Its not just about carnatic
I was watching some shows on TV where people participate for music competitions….I was suddenly struck by a thought….if you are a carnatic expert, if your basics are strong…can you go on to these competitions….????
Its a yes and a no….
Atleast thats what is my opinion….I’ll tell you why…
be it a hindi channel or a south indian language channel ( I have checked tamil, malayalam and kannada channels)….I see one thing…singing a movie song is a little different from carnatic….
yes…the songs are based on raagams, yes ….the basis is carnatic…
but what you can strongly note is that, if a movie song is not sung with a flow…if it is sung like a carnatic song where you express every note strongly…then it does not sound good…
this does not mean you can sing off note in a movie song…but…in a movie song the expression of the note must be correct but subtle..
The same applies to western music…..if you have to sing an english song, it demands that you keep the right notes but not stress on them like you would do in carnatic music…
So….knowing carnatic music helps tyo a great extent
you know what they mean when they say you missed the sruthi …..it meant that you were not keeping up your pitch….singing in the right pitch matching up to the intruments is very important. If you pick up the wrong pitch the song will slowly start sounding out of tune. The pitch also needs to be maintained for every single note.
All this comes with the knowledge of carnatic music (of course if you have learnt your carnatic music in sucha way….)
bringing in the flow of voice….singing the right notes without stressing on them…..being able to sing in a variety of pitches (especially very high pitches)…..bringing in voice modulations…bringing in the expression of the song (like singing a comic song in a particular way and singing an emotional song in a totally different manner)….
All these come with practise.
So I have decided to not only practise carnatic songs…but also try singing the movie songs exactly how they have been sung…catching the nuances…this is like an application of my knowledge.
I have learnt the basics in my carnatic music…now I am going to see how much I can apply what I have learnt, into singing in general.
