Music of the subconscious mind

Have you ever been woken up from the deep slumber of the wee hours and asked to sing in concert for three hours?

It happened to me on January the 8th, at 5pm, in Palo Alto, California.

I returned to California from India after a 12 week trip and got severely jet lagged. I have almost always gotten jet lagged travelling against the spin of the earth, but never in the reverse direction. One of life's little mysteries ...

So, here I was, waking up in the middle of the night, very awake, and falling asleep at noon. 5pm would, in this shifted sleep cycle, correspond to 3 or 4am.

I landed on the night of the 4th and had a concert in Palo Alto on the 8th evening.

As I said, this was the first time in my life, that I experienced what it was to wake up from Slow-Wave sleep (the deepest stage) and sing in concert for 3 hours!

I thought this would be an discordant, disoriented, dizzy disaster! What happened instead was akin to pinning a microphone directly to my subconscious mind. I performed things in the concert that I had never consciously known or thought. It was, in hindsight, like being hypnotized on stage!

Now, keep in mind that in most concerts with an energetic audience, I usually channel tremendous amounts of energy from them and amplify it musically. But this time, it was not only effortless, it was untainted by the barriers erected by conscious thought.

The conscious mind creates filters based on fear -- of failure,  being misinterpreted, crossing some musical line, of being misperceived.

Music of the subconscious mind is beautiful, pure, personal and unpretentious because the ego is divorced.  I wonder how I can make this divorce permanent!

Tu Ek PahuNaa Ya Gharacha - Marathi Poem by Chandrika Ranade

This sobering poem by Chandrika Ranade reminds us all, that we are born with nothing, and shall die with nothing. All wealth, power, beauty, hubris is ephemeral.

तू एक पाहुणा या घरचा, मुक्काम घडीभर भूवरचा || ध्रु || 

आतिथ्य घेउनी झालासी, तू कृतघ्न घरच्या स्वामीसी ||
तुझ विसर कसा पडला त्याचा? || १ || तू एक पाहुणा ... 

या घरी रडत तू आलास, असहाय पांगळा होतास ||
उपकार आठवी स्वामीचा || २ || तू एक पाहुणा ... 

अभिमान रूप गुण शक्तीचा, अभिमान तुला धन दौलतिचा ||
जरी राजा असशिल दुनियेचा || ३ || तू एक पाहुणा ... 

या जन्मी करशिल सुकृत जे, तेव्हढेच रे येइल संगे ||
हा न्याय असे देवाघरचा || ४ || तू एक पाहुणा ... 

अंतरास आपुल्या तू शोध, हा साधू संतांचा बोध ||
चंद्रिकेस वाटे मोलाचा || ५ || तू एक पाहुणा ...

Saamb Kasa Zala Pisa - Marathi Poem by Chandrika Ranade

This is a poem by Chandrika Ranade depicting a story where Shankar (Lord Shiva, also known as Saamb) is meditating in the forest. Parvati dresses up as a tribal woman and enchants him with her stunning beauty. Shankar, distracted, looks up and is instantly attracted towards her. He asks her what her name is and who her husband is. Deciphering her veiled answer, he realizes that the tribal woman is indeed his own wife, Parvati (Ambika)!

संब कसा झाला पिसा? सांग भिल्लिणी! ||
शंकरास तुझा ध्यास लागला मनी ||
नयनशरा मरून हरा घालिसी मोहिनी ||
राम नाम, राम ध्यान विसरला झणी ||
तुझ्या मागे धावू लागे, भान हरपुनी || ध्रु || 

मदनारी धरून करी विनवी तिझवनी ||
सांग म्हणे नाव तुझे, कोण तव धनी?
माझा धनि रागिट त्यानी मदन जाळिला ||
रणांगणी युद्ध करुनी त्रिपुर मारिला ||
ओळखली शंभूनी सती अंबिका ||
शिवशक्ति संवादे गुंफे चंद्रिका || १ ||

Saad Pavasachi Aali - Marathi poem by Shanta Shelke

A love affair between the sky and the earth.

साद पावसाची आली, शहारली माती ||
भुई सवे आभाळाची, जुळे आज प्रीती || ध्रु ||

उठावले घन घन घोर, नील कंठ झाले मोर ||
पिसार्यात लाखो डोळे, गगन न्याहाळीती || १ || 

निळामधे हीरक जडती, तसे शुभ्र बगळे उडती ||
कोसळती धारा धारा, दिशा धुंद होती || २ ||

चिंब चिंब जांभुळ रानी, मेघ मंद्र घुमती गाणी ||
मुके भाव हृदया मधले, शब्द रूप होती || ३ ||

तृप्त शांत झाली धरणी, मधुस्म्रिते हिरव्या कुरणी ||
पुसट चुंबना सम ओल्या सरी येती जाती || ४ ||

गगन धरा झाली एक, मुक्त प्रीतिचा अभिषेक ||
एक निळ्या आनंदाची धुंद ये प्रतीती || ५ ||

Mp3, (9 Minutes, 8.3 MB)

A poem by Shanta Shelke describing a love story between the earth and the sky.

Genre: Light Indian Classical

Vocals, Composition: Sandeep Ranade

Lyrics: Shanta Shelke

Tabla: Ramdas Palsule

Harmonium: Chinmay Kolhatkar

Recording Engineer: Nitin Joshi

Recorded: January 2008 

Grace is where the ego isn't

Grace transcends form and time.
It is the one factor that separates the amateur from the expert, the student from the guru.
Grace comes not with practice, but from transcending the ego.

Miyaan-ki-Todi, Addha Teentaal (November 2010)

Composition

कैसे सपने देखे निरं_१तर ||

नींद खुली तो आगे था_१ डर ||

मन कंकड़ का करदे प_१र्वत ||

छोटी सी बात, अतही डरा_१वत || ध्रु ||

मन चंचल ये शोर मचा_१वत ||

ध्यान कर 'नादरंग' समझा_१वत ||

जिस दिन का था इतना _१डर ||

भय पिघले दिन आने_१ पर || १ ||

Explanation

Dear God! The Nightmares ... The Fear!

The mind makes a mountain of a mole hill.

The smallest thought can be mighty scary!

The worried mind becomes agitated and adds to the tension. 

But upon meditation, 'Naadrang' calms his mind down.

And once serene, all fear dissolves!

Mood and Notes (Part 2)

Prior Reading

1. The Holy Grail of Music
2. Swars and emotional response
3. Musical nuances and emotional response
4. Moods and Notes (Part 1)

Question

Why is it that certain notes create an unstable mood while others create a stable mood?

Answer

Before we go any deeper, let us state some observations. One note is always stable if it is sustained without change of frequency. Also, any note is stable, if there are no other notes in the background. For this discussion, let us assume that there is a continuous base note in the background. All notes will be relative to this base note.

• A note that matches in frequency with another note (usually played/sung with a different timbre) also creates stability. As an example, a singer singing Sa, that is in perfect tune with that of a Tanpura (drone) creates stability in the listener.
• A note that's not correctly sung or played (out-of-tune or besur) generates instability, sometimes even to the point of pain!
• Certain notes appear to be harmonious with a given note. Examples include Sa:Pa, Sa:Ma, Sa:Ga, etc.
• Certain notes appear to be discordant with a given note. Examples include Teevra Ma:Sa, Komal Re:Sa, Shuddha Ni:Sa, Komal Dha:Sa, etc.

Relationship between two notes

One note in isolation is not interesting. When two notes are taken together, one acting as a background base note, the other acting as the foreground, lead note, then we have music. Someone said "Anyone can draw one dot on a canvas. To draw the second dot, you need to be an artist".

Let us analyse the relationships between two notes in an octave. One of the fundamental relationship is the ratio of frequencies.

Ratios

• The same note played together is the best match. Ratio of 1:1!
• Certain notes appear to be the "same note, just higher or lower". The frequency of the higher "same note" is 2:1 and that of the lower "same note" is 0.5:1. These notes have the highest stability relative to each other -- indeed, they seem to be the same note!
• The midpoint of an octave appears to have the next best stability. This note is at a ratio of 3:2 and is called Pa.
• If we shift Pa to the lower Sa, then the Upper Sa is shifted to a frequency of 4*Sa / 3. This Swar, with a ratio of 4:3 to Sa, is called Ma. 
• Notes that have simpler ratios with a given base note's frequency are also perceived as creating a stable effect. Ga:Sa (5:4) and Komal Ga:Sa (6:5)
• A note that has complex ratios with a given base note's frequency are perceived as creating instability. Examples include Komal Re:Sa (256:243), Teevra Ma:Sa (45:32), Komal Dha:Sa(128:81), Shuddha Ni:Sa (243:128).
• Some notes are neither simple, nor complex in ratio: Shudha Re:Sa (9:8), Komal Ni:Sa (16:9), Shuddha Dha:Sa (27:16)
• The smaller the amount of deviation in a note from a given frequency, the higher the amount of instability. Thus a slightly besur note will be far more unstable than a blatantly besur note.

Case Study: Maarwa vs. Pooriya.

From Mood and Notes (Part 1), we have:

• Stability(Komal Re + Shuddha Dha) < Stability(Shuddha Ga + Shuddha Ni + Sa)

If we look at the ratios of these swars, we can rewrite this inequality as follows:

• Stability (256/243) + Stability(27/16) < Stability(5/4) + Stability(243/128) + Stability(1/1 or 2/1)

We can "cancel" Komal Re and Shuddha Ni from this equation -- they seem to contribute in seemingly equal amounts to the instability based on their complex ratios.

• Stability(27/16) < Stability(5/4) + Stability(1/1 or 2/1)

From this, it's clear that Maarwa has no stabilizing components, but Pooriya has 2 (Shuddha Ga and Sa). However, both have unstable components in excess of stabilizing components, and hence the average effect created will be unstable. Maarwa creates a pure melancholic effect while Pooriya feels more like longing.

First Insight

Simpler ratios create stability, complex ratios create instability.

Second Insight

The more complex the ratio, the more unstable it becomes -- besur or out-of-tune notes have very complex ratios.