Something About Scales and Ragas (Part 1)

Why does one song sound different from another? You may say, "It's a different tune! Obviously, it sounds different." This tune is the song's Raga and this post will discuss the classification of ragas, types of ragas and talk about some examples.

This is a slightly long post with detailed technical explanations of what a Raga is,  its classification and finally some examples to help you understand all the information you would've gathered till that point. Keep reading, and do bear with the length of the post!

So, what is Raga?

Every song you hear creates a mood, a setting that helps you feel varied emotions- happiness, anger, melancholy, excitement etc. These moods are characteristic of the Raga or tune the composer sets the song to. The purpose of a Raga, thus, is to lead you to experience a feeling or emotion in entirety.

The term 'Raga' means scale. It is essentially a set of notes that define a pattern or a tune. A composer sets her song to a tune that follows this scale-- the notes used to play the song are a combination of this defined scale. You may have heard of scales like "C major" or "A minor". In these, a set of notes progress from a lower frequency to a higher frequency. Similarly in a raga, the notes ascend in frequency in one progression, but they also descend in frequency in the next progression. The ascending progression is known as Arohan and the descending progression is known as Avarohan.

Let me elucidate this:
Consider the Raga Mayamalavagowla. I've chosen this as an example as all initial lessons in Carnatic music are based in this Raga. Mayamalavagowla contains 7 notes: Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Dha Ni.
The arohan progression is- Sa Ri Ga Ma Pa Dha Ni Sa
The avarohan progression is- Sa Ni Dha Pa Ma Ga Ri Sa
What makes this different from other ragas that contain 7 notes is the difference in Re, Ga, Ma, Dha and Ni. You see, there is only 1 variation of Sa and Pa but 2 or 3 variations of the other notes. We'll talk more about this later. [In this case, Mayamalavagowla has Ri(1), Ga(3), Ma(1), Dha(1) and Ni(3)]

How are Ragas classified?

I. Primitive classification: Parent and Derived Ragas
There are 72 parent ragas and many derived or children ragas.
The parent ragas are called Melakarta and the derived ragas are called Janyam.

Melakarta
These are ragas that have all 7 swaras/notes in both their arohan and avarohan progression. Yes, Mayamalavgowla is a melakarta as it has every one of the 7 swaras in arohan and avarohan.
If every 72 melakarta raga has all 7 notes, what's the difference between each of them and how are there 72 of these ragas? This is all interesting math- permutation and combination.
As you read above, there are 2 variations of Ma and 3 variations of Re, Ga, Dha and Ni. The technical terms for these swaras are Rishabam, Gandharam, Dhaivatam and Nishadam.

Types of Rishabam (Re)

1. Shudha Rishabam or Re1
2. Chatushruti Rishabam or Re2
3. Shatshruti Rishabam or Re3

Types of Gandharam (Ga)

1. Shudha Gandharam or Ga1
2. Sadharana Gandharam or Ga2
3. Anthara Gandharam or Ga3

Types of Madhyamam (Ma)

1. Shudha Madhyamam or Ma1
2. Prati Madhyamam or Ma2

Types of Dhaivatam (Dha)

1. Shudha Dhaivatamor Dha1
2. Chatushruti Dhaivatamor Dha2
3. Shatshruti Dhaivatamor Dha3

Types of Nishadam (Ni)

1. Shudha Nishadam or Ni1
2. Kakali Nishadam or Ni2
3. Kaishiki Nishadam or Ni3

Quick note: Something important to keep in mind is that some of these notes overlap. Re 2 is the same as Ga 1 and Re 3 is the same as Ga 2. Similarly, Dha 2 = Ni 1 and Dha 3 = Ni 2

Progression of notes-


Sa
Re 1
Re 2 = Ga 1
Re 3 = Ga 2
Ga 3
Ma 1
Ma 2
Pa
Dha 1 
Dha 2 = Ni 1
Dha 3 =  Ni 2
Ni 3
Sa (next octave)

* Colour code: 
Notes with 1 variation
Notes with 2 variations
Notes with 3 variations

* The indicated pattern is similar to the arrangement of frets on the Veena. Since some notes like Re 2 and Dha 3 overlap with Ga 1 and Ni 2 respectively, we use the same frets to play these notes. To make it more clear, we have 2 frets between Re 1 and Ga 3 used for Re 2/Ga 1 and Re 3/Ga 2. Similarly, we have 2 frets between Dha 1 and Ni 3 used to play Dha 2/Ni 1 and Dha 3/Ni 2.

Classification of Melakarta
To classify anything, we try to find the variation with the least number of differing points and classify the entity according to this difference. Let's identify the least number of variations in swaras in the progression.

There is one type of Sa and Pa- these cannot be used to make categories.

There are 3 types of Re, Ga, Dha and Ni. This is good as we can get at least 3 distinct groups of Melakartas but this method poses a problem as there are 4 swaras that have 3 variations and categorizing them this way can become complicated.

This is why we choose the swara Ma to classify ragas as there are only 2 types of Madhyam and this is the only swara with two variations. The 2 types of Ma as identified above are Shudha Madhyamam and Prati Madhyamam.

The 72 melakarta ragas are thus divided in two categories of 36 each as Shudha Madhyama Ragas and Prati Madhyama Ragas.

These are further classified based on the variations in Re, Ga, Dha and Ni. We won't get into detail about this here. The Shudha Madhyama and Prati Madhyama ragas mirror each other 1 through 36, with the only difference being Ma- 1 and 37, 2 and 38, 3 and 39...  have the same Re, Ga, Dha and Ni.

Janyam
Every derived ragam has only one parent- no ragam is a combination of 2 or more Melakarta ragas. You might've already understood why this is- Since the Melakarta ragas vary so subtly from one another, a change in one swaram would result in a different raga. So, combining 2 Melakarta ragas, essentially, produces another Melakarta.

Janya ragas, unlike their parent Melakartas, needn't have 7 swaras in the arohan or avarohan progression. In fact, they sometimes don't even go in a strictly ascending or descending pattern in arohan and avarohan respectively- the swaras can go up and down. We'll talk about all this in this section.

There are 4 possibilities a Janya raga can have in an arohan or avarohan scale, making it 16 variations in total. This classification is based on the number of swaras in each progression.

5 swarams- Audava Raga
6 swarams- Shadava Raga
7 swarams- Sampurna Raga
Zig-zag progression- Vakra Raga
Ragas without Ma
Ragas without Pa

A raga can be a combination of two of these types. For instance, an Audava-Shadava ragam has 5 swarams in arohan and 6 in avarohan. A Shadava-Sampurna ragam has 6 swarams in arohanam and 7 in avarohanam.


II. Classification based on mood of raga
So far we've discussed the technical classification of ragas and their structural composition. Let's now delve into some detail about the emotional (and less technical) aspect of this. Understanding the setting a raga can create is fundamental to composing music, selecting songs for a concert and even interpreting the meaning of songs. It is difficult to categorize ragas this way as there is no set formula that can dictate what emotion a set of notes can produce, although this is an area I'd like to venture into and understand further.

I'll discuss some classifications and then provide examples in the next section.

Time of Day 
Some ragas are particularly suited for certain hours during a day and this has led them to be loosely labelled as-

1. Morning ragas
2. Afternoon ragas
3. Evening ragas
4. Night ragas

In general, morning ragas bring joy, excitement and happiness. I like to think that more thoughtful and somber ragas are associated with the evening and night. Afternoon ragas strike me as a bridge between these two states. As time passes in a day, a raga gets more meditative.

What ragas do you like to listen to at any time of the day? Leave a comment!

Seasons

Ragas are sometimes associated with seasons as they may remind us of the blowing breeze, falling rain, glowing sun and the like. This kind of classification, again, is not rigid and largely relies on the perception of an individual. 

If you find a raga particularly suited to a season, be sure to comment below!

Give me examples of Ragas!

72 Parent Ragas or Melakartas

The first of this list is Kanakangi (No. 1) and last is Rasigapriya (No. 72)

Kanakangi: Sa Re1 Ga1 Ma1 Pa Dha1 Ni1 

Rasigapriya: Sa Re3 Ga3 Ma2 Pa Dha3 Ni3

It will be useful to look at some of the intermediate numbers like Chalanatai (No. 36) and Salagam (No. 37) to better understand the transition of notes. 

Chalanatai: Sa Re3 Ga3 Ma1 Pa Dha3 Ni3

Salagam: Sa Re1 Ga1 Ma2 Pa Dha1 Ni1 

Is there anything you notice in these 4 ragas? That's right, Kanakangi and Salagam are mirrors, just as Rasigapriya and Chalanatai are. These pairs of ragas differ only in their Ma, while every other note is the same.

Derived or Janya Ragas

I'll list some derived ragas of Melakartas that correspond to the categories we discussed above-

5-note Ragas or Audava Raga-
Mohanam-
Arohan- Sa Re2 Ga3 Pa Dha2 Sa
Avarohan- Sa Dha2 Pa Ga3 Re2 Sa
Mohanam doesn't contain Ma, but it is derived from the Raga Harikambodhi (No. 28)

5-7 note Raga or Audava-Sampurna Raga-
Bilahari-
Arohan- Sa Re2 Ga3 Pa Dha2 Sa
Avarohan- Sa Ni3 Dha Pa Ma1 Ga3 Re2 Sa
Derived from- Shankarabaranam (No. 29)

Raga without Pa/Audava Raga-
Hindolam-
Arohan- Sa Ga2 Ma1 Dha1 Ni2 Sa
Avarohan- Sa Ni2 Dha1 Ma1 Ga2 Sa
Derived from- Natabhairavi (No. 20)

Time Of Day/Seasonal Ragas
Since this is a whole section of its own and I haven't detailed it as much, I would like to direct you to a nice link I found that has a number of ragas classified in this manner.

http://www.medieval.org/music/world/cds/nim5536.html

There's a lot more to talk about on this topic that I'll cover in Part 2 of Something About Tunes and Ragas. Thank you so much for reading, leave a comment with your favorite Raga or tune and stay tuned for more!