Carnatic Music and The Chennai Music Season

I am very pro-music. I have learnt music as a kid, and always continue to hope that some day I will resume my learning. I believe that music a lot more useful than being merely a means for entertainment.

I used to (still am, in a way) a Carnatic music aficionado. When in the hostel, I once had an interesting argument with a friend of mine about comparing Carnatic music with Western Classical music. My argument was that Carnatic music is the most refined and beautiful form of music to which my friend disagreed. His point was that if you would ask a naive African tribesman to listen to Beethoven and Thyagaraja and ask him to rate them, he would surely rate Beethoven higher.

This was a difficult experiment to analyze and react to. I couldn't imagine a tribesman with little connection with mainstream civilization, to like a Thyagaraja krithi over let's say Beethoven's 'Ode to joy' or some such. Does this make Western Classical music more beautiful? Tough to say. One would agree that Western Classical music is simpler to interpret and enjoy (I certainly believe so) and in this simplicity lies beauty and refinement.

Carnatic Music is a very specialized form of music whose interpretation and appreciation has some pre-requisites. Of course, there are a few krithis whose melody might cause instant appeal but the real joy and beauty of Carnatic music doesn't lie in the melody alone. In fact, very little of the beauty lies in the melody. The crux is in the rendering, the variations and the depth to which an artiste can explore.

Given all this, appreciating Carnatic Music is a very intellectual exercise. It is thus hardly surprising that Tamil Brahmin families consider this as a very important and necessary element of development. I am sure I am not the only one who has faced peer pressure at home when there is Carnatic Music on tv or the radio and identifying the raaga is the competition.

The high point of Carnatic Music exposition is the Chennai Music Season. I am in complete awe of how this tradition has continued for so long and even to this day (thanks to economics and media buzz) continues to attract a wide audience. It is an annual woodstock. Carnatic Music's growth in popularity in the near future will depend heavily on how the patronage for the Chennai Music Season changes in the coming years

I personally am out of all this. To put it bluntly, I am a very selfish aficionado of Carnatic Music. I want the art form to strengthen and continue but I am not ready to patronize it through showing up for concerts. I have been in Chennai for three music seasons in the last three years and I have attended only one concert (TM Krishna in Ananthapadmanabhaswami Kovil, Adyar, late 2009) I do not see a point in attending concerts. I do not enjoy them. This is not because I do not like the music but because my enjoyment of Carnatic Music comes from learning and improving my own skills.

Contrary to other people's opinions, I find concerts to be of no value in terms of learning. If I were at a stage where I needed to understand the nuances of concert presentation etc, there might have been some advantage in attending concerts. Currently all that I need to do is to listen to krithis. Listen to them repeatedly; which is something concerts cannot offer.

Unfortunately, I do not derive any ego pleasure from announcing to people that I attended X's concert at Y sabha, there was a superb rendition of Z etc. I am much happier when I realize that I can sing W sangathi in V krithi slightly better today as compared to yesterday.

All of us have different roles to play. I am playing mine. Baleh baleh.