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Singing strings

ARUNA CHANDARAJU

The fretless chitraveena is not as mysterious as it is made out to be argues P. Ganesh

It runs in the family. Not just musical talent but an exceptional gift, even genius, for the same. Vocalist and chitraveena artiste P. Ganesh was a child prodigy. Cousins Chitraveena N. Ravikiran is one of the world's finest slide instrumentalists; Shashikiran is a celebrated vocalist. Their uncle is Chitraveena Narasimhan and grandfather, the legendary Gottuvadyam Narayanan Iyengar.

As a vocalist, Ganesh performs duets with Shashikiran. As an instrumentalist, he performs solo and, occasionally, accompanies vocalists, including greats like M. Balamuralikrishna and T. Brinda at a young age. He's also part of Ravikiran's Melharmony, a new compositional style in world music designed by him. The chitraveena has featured at leading music festivals — a strong statement of its global appeal.

Besides Ganesh and Ravikiran, there are a few performers but not too many, and so now the family is grooming younger students. One wonders why such a fine instrument has very few performers and students compared to others. Doesn't it deserve a wider appeal? Yes, agrees Ganesh and traces the reasons — the phenomenon of a lot of people today taking up vocal rather than instrumental music, and lesser awareness about the chitraveena's uniqueness and the beauty of the music it produces.

"It is the one instrument closest to the human voice." The tone and pitch (it reaches 5-and-half, which no instrument playing solo would) are very close to the human voice compared to, say, the violin or veena. "While teaching vocal music, after repeatedly demonstrating a sangathi, if the student is still not catching it, we demonstrate it on the chitraveena. And the student grasps it easily then!"

In fact, Ravikiran too uses the chitraveena in his vocal classes. In their experience, when you combine the two, the learning curve is higher. "And if a student has a voice unfit for vocal music, we recommend he switches over to the chitraveena." The chitraveena "sings" the sahitya rather than the swaras. In fact, in padams and javalis, it is easiest to identify the sahitya here than in other instruments playing the same piece, says Ganesh. And in certain sangathis, you can achieve more clarity than in the violin or flute. "The emoting is higher than that of a veena, I feel." Also, the sympathetic vibrations are more here given its six-twelve-three string arrangement.

He stresses that all instruments have their own beauty and grandeur and that he is merely pointing out technical distinctions and the reasons why the chitraveena has a special appeal for him. There's a widespread misconception that the 21-stringed chitraveena is some kind of exotic, difficult-to-handle instrument and which is probably putting off many prospective students. Nothing could be farther from the truth, points out Ganesh.The fretless nature of chitraveena permits a continuity and fluidity of movement which makes it easier to play. The lack of frets means there are lesser hurdles to the fingers and that many less inhibitors of the sound. "We can play five octaves here, compared to three in the regular veena. A tremendous speed's also possible in the violin.

Also, in one meetu or plucking of the string we can sing an entire line on chitraveena compared to the regular veena."

A chitraveena's also a highly sensitive instrument. An apaswaram is more obvious here than in any other instrument. However, the fretless nature also means the performer has to be more intuitive about swara sthanas, since they aren't clearly demarcated. "In that sense, a chitraveena can be more challenging to a musician's intellect." There are practical issues though. A chitraveena can't be bought off a showroom shelf like a sitar, violin or veena. It has to be made to order. And even after this, getting one that has flawless tonal quality is a matter of luck. "My uncle Narasimhan recently ordered 10 chitraveenas and found all of them faulty. Of course, constant practice does perfect the instrument's naadam."

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