In search of tomorrow’s saṅgīta śāstra – 1

A work in progress..

Has saṅgīta śāstra come to a standstill today? While this question could be asked of any śāstra and not necessarily saṅgīta śāstra for the purposes of this analysis we will restrict ourselves to saṅgīta.

Imagine an Indian musicologist, three centuries from today. Now imagine a hypothetical interview with this hypothetical musicologist-of-the-future. What would his or her response be when asked about the state, progress and contributions in Indian musicology during the period 1900-2050? Before attempting to answer that question, he/she would probably reflect upon the course of Indian musicology before that period.

Indian musicology has always been a janus-faced affair, with every sage and scholar having one face firmly planted in the past and the other looking at the present and yet adding some unique idea of their own for posterity. In terms of earlier texts, one can say that Bharata’s greatest contribution was culling out sections from other individual śāstrā-s, and constructing a new one with theater at its core. It was an original text in terms of structure and perspective even though some of the content may have existed as individual elements previously. The author also seem to have wisely reporoduced some of the older systems like the section on tāndava, sections on nrtta under the pretext of śiva’s suggestions and may have perhaps even used the idea of pūrvaranga for incorporation of such concepts.This approach served as a model for future texts too in that they summarized the previous arguments before providing their own opinion on diverging debates on issues such as whether it is the śrutis or the svara-s that form the basis of the other. Scholars such as Dr.N.Ramanathan also allude to the idea that a śāstra represents the meeting point of many prayoga sampradāya-s. They also caution that there is also the case where these subsystems may have been at some point of time exclusive traditions that may have been normalized in the course of the creation of the text. In any case this is also inline with the notion of pūrvapakṣa and engaging with the ‘other’ and how the discourse of philosophy was performed. It is common in philosophy where one can see the influence of the modus operandi of the schools of nyāya and vyākaraṇa on other philosophical systems that are popular today.

Moving along this timeline, sometime before the tenth century, the mythic and mystic Mataṅga came along , drafted and defined grammar for the deśi rāga-s. This was perhaps the first step at codifying and standardizing the uncodified – a case of śāstrization of the then prevailing prayoga. Yet the question remains whether Mataṅga stopped with providing prescriptions and descriptions for an existing musical system or whether there was something original that came out in this text. It appears as though the text advocates new theory, expands on some of the epistemological basis and has unique features. We see concepts like the maṇdala prastāra for the first time. Yet, there needs to be a great deal of caution exercised before making any conclusions due to the difficulty in determining homogeneity of text. This is especially true in terms of the texts in the earlier saṅgīta period.

Then came Mahāmaheśvara Abhinavagupta – the formidable intellect who could not but leave his mark on every subject he encountered. Whether it was his opinions on śānta rasa or his expounding of details on the vādi, samvādi, anuvādi intervals Abhinavagupta seemed to have questioned, prodded analyzed and interpreted śāstra with new facets in his own way. However, considering the heterogeneity of text and the timegap between the text and the commentary, many musicologists believe that it is uncertain whether some of the commentary pertained to the music of the times when Abhinavagupta lived or if it applied to the music at the time of the NS. Despite these nuances, one can still strongly make a case that the text in itself carries a unique perspective and enriched tradition.

In terms of the texts of the middle period, it is the work of ṣārṅgadeva blazes new trails.If Abhinavagupta added steps to the stairway, one can say that ṣārṅgadeva entered adding in an escalator. While older statements are still repeated (for example about mārga and deśi) in his work, there is considerable addition to theory including the understanding of musical intervals. According to Dr.N.Ramanathan, the enumeration of the śuddha – vikṛta svara-s as described in the Saṅgita Ratnākara has served as the role model for succeeding generations of writers and musicologists and musicians too. However in line with that two-faced tradition, those that came long did make some variations based on the then available melodic material and worldview. For example : The presence of ragas such as nāṭa which have adjacent svara-s separated by an interval greater than four śrutis and less than two śrutis. This has been noted by subsequent writers such as Somanātha and Paṇḍarika Vitthala as well. Somanātha’s text for the first time notates rāga ālāpana samples, provides insight into ancient vaiṇika sampradāyas, and the evolution and change in gamaka-s of this period as distinct from that of ṣārṅgadeva. By this time the quantum breakthrough or a shift in the fundamental way theorization of music had happened and the idea of melas and the genus-species classifications have already been introduced. Then we have Rāmāmātya makes his statement and states his objective of reconciliation of variant ideas and viewpoints before he makes bold to state his case. Whether it is his much-maligned meḻa classification or his approach to śruti intervals they are clearly original contributions even though like most people he reproduced material from older texts.These classifications in turn had their practical influence in grouping, pairing and evolving additional melodic patterns. Paṇḍarika viṭṭhala served as a bridge between the music of the North and South and had specific contributions whether is in terms of  categorization of melodic material,  constructing of rāga lakṣaṇa-s and treatment of musical intervals. It is in this period where we are also at a much better position where the contribution and change or shift in each author’s period is identifiable.

Similarly from the time of Govinda Dīkṣita and Veṅkaṭamakhin, we have lakṣaṇa texts playing a key role in the architecture and structure of the vīṇa. And then came along Veṅkaṭamakhin defining the karnātaka periodic table which enabled subsequent descendants to name and frame and discover the remaining melodic elements in their assigned positions. With this theoretical tool , was also layered in prayoga in the form of gītas. Yet Veṅkaṭamakhin also reproduced anachronistic concepts from the Ratnākara in an attempt to keep one foot in the past. This theorization had its profound influence on the art as seen in the compositions of Muttusvāmi Dīkṣita who again maintains this dual outlook to his music.One can excuse MudduVeṅkaṭamakhin as an exception because what he wrote was meant as an addendum or an appendix and not an independent śāstra in itself in either name or in form. Shahaji or the author of rāga laksana around the same time frame made a clear decision not to repeat older concepts of graha amśa svaras while Tulaja decided to repeat them in the sārāmrta. Even the most recent text, saṅgraha cuḍāmani with all its sastraic, grammatical and organizational flaws too continued in this path by trying to reproduce snippets at random from the Nāṭyaśāstra but somehow managed to add some new notions however flawed or faulty they may be. In that sense atleast, it had a distinct musicological idea – the section on srutis, the nomenclature, and the kramasampurnatva and the documentation of names and construction of prototype compositions in them can said to be the distinct contribution of this text.

With this background, it would be interesting to look at the time closer to our times ie 1900 on wards and what has been added to the theoritical framework in the last 100 odd years.