Indian Rāgas 101: More pentatonic — Shivranjani

Once you begin to mix and match notes, there’s really no end to it. Pick any 5 from 12 notes, and you’ll get a pentatonic. Of course, you might choose

S R G P D S`

which is simply, Bhupali (or Mohanam in Carnatic), and a subset of the natural major heptatonic scale S R G M P D N S`.

But when you delve into minors, you have several choices; the natural minor hepatonic is

S R g M P d n S`

You can subset this into pentatonic in several different manners. The one similar to Bhupali would be

S R g P D S`

Let’s call this ‘natural minor pentatonic’; of course, a similar set

S g M d n S`

(which is Malkosh) will also make the claim. Things get complicated when you use subsets of the harmonic minor heptatonic

S R g M P d N S`

Which in pentatonic might be split into

S g M d N S`

or even

S R g P d S`

Converting the last one into melodic minor pentatonic, we get

S R g P D S`

This is ‘Shivranjani’, a go-to Raag for many composers. However, unlike the melodic minor, Shivranjani descends with a shuddha D and not a komal one. The one change from Bhupali, the inclusion of a komal ga, makes Shivranjani a pang of agony.

Its been abused as a tear-jerker whenever situation demanded

Because of the komal ga, Shivranjani belongs to the ‘Kaafi’ thaat and is to be sung at midnight; a sense of impending dread, hopelessness and a hint of supernatural pervades this magnificient song by Lata Mangeshkar (makes for a perfect Halloween evening)