Historical Development of Indian Music: A Critical Study c2.6

c2.6

The twenty-two microtones and ten essentials (daśa-lakṣaṇa) are indispensable for the fuller manifestation of the rāgas, and they are full of inner significance and value, in the science of Indian music or musicology. Besides, there are varṇas and alaṁkāras, mūrcchanās, and other musical ingredients. The varṇas are the musical effort or gāna-kriyā. They determine the ascent and the descent of notes of the rāgas that create the sentiments and emotive feelings (rasa and bhāva). The rāgas are so called, because they create enjoyability or rākti-bhāva, which originates from the sentiments that lie hidden in the tones and microtones. The alamkāras are the combind froms of the ascent and the descent of seven notes, and as such they are the varieties of the varṇas or musical efforts. The mūrcchanās evolve with the help of the notes in a cyclic order, and they create different shades or chāyās of the rāgas, having different emotions. The vistāra or elaboration of the notes creates ālāpa that makes the prabandhas or musical compositions and sthāyas or musical phrases of the songs (gītis) prefect and significant with the parts like ākṣiptikā, from which a rāga is thrown out or manifested in all directions, rāgavardhanī that makes the expansion of the rāga, etc. (vide Caturdaṇḍīprakāśikā, VIII. 1-11). The Saṅgīta-Ratnākara is mainly concerned with the ākṣiptikā in connection with ālāpa, and this ākṣiptikā is divided into four parts. The method of ālāpa makes a rāga fully manifest, with its aesthetic beauty and emotional appeal. Besides, there are other essential ingredients that are required to be observed to make the rāgas manifest fully, with their rakti and rasa bhāvas.