Somanatha's Ragavibodha

The Ragavibodha is a masterpiece on musicology from the 17th century. It was composed by Somanatha to address the existing contradictions between the ancientsê theory and prevailing performance practices; thus making it an indispensable treatise, to be included in the Kalamulasastra series of the IGNCA.

Somanatha is by far the most important and the most original of all the sixteenth and seventeenth century writers on music as he produced the Ragavibodha, an outstanding treatise on the subject. The Ragavibodha is a distinctive text because it is embellished with a contemporaneous autocommentary by the composer himself, making it easier to comprehend his theory and viewpoint. It also has the authorês music illustrations that reflect the music of the time and serve as a bridge between the music of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and that of the present-day. Moreover in this treatise, the author has invented twenty-three notational symbols and names for the Vadanabhedas that he has culled from the ancientsê legacy of gamakas etc.; thus rendering it as the first work in the textual tradition that has attempted the aural possibility of visible symbols.

Prof. Ranganayaki V. Ayyangar has painsta-kingly edited and translated this text and has supplemented the edition with a very scholarly introductory chapter, in which she has described in great detail the manuscripts, lithograph versions and printed versions of Ragavibodha as well as its contents, metres, etc. She has also critically analysed the compelling reasons that drove

Somanatha to compose this masterpiece. The translation rendered by Prof. Ayyangar is as masterly as the text itself. She has, for the first time, decoded and presented the musical notation of Somanatha, which constitutes Appendix of this volume reproduced here in a CD.

In the present edition of the Ragavibodha of Somanatha, Dr. Ranganayaki Ayyangar has given an authentic text and complemented it with a faithful and lucid English translation. She also has painstakingly illustrated the musical notations of Somangtha by herself, which are reproduced in the appendix.