Sarngadeva and His Sangita- Ratnakara (Proceedings of the Seminar Varanasi, 1994)

The Sangeet Natak Akademi organized a seminar concentrating on the first, sixth T, and seventh chapters of the Naryalästra in Delhi in April 1992 this was the first seminar devoted to a specific district text. The second seminar was centered on Samgadeva's Sangita-ratalkara, the most important text of sangitalastra. This seminar was held in Varanasi in February 1994, although originally it was planned to be held in Devagiri fort, the place where Särngadeva lived and worked. The proceedings of the seminar on Natyalästra are being published separately.

The present volume contains the proceedings of the seminar on Sangita-ratnakara (22-26 February 1994). If one were to name a single author or text of sangitafästra which embodies the earlier tradition (lakana or body of terms and concepts) in remarkable detail, put together judiciously, and at the same time incorporates contemporary developments, which has been constantly referred to in musical and literary texts in the subsequent centuries, which has been profusely commented upon, which has not only been looked upon with awe and reverence but has also occasionally been the target of reproach born of frustration, which wielded great influence over the later textual tradition, one would undoubtedly name Sargadeva and his Sangita-ratakara of the early 13th century.

The above seminar was divided into five sections as follows:

(1) Historicity and Interdisciplinary Approach (3 papers), (2) Indebtedness and Impact (3 papers), Textual Criticism, Commentaries (I paper): (4) Critical Appraisal of the Treatment of Important Concepts and Forms (7 papers). (5) Reconstruction of Instruments/Forms of Music/Dance and Discovery of Links with Oral Tradition (7 papers). The total number of papers presented was 21. The introductory and concluding sections have not been included in the above list.

The third section contained the title "The Scheme of Sangita-ratnakara and the Style and Diction of Särngadeva' which was assigned to Prof. G.H. Tarlekar. He could not attend the seminar but had sent his paper. While editing, it was found that this paper was a running survey of the contents of the text which was not intended in the title. With reference to the scheme of the seminar, it has not been possible to include this paper in this volume. Two more papers were circulated in absentia and these were Prof. Kunjunni Raja's paper on "The Problem of Textual Criticism of Sangita-ratnakara and its Commentaries' and Prof. R. Sathyanarayana's paper on "The Treatment of Prabandha in Sangita-ratnakara vis-a-vis Brhaddesi, Sarasvati Hrdayalankara-hära and Mänasollasa Prof. N. Ramanathan has provided a supplement to the first of these under the title "The Text of Sangita-ratnakara, adding an appendix containing a list of the manuscripts of Sangita ratnakara, prepared by his student, V. Premlatha.

Under 'Concepts and Forms", raga, tāla, prabandha, abhinaya, nrtya-nytta and rasa- only these have been taken up. The topic of raga had been assigned to Dr Mukund Lath who had not sent a paper in advance but spoke extempore in the seminar. A transcript of his talk and the discussion that followed has been included.