Lesson-8 : Time Factor in Music-Feel It !

Hi All,

When somebody ask about your language proficiency, we indicate that in terms of Read, Write & Speak.

So here in music also, our proficiency requirement is in terms of Read, write and Play.

But.. I am equally stressing the Fourth parameter, ie Feeling ….

Feeling a language means, the basics, background communicated through such read, write, speak effort…

In case of music, Feeling the music….we are already experiencing that through IR !

All other skills enable and improvise that experience..

That’s one reason why I try to dwell a little longer on these basics and trying to correlate certain IR examples now and then…!

Please don’t feel that these are only certain abstract terms which are not going to help much…rather these will refine our appreciation process and help in fast pick-up later.

These basics hold good in all kind of music whether Carnatic or WCM !

Today, we are extending our understanding and comparisons of words in a language and in a musical form..!

While writing we give some space in between words, to mark the end of the word and also start of next…...While speaking also, there is some undefined gaps between words..!

So also in music we do that…which can only be felt…!

This gap is necessary to communicate properly the musical word, its start and end, its effect etc

and also to take a breath in between if you sing,

or, if you are playing some instrument give some rest and change the finger , hand position in between etc.

(The professional singers can realize what I mean… controlling the breath while singing and take proper rest at right place…without making hissing exhale sound in the mike…!

So also in instrument playing aligning your hand position for proper fingering is more crucial for continuity of playing. Good composers take care of all these while writing music…!.)

Next un-conscious thing we are doing is giving stress to certain letters in the words (as is taught learnt to speak) .

Usually words are divided on such stresses as single (mono) syllable word (at, cut etc) , 2-syllables (Tren-dy, Win-dow etc..) , 3 syllables (beau-ti-ful, en-trench-ment etc.) and so on..

Usually such stress while speaking will be on the first part, sometimes on second part like that..

Now take the example…. “Me-gam…Kot-tat-tum….Aaat-tum Un-du…..” You can feel the stressing given in the beginning of each of these word…musically also…!

Usually, each of these syllable are assigned some kind of note ( C, D, E etc.,….as per the tune…) and while playing or singing, such stresses are automatically fall in line with the strong beat of the rhythm of the song…!

Another song.. “ Van-Dhaal… Van-Dhaal…. Raa-ja-Ku Ma-ri….” See the pattern of breaking into notes and the stress shifting while singing….!

Also the gap in between word taking a fraction of some time …

If I say 1-2-3, 1-2-3 to match first two words above…1& 2 denotes Van-dhal and 3 is a gap or silence, which I want you to notice !

Another anology, In Tamil, while grammar of poetry writing is taught we are told something like, equating the words & its sound to two basic components “Ner “ & “Ni-rai” !

So word is broken into Ner or Nirai or combinations of Ner-Nirai forming the words like “The-ma, Puli-Ma, The-Maang-Kaai, Puli-Maang-Kaai, Karu-Vilang-Kani etc etc….. !

If Ner = one value, and Ni-rai = 2 equal half values and so on…

You can assign musical notes of such value for each syllable..any words !

Are you realizing now, for the genius like IR who knows these fundas, lyrics to music or music to lyrics anything is possible…!

If somebody finds fault with IR on such issues, its only their ignorance !

Generally, Time element of the syllable determine the breaking up of musical word and vice versa.

Again…. no hard and fast rules !

See how IR prolongs the word “Aaaaathu…. Meeeeeettula…..” song of Gramathu Adhyayam requiring so many notes to one syllable also….!

Dissecting the notes and assigning the proper time value is a great skill !

In the above paras of today, what I tried is, to make you think of the various factors that may govern the …"The Time Association of Musical Notes…”

Through that we shall be able to understand the time duration of each notes, the gap or silences between them , time when the stressing of note occur, etc…etc.