Early rock music – Music
from Stones
Strange, the uninitiated would think, reading the title, for
it is neither about rock music as we know it today, nor about the rolling
stones, but about music from stones, a field called Lithophony, and its early
applications in South India, characterized by the many musical pillars, staircases,
idols and stone blowing instruments found in certain temples. While there are a
number of articles about these music pillars on the web, they follow pretty
much the same template, and some of them have incorrect information as well. Almost
all these articles are about the pillars at Hampi’s Vittala temple,
mentioning them as singular and unique, but seem unaware that there are many
more in Tamil Nadu and Andhra. So, I thought I would put on my research cap and
work a bit on it. Let’s go.
In our Tharavad house in Palghat, at the entrance, just as
you climb up the steps, under the low awning overhead, is a knurled roller, which
you can spin. As a kid I was mystified about its purpose, for all you could do
was spin it either way, and it was just a carved wooden disc that spun over
the wooden screw. My uncle explained to me that these were the master
carpenter’s signature items. Some were incredibly complex, some simpler. Similarly,
the musical pillars in these temples were not built by aliens, or by using rock
melting technology, but were carefully chiseled and tuned lithophonic stones.
But we will get to all that in due course, read on…
A lithophone is a musical instrument consisting of a rock or
pieces of rock which are struck to produce musical notes. Such resonating
stones can be found in many parts of the world and many rudimentary lithophones
bear witness to the fact that ancient people found and created musical
instruments out of them. In fact, some months ago, we visited the Luray
caverns near Washington DC and saw the largest stone organ (recently created),
the ‘stalacpipe’ as it is called, which creates plays a lovely sonata when the limestone
columns are tapped, click the link for details. Even though there are other Lithophonic rock locations
in the US and other parts of the world, we are going the review the ancient
ones in South India. Though I have not been to the Hampi ruins, I do recall the
musical pillars at Padmanabha Swamy temple in Trivandrum and the ones at
Madurai Meenakshi temple. They did make some sounds when tapped but did not
seem astounding, in any way, so I had not taken notice.
Aravamuthan’s article, ‘Pianos in stone’, circa 1943, is an article
in poetic English replete with uncommon vocabulary, something our man Shashi
Tharoor, would nod at. On many instances, I had to stop and smile, seeing his
choice for words! The first aspect that a reader should take note of is that these
clustered musical pillars are structured in a particular fashion with a main
thick load-bearing shaft in the middle and surrounded by a number of slender
pillars (as many as 48), exhibiting a lithophonic character. Though cloistered
columns can be found in European churches separating aisles, dating to the 10th
century, they were used only for ornamental purposes, and not with any musical
intent.
Each of the stone pillars produces a different note and the
range could extend over an entire octave. Aravamuthan has no doubt that Hampi
musical columns were played by skilled musicians to produce dance
accompaniments to tuneful psalms, while the dancers moved from one end to the
other. He despairs that not many are even aware of the splendid musical pillars
at the Nellaiappar Manimandapam which are 8’ tall and 5’ square. That these
were chiseled out of a single block of granite, is also stated by him, and tuned
to specific notes. They are not all necessarily square in cross-section and
are shaped differently as square, rectangular, circular, oval, octagonal,
spiral, etc., depending on the note desired, but all cut to true lines. Since
many of them are crowded together, no single instrument can play these to
create music as such, and he feels that for this reason, these complex
structures were condemned to futility, and were just curiosities.
He believes that these were thus played in unison, creating
a chorus of sound. He adds that in the nearby Alwar Tirunagarai temple, special
structures have been added to make some subtle changes to the music from the
columns, making the structure even more complex, exemplifying his conclusion
thus - The architect must have designed this pier in the architectural
elucidation of some of the cardinal principles on which musical instruments are
constructed. For hours one could stand playing on these columns, parent and
offspring and brothers, all sprung of the same stock, and listening to the
variety and the range of the whimsicality of the separate and the mingled
notes. A gentle tap at the offspring makes it wake up with a tremulous note
and, at the same time, sets the parent responding with a lullaby: a light tap
at the parent makes it tuneful and makes the offspring hum.
Though he mentions - These pianos, with strings, resonators
and frets that are fashioned out of a material which weather cannot warp and
time… many of these pillars have lost some of their tonal qualities, as
testified by musicologists who checked them out.
The musical pipe scooped out of a granite stone pillar found
at the temple at Shanbagaramanallur in Tirunelveli is also an architectural
marvel, as it gives the tone of the Ekkalam (cymbal) when blown from one end
and the tone of the conch when blown from the other end. A miniature nagaswaram
made of stone is said to be still in use in the temple at Alwartirunagari. In
some temples, there are figures whose limbs give out musical notes. A musical
statuette of Lord Ganesa has been found in Tanjore, and the sculptures of Rati
and Manmadhan in the Vishnu temple at Shanbagaramanallur (and also at Tenkasi)
are of resonant stone which produces different notes when struck. The stone
steps in the temple at Darasuram creates notes of varying pitches. There is a
stone Nadaswaram at the Kumbhakonam Kumbeswararswami temple as well. The
Srinivasa Perumal temple in Chamarajapet, Bangalore also contains musical stone
pillars but since they are not of sufficient height, the notes given by them
are not quite bright.
The Manimandapam at Tirunelveli’s Nellaiappar temple is of
particular interest, as it has pillars each with fifty pillarets! At the
Western end of the Alankara Mantapam in the Northern Sribalipura in the
Suchindram temple, we find the four clustered columns of musical pillars. The
two Southern groups contain 33 shafts and the two Northern, 24 shafts in each.
The entire group of pilasters is carved out of a monolith, an architectural
marvel. Each shaft yields a different musical note. Facing the Kala Bhairava
shrine appears the marvelous pieces of art, the musical pillars chiseled out
of a single block of granite. The halls containing the musical stone pillars
are referred to as Mani mandapas. Some pillars give notes belonging to the
Kharaharapriya scale, some to the Hari-Kambhoji and some to the Sankarabharanam
scale. The pillars at Tadikombu give out notes which correspond to the Udatta,
Anudatta and Svarita svaras of Vedic music.
 |
Nellaiappar Temple Tirunelveli |
Prof Sambamurthy’s ‘Music in stones’ from Akashvani circa 1942 and his excellent treatise – History of Indian Music provide more insight– He explains that while some pillars have dim notes, the others are still quite rich and comparable to the Jalataranga notes. These granite pillars around the Prakaram (temple compound around the sanctum) of the temple, grey, black, white, or sandalwood in color, are actually of different heights (3’-6’) and shapes as explained by Aravamutham previously. Sambamurthy focuses on the technical skill and the musical knowledge of the stonemason. These were used to provide a sruti accompaniment and a musical accompaniment. Some of these give the basic swaras of classical music. These pillars were played upon with two thin sticks made of cane or bamboo, just like Jalatarangam. He explains that they were four types of pillars.
Sruthi Sthambas- These were used for sounding the
drone note. With the tonic note given by the pillar, the sacred choir gave
recitals of sacred music - Vedic hymns or the Tevaram or both.
Gana Sthambas-In this case, two players with thin
bamboo sticks stood at opposite ends and played in a concerted manner. The
compass of the musical notes of the pillars extended over one octave. In some
cases, the pillars gave the notes belonging to the Kharaharapriya scale and in
other cases to the Harikambhoji or Sankarabharana scales. Solo performances were also given with these Gana sthambas.
Laya Sthambas - These were used for providing a
cross-rhythmical accompaniment. These pillars are so sensitive (e.g., Bugga
Ramalingeswaraswami temple at Tadpatri) that any player on the Kanjira can play
on them. Rhythmic accompaniment was provided to sacred music with these pillars
and perhaps jatis were played on them for the guidance of the dancer or a group
of dancers.
Pradarsana Sthambas - The phenomenon of sympathetic
resonance can be seen and verified in the musical pillars in the Suchindram
temple. The opposite corner pillars are so accurately tuned that when one
pillar is just tapped, the pillar at the opposite corner which is tuned to the
note of the same frequency, immediately vibrates. This vibration can be clearly
heard and also felt by the fingers.
Pillai covers the musical pillars Suchindram – He states
that there were constituted by four groups of pillars, two on the north and
two on the south, standing parallel to each other. The two northern groups are
in a cluster of 24 pillars, while the southern ones are in a cluster of 33. A
striking feature is that all the pillars of each group, together with the
exquisitely carved turret at the top of each group, are chiseled out of a
single block of granite.
Now that we know of what is out there, their physical
attributes, the purpose, etc., let us take a look at the period when these
acoustically skilled artisans created these masterpieces. While the Nellaipayar
temple is the oldest dating back to the 7th century, it is also established
that a number of modifications have been done in the premises and by
conjecture, once and surmise that the musical pillars there were not really
that old, but were added in when the Madurai Nayaks were ruling over
Tirunelveli. Uma Maheswari, writing about this subject and focusing on the
Madurai and Travancore regions, opines that it was indeed so. The Vittala
temple Ranga mandapa and pillars dates to the ~1554-time frame. Interestingly, a
prehistoric lithophonic stone structure existed just 8-10 miles from Hampi at
the Vanibhadreswara temple! Just tapping the Vittala temple pillars these days,
seem to just produce gong
and bell sounds, but the musicians who played on them, centuries ago, may
have had a different technique.
The two Ajanta musical pillars in Cave # 6 are a curiosity and date back to the 2nd-5th centuries. Walter Spink
states that they ring since they are so attenuated, having been quite literally
cut out of the wall, when the typical fronts of such early cells were
converted to fronting elements of the more elaborate pillared complexes. He demystifies
the musical aspect completely and I am drawn to Aravamuthan’s comment - Blind
to the obvious are they who pursue the recondite or seek quick returns.
In general, one can state that the Vijayanagar style in
temples manifested during 1336-1565 period whereas the Madurai Nayak styles
were predominant as they rose to prominence in 1600-1700. The artisan families
in Vijayanagar must have moved South to Madurai and other temple states after
the fall of the Vijayanagar empire, just like the musicians and Carnatic
music moved to Tanjore.
The sculptors who came to the South made these pillars on
their southward journey. These pillars are found in Meenakshi temple, Alwar
Tirunagari, Tirunelveli temples, Suchindrum and at the Padmanabhaswami Temple
at Trivandrum. The pillars in Padmanabhaswamy temple have sculptures of
Gods and Goddesses and produce musical sounds of various instruments. The
pillars in the Nellaiappar Temple have lost the capacity of producing the
"Swaras" and a few pillars only produce ''sa, ri, ga, ma, pa".
While the Suchindram pillars are slated to 1798, the Trivandrum pillars seem to
be made somewhat earlier. The new additions to the older temple are the prakaras
(outer part of the Sanctum) and this style reached its zenith during the 17th
century A.D.
Modak was the first to do some scientific studies – he adds
- The number of pillars in a cluster varies from three at Lepakshi to fifty at
Tirunelveli and Alwartirunagari. The resonance method has been used to
establish the frequencies of the Pillars in the Swami Nelliappar Temple at
Tirunelveli. In general, the conclusion was that the two batches - square and
circular pillars had been carefully constructed and that the theoretical
calculations were a close match to the actual measurements, but arbitrarily distributed
around the main pillar and most very difficult to reach. However, the ones that
generate true tones are not properly located so that they could be struck to
create a tune, but they seemed to be more ornamental or used only for
accompaniment music composed in three to five-note combinations. as in
religious hymns. It is possible to select the pillars near each other producing
notes in such scales these pillars produce pleasing tones
In general, I am inclined to go along with the hypothesis
that these pillars were the sculptor’s signature and mostly curiosities adding
to the lure and lore of the temple, and the power of their patrons, and not regularly
used musical instruments. As Dr. Raghavan maintained in 1977, these pillars,
which emitted musical sounds, were not used in any music or dance rituals in
the temples and were just architectural curiosities. These stones had some
peculiar geological qualities and the Shilpi’s who came across them while
cutting stones for the temple work created these as well to demonstrate their
skill. But without a doubt, they are marvels, carefully crafted by those rock sculptors
who also had a good understanding of music and tones.
So, how did the relatively modern term ‘Rock music’ come
about? It came about from the rock and roll style in the US during the late
40s and was popularized in the mid 50s. For decades African Americans had used
the term rock and roll as a euphemism for vigorous sex!! The phrase
"rocking and rolling" originally described the movement of a ship on the
ocean - a phrase apparently used by 17th-century sailors to describe the motion
of a ship on the sea. Pretty distant from the art of tapping on rocks, right??
Musical Curiosities in the Temples of South India - H. V. Modak
History of Indian Music – P Sambamoorthy
Musical pillars and singing rocks M.G Prasad and B. Rajavel
Journals of the Music academy Madras – 1943, 1977 (Aravamuthan article, Dr Raghavan’s speech, etc.)
Heritage of the Tamils – temple arts – Ed Dr. SV Subramaniam, Dr. G Rajendran
The Suchindram temple – KK Pillay
Wishing all readers a great NEW YEAR
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