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ಮಾರ್ಚ್ ೨೦, ೨೦೦೮ – ಇವತ್ತು ವಸಂತ ವಿಷುವ!
ವಸಂತದ ಬರವನ್ನು ಸಾರುವ ಈ ಕವಿತೆ ಓದಿ:
Spring: A poem by Thomas Nashe. 1567–1601
Spring, the sweet Spring, is the year’s pleasant king;
Then blooms each thing, then maids dance in a ring,
Cold doth not sting, the pretty birds do sing—
Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo!
The palm and may make country houses gay, 5
Lambs frisk and play, the shepherds pipe all day,
And we hear aye birds tune this merry lay—
Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo!
The fields breathe sweet, the daisies kiss our feet,
Young lovers meet, old wives a-sunning sit, 10
In every street these tunes our ears do greet—
Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo!
Spring, the sweet Spring!
ಮತ್ತೆ ಈ ಗೀತೆಯ ಒಂದು ಸುಂದರ ಅನುವಾದ – ಬಿ.ಎಮ್.ಶ್ರೀ ಅವರ ’ಇಂಗ್ಲಿಷ್ ಗೀತೆಗಳು’ ಸಂಕಲನದಿಂದ – ಇದನ್ನು ಪ್ರಾಥಮಿಕ ಶಾಲೆಯಲ್ಲಿ ಬಾಯಿಪಾಠ ಮಾಡಿದ್ದೆಂದು ನೆನಪು.
ವಸಂತ
ವಸಂತ ಬಂದ ಋತುಗಳ ರಾಜ ತಾ ಬಂದ
ಚಿಗುರನು ತಂದ ಪೆಣ್ಗಳ ಕುಣಿಸುತ ನಿಂದ,
ಚಳಿಯನು ಕೊಂದ ಹಕ್ಕಿಗಳುಲಿತವೆ ಚೆಂದ,
ಹಕ್ಕಿಗಳುಲಿತವೆ ಚಂದ
ಕೂವೂ ಜಗ್ ಜಗ್ ಪುವ್ವೀ ಟೂವಿಟ್ಟವೂ !
ಕುರಿ ನೆಗೆದಾಟ, ಕುರುಬರ ಕೊಳಲಿನೂದಾಟ,
ಇನಿಯರ ಬೇಟ; ಬನದಲಿ ಬೆಳದಿಂಗಳೂಟ,
ಹೊಸ ಹೊಸ ನೋಟ, ಹಕ್ಕಿಗೆ ನಲಿವಿನ ಪಾಠ,
ಕೂವೂ ಜಗ್ ಜಗ್ ಪುವ್ವೀ ಟೂವಿಟ್ಟವೂ !
ಮಾವಿನ ಸೊಂಪು ಮಲ್ಲಿಗೆ ಬಯಲೆಲ್ಲ ಕಂಪು
ಗಾಳಿಯ ತಂಪು ಜನಗಳ ಜಾತ್ರೆಯ ಗುಂಪು
ಕಿವಿಗಳಿಗಿಂಪು ಹಕ್ಕಿಗಳುಲುಹಿನ ಪೆಂಪು
ಕೂವೂ ಜಗ್ ಜಗ್ ಪುವ್ವೀ ಟೂವಿಟ್ಟವೂ !
ಬಂದ ವಸಂತ! ನಮ್ಮ ರಾಜ ವಸಂತ !
ಭಾಷಾಂತರ ಮಾಡಿದರೆ ಹೀಗೆ ಮಾಡಬೇಕು ಎನ್ನುವುದಕ್ಕೆ ಇದಕ್ಕಿಂತ ಒಳ್ಳೆ ಉದಾಹರಣೆ ಬೇಕಿಲ್ಲ!
-ನೀಲಾಂಜನ
On the way to work this morning, I was listening to a show on raaga kalyAni on Stanford Radio at 90.1FM (www.itsdiff.com) presented by Sri Ragavan Manian, an eminent musician of SFO bay area.
Kalyani, or yaman if you are from north of river Krishna, is a very captivating rAga indeed. I have rambled on it this rAga earlier, here and here. Today, it is the chance to write a bit more!
What if I were to be stranded in an island, and had only one rAga to listen to? Which rAga would I pick? Of course, kalyAni. Actually that reminds me of a comment made by one of the callers in the radio program this morning - ”How can anyone in the right frame of mind NOT like kalyANi?” 
?
Texual traditions place Kalyani to be an import from the music of the Middle-Eastern music. The word ‘yaman’ comes from ‘eman’ or ‘iman’ in Persian – which means “blessed”. When this rAga was adopted to Indian music, the name was indianized with the same meaning as ‘kalyaNa’, or ‘kalyANi’. This import should have happened sometime around 1400 AD (or before), since we have the name of the rAga mentioned in a composition of SripadarAya (1402 AD-1500AD).
Sometime back, the blog avadhi asked it’s readers to name their Top Ten kannada books. My list was published there too. Today’s show on rAga kalyAni made me list my top ten favourite compositions, set in kalyAni rAga.
Disclaimer: This order is not set in stone, and I will just say that it is today’s list; if I were to set to do the list another day I might come up with a slightly different order 
For those interested, I am pointing to some of my favourite audio links as well.
1. nidhi chAlA sukhamA :
One of the Kalyani gems composed by Tyagaraja. It was supposedly composed in response to the invitation of Serfoji (king of Tanjavoor) to Tyagaraja to become a court musician. He asks “Does wealth give you bliss, or being close to Rama give you bliss”? You can listen to it here sung by S Sowmya.
2. EtAvunnarA:
Another grand kriti of Tyagaraja in kalyAni. Listen it here on the Veena, by Eemani Shankara Shastry.
3. sundari nI divya rUpamunu:
Yet another wonderful kriti of Tyagaraja in Kalyani. Tyagaraja visited Chennaipattanam (now Chennai) to visit one of his deciples. There he visited the temple at Tiruvottriyoor, on the northern outskirts of current day Chennai, and composed five compositions on the goddess Tripurasundari. These are termed as the “Tiruvottriyoor Pancharatna kritis”. This composition is one of those five. Listen to it sung by Dr M Balamuralikrishna , unquestionably my personal favourite.
4. nija dAsa varada:
No wonder the first three were compositions of Tyagaraja. He has composed more than 30 songs in this rAga. And for the same reason, it seems Patnam Subramaniyam Iyer, who comes in the lineage of Tyagaraja did not compose anything in Kalyani for a long time because he felt that Tyagaraja had almost exhausted all the possibilities in kalyAni rAga. But finally he came up with a his own grand composition, to match those of the saint, set slightly differently to showing his individuality. Listen to it on the nAdaswara by Namagiripettai Krishnan.
5. SringapurAdhIswari shAradE:
A very nice composition of Krishnamachar, popularly known as Padmacharan. Till recently I did not know this kriti – but once I listened to this the rasika forum (www.rasikas.org) (sung by M N Sriram, a fellow rasika on the forum) sometime back, this has become one of my favourites!
6. nannu brOvamani cheppavE :
I love the folksy touch given to this composition of Annamayya. Listen to this song here sung by Dr BMK .
7. kamalAmbAm bhajarE :
Here comes the composition of Muttuswami Dikshitar (MD). This majestic composition is one of the Kamalamba Navavarana kritis. Listen to this played by U Srinivas on the mandolin
8. bhaja rE chitta:
Another kriti of MD. Listen to this here sung by Sanjay Subramanian
9. himAdri sutE pAhimAm :
A composition of Shyama Shastri. One of the few compositions that has two different set of words - one in Samskrita and one in Telugu (birAna varAlicchi brOvumu) . Here is the samskrita version from a kannada movie, Hamsageethe, by Dr BMK
10. shivE pAhimAm ambike :
While I could not locate the audio for this kriti, I wanted to list it here because this was the first Kalyani kriti I became aware of! This is a kriti of Tyagaraja, on Dharmasamvardhini, the diety of Tiruvayyaru, the hometown of Tyagaraja.
I wish I could add more compositions, but ‘Top Ten’s are supposed to be what they mean – Right? So even though I don’t want to add these to the list, I will just mention few other must listens in this rAga - kAru vElpu of Tyagaraja, abhayAmbA jagadambA of MD, kELano hari tALano or Purandara dAsa sung beautifully by BMK for a kannada movie - gAnayOgi rAmanna ( Listen to it here) and the ThAya mAlika tillAna composed by Dr MBK come to mind immediately. The last one definitely merits a post on it’s own. May be some other day!
-neelanjana
My Kannada blog, Hamsanaada is featured on Kendasampige today as ”The Blog of the Day“ , and this blog ಅಲ್ಲಿದೆ ನಮ್ಮ ಮನೆ got a mention too!
http://www.kendasampige.com/preview/?page_id=176
-neelanjana
If you have not lived in a concrete jungle all your life, you would have definitely heard different bird calls. Who is not captivated by the the koel singing in it’s sweet voice, perched on the branches of a mango tree in spring time?
KoelOne well known samskrita shlOka says thus:
काकः कृष्णः पिकः कृष्णः को भेदो पिककाकयोः
वसन्तकाले सम्प्राप्ते काकः काकः पिकः पिकः
The crows is black, the koel is black.
Pray, tell me the difference ?
Come spring time, you’ll see
Who’s the crow and who’s the Koel!
ಕಾಗೆಯು ಕಪ್ಪು ಕೋಗಿಲೆ ಕಪ್ಪು
ಎಲ್ಲಿದೆ ಏನಿದೆ ವ್ಯತ್ಯಾಸ ?
ವಸಂತಕಾಲವು ಬಂದಿರೆ ತಾನು
ಆಗುವುದದು ಖಂಡಿತ ಭಾಸ !
Sometime back I had written about samasyA pooraNam in Samskrita, and in Kannada. A few days ago, I got a couplet from a visitor to my Kannada blog. I found it very interesting. I had not read or heard about this before. I am not sure if is a good samasya-pooraNam example, but it could very well be one.
The couplet has only two consonents in it - r and t. I guess it is very hard to write poetry like this in other language. At least for people like me
Here it goes the shlOka:
तारतारतरैरेतैः उत्तरोत्तरतोरुतैः ।
रतार्त तित्तिरी रौति तीरेतीरे तरौतरौ ॥
To make it comprehendable, I have to split the compound words as below:
तार तारतरैः एतैः उत्तरोत्तरतः ऋतैः ।
रतार्त तित्तिरी रौति तीरेतीरे तरौतरौ ॥
tAra tArataraiH EtaiH uttarOttarataH RutaiH |
ratArta tittirI rauti tIrE tIrE tarau tarau ||
Here is my attempted translation into Kannada:
ತಾರತಾರಕ್ಕೆ ಏರುವ ದನಿಯಲಿ
ರತಿರಾಗದಲಿ ಜೊತೆಬಯಸುವ ತಿತ್ತಿರಿ
ರೋದಿಸಿತದು ಕೆರೆಕೊಳಗಳ ತೀರ
ತೀರದಲಿ ಮರಗಿಡಗಳ ನಡುವಲಿ
I don’t have to reiterate that I have not kept the special feature of the original!
The couplet is describs the plight of a female partrige bird that is looking for a mate among the trees on the shores of lakes and ponds, calling in sounds that go to higher and higher pitch with each of it’s calls.
I have never seen a Partridge (tittirI, ತಿತ್ತಿರಿ) anytime in wild – But here you can see one here, thanks to google search The closest I have come across a partridge is in the Christmas song - A partrige in a pear tree!
When I am talking about birds, I should definitely tell about the cAtaka bird. This bird is supposed to drink only the rainwater that is falling from the clouds, and not drink any other water. So, no wonder that it calls out for rain. The cAtaka bird ( A form of cuckoo, Cuculus Melanoleucus as per some sources on the web; Some other sources equated it to the Pied Cuckoo and the bibeeha bird, neither of which is identical to Cuculus Melanoleucus) has become a well known poetic image in Samskrita.
Bhartrhari writes thus:
रे रे चातक सावधानमनसा मित्र क्षणं श्रूयताम्
अम्भोदाः बहवो हि सन्ति गगने सर्वेपि नैतादृशाः
केचित् वृष्टिभिरार्द्रयंति धरणीम् गर्जंति केचिद् वृथा
यं यं पश्यसि तस्य तस्य पुरतो मा ब्रूहि दीनं वचः
Oh, CAtaka bird, give me a patient hearing, just for a minute
There are plenty of clouds in the sky; but none so alike
Some drench the earth with copious rain; others thunder in vain
So don’t be an indigent and supplicate in front of everyone!
Although he is addressing a bird, it is very clear who he is takling to!
To end this post, here is my translation of this subhAshita in kannaDa:
ಎಲೇ ಚಾತಕ, ಸಾವಧಾನ ಮನದಿ ಕೇಳು ಒಂದೆರಡು ಕ್ಷಣ
ಬಾನಲಿಹವು ಹಲವು ಮುಗಿಲು; ಆದರೊಂದೊಂದೂ ವಿಭಿನ್ನ.
ಮಳೆಯ ಸುರಿಸಿದರೆ ಕೆಲವು, ಬರಿದೆ ಗುಡುಗುವುವು ಕೆಲವು
ಅದಕೆ ನೀ ಕಂಡ ಕಂಡಲ್ಲೆಲ್ಲ ತೋರದಿರು ದೈನ್ಯವನ್ನ
-neelanjana
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