnatic classical music.

A slew of composers emerged, creating works in different languages (Telugu, Tamil, Sanskrit and Marathi). The important names are Seshaiyengar, hailed as "mArgadarzi" or Pathbreaker; Uthukadu Venkata-kavi, whose Tamil and Sanskrit works include the famous alaippAyudE; the Tamil composers Arunachala-kavi, creator of the rAma nATakam and Gopalakrishna Bharati, whose magnum-opus is the nandanAr caritram. The pinnacle was reached with the Trinity of Tyagaraja, Muthuswami Dikshitar and Syama Sastri, who are known too well for me to go into details.

These compositions were created in various formats. In addition to the well-known kRti, is the Natakam (opera), exemplified in the bhAgavata mELA form. It consists of plays in Telugu and Marathi which are performed by an all-male cast of Telugu speakers from Melattur village in Thanjavur.

Of all these works, the ones that deal with Krishna-bhakti are always... erotic! One such is the kRSNa lIlA taraGgiNi, composed by Narayana Teertha (who moved in from Andhra). And Tyagaraja, who was as orthodox as they came, created the zRGgAra-laden opera naukA caritram. Other “madhura-bhakti” formats are the padam and jAvaLi.

Besides the intense composing activity, important strides were made in musicology as well. Venkatamakhin wrote the caturdaNDI prakAzikA, that deals with the 72 melas. This was refined into the Mela-karta raga system as we know it today by his grandson Muddu Venkatamakhin. Some of the kings were scholars themselves: Tulaja wrote the treatise saGgIta sArAmRta.

Furthermore, the bhajana sampradAya took shape here around this time. The primary gurus of this tradition were Bodhendra Saraswati and Sridhara Venkatesa (popularly known as "ayyAvAL"), a local of Telugu ancestry. (The late Swami Haridas Giri was the most visible face of this sampradAya in recent times.) This system was made rich with contributions from the earlier Kannada as well as Marathi (abhang) bhajana movements.

The Marathi settlers (thanks to their rhythm-dominant abhaGgs) also helped develop the mridangam techniques. This is evident from the Carnatic terms, chapu (as in the tala "Khanda Chapu") which is probably from the Marathi "chhaap" छाप; and mora (rhythmic patterns) from "mohra" मोहरा. (In fact, their influence can be seen in other spheres too - the original name of Bharatanatyam "sadir" and the famous "sambar" come from Marathi.) One of the foremost mridangam exponents was a Thanjavur Marathi, Nanasama Rao (aka Narayanaswami Appa).

Thus evolved our music - in a cultural melting-pot that was Thanjavur.
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Other recent blog-posts on Carnatic Music that are great:

• Suraj's Crash Course in Identifying Ragas
• Sunil's If Music be the Food of Love

Cry "Wolfgang!"

The world celebrates the 250th birth anniversary of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, the great Western Classical composer, this Friday (27th January). Thousands of people are gathering at Salzburg, Austria, his hometown.

On this occasion, an excellent set of concerts, tributes and other audio programmes are featured on the non-profit radio station NPR. Check them out!

[Link via Yossarian Lives. Pic: Wikipedia.]

More links on Music: http://del.icio.us/srikanths/music

Harmonium - Sarangi Wars, Redux.

A while ago at a Hindustani concert by Padma Talwalkar, seeing the accompanying harmonium unable to keep up with the fluid voice of the singer made me wonder why this instrument was preferred to the sarangi or the violin. I expressed my thoughts in the article How the Harmonium Came on the Hindustani Stage.

I didn't know it when I first wrote this article, but the harmonium was banned in AIR concerts for 30 years from sometime in the 1940's. This is surprising. Though the instrument can't probably reproduce the high-speed taans or certain types of gamakas, it's got a rich continuous tone that only a very good violinist with impeccable bow control can match. This is a very desirable quality for an accompanying instrument. Banning the harmonium, I feel, was draconian.

In the late 1960's, the Sangeet Natak Akademi invited experts to a seminar to discuss this ban. Excerpts from the seminar proceedings were posted in the rec.music.indian.classical group and make a very interesting reading. V.H. Deshpande, an AIR artiste, while presenting his case for the harmonium, brought up the important topic of the role of an accompanist in a concert:

[W]hat is the role of an accompanying instrument? I submit it is to create a musical atmosphere, and inspire the artiste by bringing him into his best singing mood. Further, the accompanying instrument must keep the continuity of singing to heighten the musicality of the performance and make it more more entertaining and in effect more pleasing. This it is expected to do by following the main artiste closely with or without a little time lag and also at times being played independently in the interludes, generally calculated to excite and inspire the principal to do better than before. I dare say that the Harmonium by its powerful, constant and sustained notes not only abundantly satisfies all these requirements but satisfies them in a far greater degree than any of the stringed instruments...

It is said that Sarangi can reproduce the exact tonal nuances and meends and gamaks. This is alright only if the resonating strings allow it to remain in accurate intonation. But let me ask, whether exact reproduction is at all necessary for an accompanying instrument, whose role is only complementary?

A certain P. V. Subramaniam from Delhi makes an eloquent case for the harmonium as well:

It is not realised that as in the case of other aids to music the Harmonium has undergone great refinement. Today's version of the Harmonium is capable of providing a whole range of tonal excellence unavailable in other musical instruments... Present-day Harmoniums have three-reed-boards joined together with provision for air-release in a zig-zag fashion ensuring softness of tone and melody.

In the far South, before the days of cant and dilettantism, Perur Subramanya Dikshitar, the Harmonium Wizard, used to accompany the great classical vocalists... Dikshitar played on a highly sophisticated Harmonium. There are many gramaphone records testifying to his instrumental excellence while accompanying a maestro of the calibre of Palladam Sanjivi Rao. These records have also been broadcast over the Radio. The heavens have not fallen. They are in one piece.

This gentleman, P. V. Subramaniam, is none other than the much-feared Carnatic critic Subbudu!

Read the whole thing.

More on the Harmonium vs Sarangi debate:
In the For Sarangi team: Kishori Amonkar.
In the For Harmonium team: Rajan Parrikar.

Who doesn't love a good fight?

Our languishing music heritage

India has an astonishing wealth of music. Besides the Carnatic and Hindustani traditions that we all have heard of, there are a number of lesser known ones such as:

• Panns: The Tamil region since ancient times has had a well-developed music system, mentioned in the Sangam literature and extensively discussed in the 2nd century epic Silappadhikaram. The Tamil bhakti texts (circa 7th century AD) such as the Thirumurai and the Devaram were set to panns (ancient ragas). Unfortunately, large parts of this music was lost after Malik Kafur's raids in the south. Whatever remains has been assiduously preserved by a dwindling number of odhuvars, who traditionally sing these hymns in temples. The panns are believed to have had considerable influence on the development of the Carnatic ragas.

• Abhang, the bhajans of the Marathi saints, Namadev, Jnaneshwar, Tukaram and others, who were bhaktas of Vitthala. To this day, their itinerant followers, called the varkari panthis, celebrate the names of the Lord in these songs of intense devotional fervour. The abhangs even spread to the Thanjavur region (which was ruled by Marathas) and were merged into the divya-nama tradition of Tamilnadu.

• Vachanas: In the 12th century, a Shaiva movement was founded in Karnataka by Basaveshwara. A revolutionary, he fought caste, glorified manual labour and condemned ritualism. The ideas of Basava and his followers (cutting caste and gender) are expressed in Kannada poetry, called vachanas. The original melody of the vachanas are probably lost; they are now sung in the Hindustani style.

Such wonderful, but little known, music deserves a wide audience, but unfortunately there are few recordings widely available.

Recently I met a gentleman who has recorded such music, but is unable to find anybody willing to market them. He has produced the Thirumurai sung by an odhuvar in the original pann system, abhangs by varkaris as well as basava-vachanas. Marketing people expect a well-known name on the label for reasons of commercial viability, but the authentic sources of such music are unknown and poor persons languishing in remote villages or temples. The gentleman I met is very commited to such an undertaking; he has set up his own studio for this purpose; he also has a keen attention to detail evident even in the aesthetically created jackets for the CDs.

Do readers have any suggestions as to what could be done to market such productions? I was thinking along the lines of setting up an e-commerce site. Probably Yahoo! Store is an option to consider; does anyone have experience with such stuff? Or better ideas?

Update:

Suraj Kumar, a Carnatic enthusiast and guitarist who works at Amazon, suggested:

I talked to folks. Seems the Amazon Advantage Program will fit you right. BUT... are you trying to sell only to India? or Will this include global audience as well?

The good thing is the kind of systems that we have in place that would help you as a seller. Firstly, when you decide to sell via most online stores, the route is quite long. You as a publisher / producer will have to go to a distributor and the distributor would place your product on a lot of different places (amazon, barnesandnobles, etc.,.). But you end up paying up a lot of cuts. This would be advantageous if you expect a whole lot of audience purchasing your product (like you are selling iPods).

This is why the amazon Advantage program is beneficial for small sellers.

More suggestions from Shivku and Sivaram in the comments below.

Thanks a lot everybody!

Update 2: The details of the pann recordings: (These were produced by him for Kosmic Music, not for his own fledgling company.)

1. Pann muraiyil Thirumurai (3 volumes - audio cassettes)
2. Pann muraiyil Pasurangal (2 volumes - audio cassettes)
Both by Muthukandasami Desikar, the odhuvar at the famous (Rock Fort) Thayumanavar Temple, Trichy.

The panns covered are:
Nattapadai (Gambhira Natta), Sigamaram (Malavagowla), Thakkesi (Kambhoji), Kolligouvanam (Navaroz), Megharagakurinji (Neelambari), Pazhamthakkaragam (Arabhi), Vizhakurinji (Saurashtram), Thakkaragam (Kambhoji), Nattaragam (Panthuvarali), Sevvazhi (Yadukula kambhoji), Kausikam (Bhairavi) and many more. (I am too lazy to type all of them.)

These cassettes are also listed on the Kosmic Music site.