Devotional music
PREMA NANDAKUMAR
SPIRITUAL HERITAGE OF ANNAMACHARYA — Vol. II: M. Narasimhachary, M. S. Ramesh; Tirupati Tirumala Devasthanams, Tirupati-517507. Rs. 35.
The world of Bhakti in general and Vaishnavism in particular owes a great deal to Tallapakam Annamacharya who channelled the aspirations of the common man through musical compositions to irrigate the spaces of the Vedic religion.
While philosophical discourse has been the base-plank of Indian religious traditions, they became popular because of our temple culture, which in its turn included art, architecture, poetry, music and drama. Everything man knew about was looked upon as an offering to the Supreme. With Tallapakam Annamacharya, the Supreme was Lord Venkateswara.
Self-surrender
When an evolved soul like Annamayya sang ecstatically, the songs necessarily carried the nectarean message of spiritual living. Half a century ago, C. Ramanujachari published the immensely popular and deeply significant volume, The Spiritual Heritage of Tyagaraja. It was a gem of a title perfectly tuned to the argument; and so it is with Spiritual Heritage of Annamacharya. Erudite scholars both, Narasimhachary and Ramesh have already published the first volume of this project. The present work comes with a crystalline introductory chapter on the concept of self-surrender explaining its verbalisation as the Ashtakshara, Dvaya and Charamasloka.
Further, the authors also draw our attention to the five Charamaslokas accepted as the conclusive message of guardianship uttered by the Supreme in various contexts as Varaha, Rama, Sita, Narasimha and Krishna.
Prapatti Yoga “is quick, universal (and) does not have the danger of any possible omissions and lapses. It is result-oriented.” It cannot fail for the Mother is our ambassadress to the Lord. Her abundant love will brush aside “the magnitude of our accumulated earlier sins.” This concept is integral to Annamacharya’s compositions. Backed by soul-elevating musical modes, his songs created a whole world of devotional music in Andhra Pradesh including the folk genre of “Tirunamamulu”.
Features
One hundred and twenty-one songs from Annamayya’s spiritual outpourings are presented in this volume in transliterated text with English meaning and a running commentary which is a scholar’s delight.
In trying to understand “Patta vasumugaani”, we get to know about Krishna’s ascension in Mausala Parva and its close association with the icon of Lord Venkateswara; “Itara Dharmamu” teaches us that we should perform service for the sake of the Divine; and the authors come up with the contemporaneity of Annamayya when explaining “Naatiki nade nachadhuvu” as “a very pithy, accurate description of the absence of any value-based education in the present-day of the so called “rationalists’ (atheists) misconception of a materialistic content in education.”
Fortunately, as Spiritual Heritage of Annamacharya proves it, we have been able to discover Annamayya’s songs which will provide the needed glow and all will yet be well.
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