Benefits of Moorchana - Part 1

- Pt. Vijay Bakshi

Let us talk about a couple of benefits of Moorchana.

1) Mastery over Swars:
Let us assume for a moment that one is used to practising in Kaali-1(C#). If the person is asked to try in Kaali-2(D#) it is going to be difficult. Since (s)he is so used to Kaali-1, hitting the right swars with base of Kaali-2 may not come naturally. It is a common difficulty as the swars in one's natural base are so fixed in the mind that when the base and hence Saptak(octave) is shifted the swars from the original sale may still influence the new ones. The result is the possibility of being out of tune.

Hence, during riyaaz(practice) make an effort to use Moorchana's to achieve more flexibility and vocal range. Continuing the above example and assuming that your base is at Kaali-1, set the Tanpura(drone) to it and sing your seven shuddha swars. Then set the tanpura to komal-Rishabh as per your saptak, and sing the seven shuddha swars. And so on, keep shifting the tanpura up by one swars, in your saptak, and singing the corresponding shuddha swars.

Now try the above experiment, but do not shift the tanpura and set it at your natural scale, in this example Kaali-1. Try singing the moorchana's of the seven shuddha swars. The table below lists these moorchana's.

Table 2.1 Moorchana of Shuddha Swars

2) Simplifying complexity:
Let us assume that during riyaaz you are practising Raag Lalat, also referred to as Raag Lalit. This raag has both Madhyam's (Ma-MA) in sequence. At times, some people find it difficult to sing both the swars in rapid succession. Especially, if you are going to use the "Ni-re-Ga" alankaar of this raag, it happens something like this:

Ni re Ga , re Ga Ma , Ga Ma MA , Ma MA dha , MA dha Ni , dha Ni Sa ,

Sa Ni Dha , Ni Dha MA , Dha MA Ma , MA Ma Ga , Ma Ga re , Ga re Sa

Likewise, consider the following swar group:

Ga Ma MA Ma , re Ga re Ga Ma  Ga Ma MA Ma , Ma MA dha MA Ma , 

re Ga Ma MA dha  MA dha MA Ma Ga ...

The moorchana of shuddha-madhyam (Ma), will make is easier to master the Ma-MA combine. The table below displays the moorchana.

Table.2.2 Moorchana of swar Shuddha Ma in Raag Lalat

Now let us examine the effect of this on the same swar group above:

Ni Sa re Sa , dha Ni dha Ni Sa Ni Sa re Sa , Sa re Ga re Sa , 

dha Ni Sa re Ga re Ga re Sa Ni ...

The positions of the swars can be fixed by replacing "Ga-Ma-MA-Ma" with "Ni-Sa-re-Sa". later try this at Drut-laya(Fast Tempo).   

Audio 2.1 Narration and Vocals: Pt. Vijay Bakshi

Similarly, a lot of complex swar groups or combinations can be simplified.

Understanding Moorchana

The concepts of Graam and Moorchana are explained in ancient texts. In those days there were three graams - Shadja Graam, Mandhyam Graam, and Gaandhaar Graam. Each graam contained seven swars(notes). The swars were derived from the shruti's. The rule of thumb was that any sequence of seven swars is moorchana. If Sa(Shadja) is considered to be the first swar in Shadja graam, then Sa - Re - Ga - Ma - Pa - Dha - Ni, is the moorchana of the swar Sa. Now if instead of Sa, the first swar is Ni; then Ni - Sa - Re - Ga - Ma - Pa - Dha, is the moorchana of Ni in Shadja graam. In the same way, if each of the other swars are considered the starting point of a graam, then there can be seven moorchana's of the seven shuddha(sharp) swars. Similarly there were seven moorchana's in the Madhyam graam.

During the time of Bharata, in addition to the shuddha swars there were two vikrut(deviant) swars: Antar-Gandhaar, Kaakali-Nishaad. Including these two swars in each of the graams gives us fourteen moorchana's per graam.

Table 1.1 Moorchana's of the Graam's

This was the methods of creating Raag's. In those days, describing a Raag did not involve enumerating the shuddha, komal(flat) swars in it. Rather a Raag was described as "This Raag contains... this moorchana". 

The Gaandhaar graam was lost to the tides of time, and there is very little information available about it. And so is the concept of graam to the modern times. Nowadays a Raag is described by it's constituent shuddha, komal and teevra swars. But it is still fascinating to note that our ancestors had a deep knowledge of moorchana.

A general definition of moorchana can be: To derive a group of swars from within a selection by considering any swar as the Shadja (Sa).

Let us take an example. Raag Bhoop consists of five swars: Sa, Re, Ga, Pa, Dha. Now if we consider each of the fours swars(Re, Ga, Pa, Dha) as Sa - some interesting things happen.The new swar group derived from changing Sa, resembles the swars in some other Raag. But it will be inappropriate to term that new swar group as a new Raag. The reason is that every Raag follows some very strict guidelines eg. aaroha-avroha (ascent-descent), chalan (Raag signature), vaadi-samvaadi (two main swars of the Raag), etc. The video below explains this concept in detail.

Another thing to keep in mind is that moorchana of a swar will not always provide a swar group resembling some other existing Raag. By applying concept of moorchana to exploring -  new Raag's can be created.

Another example similar to the above, is of Raag Hindol. It comprises of the swars Sa,Ga,MA(Teevra Madhyam), Dha, Ni. By moving the Sa around, swar groups resembling Raag Shobhavari, Raag Shivaranjani, Raag Bairagi can be derived.

Table 1.2 Moorchana of Raag Hindol

To reinforce the the above point, lets us take an example. The audio clip below is of a old popular Marathi song "Radha Krishnavari Bhalalee" - and the use of moorchana in it.

Audio 1: Narration and Additional Vocals: Pt. Vijay Bakshi, Vocals: Shruti Vaze

If Sa is shifted to the last syllable of the the word "Bhalalee", it produces the effect similar to Raag Hindol. Again, if Sa is shifted to the second syllable of "Radha" - an effect similar to Raag Shivaranjani is produced. Both are demonstrated in the above audio clip.