Raga is a musical scale, an emotional or creative idea which utilizes sound frequencies (swaras) and rhythms (layas) at their most subtle levels of oscillations in terms of their emotional appeal.
The Indian note or swara is distinguishable from its Western counterpart, as its frequencies are not so rigidly fixed and are allowed to oscillate freely, depending on the emotional demands in rendering a raga.
Tradition demands that a raga should be pleasant (“ranjayati itih ragah”), to achieve this effect a raga is embroidered with at least five notes (swaras or sur or swaram), going up to a maximum of seven.
Let’s coin now a term “proto-raga” to distinguish those natural, unpretentious and spontaneous sound clusters and swara phrases, which do not qualify to be referred to as ‘ragas’, as they are short of the minimum notes, namely five.
These proto-ragas, which may have one, two, three or four notes, have their own beauty and charm like those physically or mentally-challenged amongst us! They sound more intuitive than the ‘normal’ ragas and despite their ‘handicap’ they please us with their sincerity, spontaneity and naturalness.
It is a matter of speculation that these proto-ragas might have ruled the roost in most primitive societies. For, much before the languages were invented, spontaneous sound expressions such as aahs, oohs and ouch had to be relied upon as reliable means of communication. Their tonal frequencies and oscillations distinctly conveyed the raw feelings — love and enjoyment or hatred and pain —rather than the letters and words, which came to occupy and distort human societies!
Proto-ragas reached their zenith when they came to be employed in liturgical and devotional pieces: Gregorian chants, Vedic chants, Quranic verses, Shabad, etc. Experiments of this author with mentally-challenged adults and children indicate their usefulness in involving them readily into music, as compared to fully-evolved ragas and elaborate raga alapana.
The One Note Wonder
Archika, a Sanskrit term refers to a single tone or which gets repeated endlessly. In other words, it deals with monotones. Repeatedly chanting a tone is a time-tested technique to achieve what is called ‘ekagrata’ or concentration. As one gets accustomed to this “treadmill” music, what starts as an absurd exercise starts working wonders. Through the endless repetition of say, ‘sa, sa, sa’ the note involved in archika, the mind gets thoroughly pounded and in due course benumbed too! Take for instance, an ek tara or single string instrument. As you go on repeatedly striking it, focusing your mind on the monotones of Archika, what starts initially as a drudgery ends up as an ecstatic spiritual experience!
The Two Note wonder:
Addition of the companion note ‘ni’ to the already existing ‘sa’, creates a new genre, Gathika. This marriage of two notes paves the way to the eventual evolution of Samika.
The Three-Note wonder:
While two is company, three, becomes a crowd! The same is applicable to Samika too. The three note-combination (‘sa ’,‘ni’ and ‘ri’) adds a new dimension to our musical experience. All the three notes as “neighbours” in an octave and they are friendly to each other too. ’Ni’, the low-pitched is called Anudatta, ‘Sa’ that is central is Svarita and ‘Ri’ which is the high-pitched is Udatta. Vedic recitations make use of these notes profusely. For example, the Vedic chanting of “Mantra pushpam” reads like this:-
RISA NISARI NISARI NISARI SAS SASA SA
(Yopam Ayata namveda Ayata navaan bhavati)
Balamurali ’s experiments
Dr. Balamurali Krishna, the well-known exponent of Carnatic music, has made some path-breaking research on proto-ragas. Some of the proto-ragas (called as ‘ragas’ by him) have been evolved by combining some friendly swaras are detailed:
Proto-ragas, by the virtue of their limited sound frequencies may not provide that richness of musical experience, available in fully-evolved ragas. Nevertheless, they are more direct and soothing. They exist nearer to our heart and soul than our mind.
This could be the reason why the mentally-challenged among us react more spontaneously to proto-ragas than to musical pieces composed in fully evolved ragas.
Being natural and yet-to-evolve, perhaps, proto-ragas have got identified readily with them. This could be, no doubt, an ideal area for further research in our scientific exploration of the brain with sounds, neuro-musicology.
| Proto Raga | Arohana | Avarohana |
| Sarvasri | SA, MA, PA, SA | SA, SA, PA, MA, SA |
| Mahati | SA, GA, PA, NI, SA | SA, NI, PA, GA, SA |
| Sumukam | SA, RI, MA, NI, SA | SA, NI, MA, RI, SA |
| Lavangi | SA, RI, MA, DHA, SA | SA, DHA, MA, RI, SA |
This article was published in ‘Bhavan Journal’ May 15, 2005 – Pages 93 5o 95
Edited by Geeta Shreedar, Mar 16, 2021