1.4 Why every beginner starts in Mayamalavagowla
Sing or play the Mayamalavagowla scale up and down, and say why this raga rather than another is the beginner's raga.
Every exercise in the next four modules is set in one raga, Mayamalavagowla, and it has been that way since Purandara Dasa in the sixteenth century. The reason is in the shape of the scale: the intervals in its lower half are the same as the intervals in its upper half, so a beginner learns one pattern and gets the second one free. It also contains wide and narrow steps side by side, which trains the ear far faster than an even scale would.
The notation
Written the way this tradition writes it: one symbol to a beat, and the ornaments left to your teacher. Every line is also written out in words for anyone reading by ear.
sa ri one ga three ma one pa da one ni three upper sa.
upper sa ni three da one pa ma one ga three ri one sa.
A scale is not set in a tala, so this line carries no bars. The numerals are written out here because naming the exact swaras is the whole point of an arohana; in the exercises that follow, the raga is stated once and the numerals are left off, which is how the tradition prints them.
Work through these
Learn the scale upward: sa, ri one, ga three, ma one, pa, da one, ni three, upper sa.
These are the specific swaras this raga takes, and the numbers matter because other ragas take different ones. It is the fifteenth of the seventy-two parent scales.
Mayamalavagowla · ReferenceLearn the same scale downward, from the upper sa to the lower.
In this raga the descent uses the same notes as the ascent, which is not true of every raga and is part of why it is taught first. Learning both directions separately is still worth the time.
Compare the four notes from sa to ma with the four from pa to upper sa.
The gaps between the notes are the same in both halves, and hearing that symmetry is the point of the comparison. It is the single biggest reason this raga carries the whole beginner repertoire.
Sing or play the scale slowly against the drone, holding each note until it settles.
The wide step between ri one and ga three is the one beginners flatten, and slowing down is the only way to hear yourself doing it. Fix it here and every later exercise is easier.
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