Components of a Tala in Carnatic Music

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KavyaVriksha

6 min readMar 29, 2019

In Carnatic music, in addition to the percussion accompaniment, a vocalist also keeps time by explicitly putting the Tala of the song being sung. The tempo of the song can be fast(dhruta laya), slow (vilambita laya) or medium(madhya laya) as detailed in Layam and Kalapramanam in Carnatic Music.

Vidya Shankar says “The measurement of these speeds is tala. The first letters of Tandava and Lasya coin the word tala: Tandava is the dance of Lord Shiva and Lasya, the dance of his consort Shakti. Thus tala is a combination of energy and grace.”[2]
Prof S R Janakiraman elaborates : “Importance of Rhythm and Tala in musical compositions is beyond estimation. What meter is to poetry, tala is to musical compositions. Laya or abstract rhythm could be traced to times immemorial. Tala was much later in origin. Analysis of ever flowing rhythm into definite solid structures results in tala. Note scale is Raga and time scale is Tala.”[3]
In her book, The Art and Science of Carnatic Music, Smt Vidya Shankar explains that “the ten elements that constitute Tala are called tala-dasa prānas. The first five are called maha-prānas and they are kāla (kaala), mārga(maarga), kriya, anga and graha; the second five are called upa-prānas and they are jāti(jaati), kalā(kalaa), laya, yati and prastāra(prastaara).”[1]

Let us look at the definitions of each of these elements in the context of a specific tala such as Adi Tala which is one of the most common in Carnatic music.

Laya

Vidya Shankar says “Rhythm is laya. The word laya is derived from the root lai to move. So, laya means movement.
The speed variations of this manifestation of movements fall under the categories: Vilambita or slow, Madhyama or medium and Drutam or fast.” [2]

See Layam and Kalapramanam in Carnatic Music for examples of songs in different speeds

Kāla

“Kāla(kaala) is Time. Time is maintained by units and subunits. In music, time measure is relative and not an absolute measure as timed by seconds and minutes.
anudrutam(U) = 1 Time unit
2 anudrutam make 1 drutam(0) = 2 Time Units
2 drutams make 1 Chatusra Laghu(l4) = 4 Time Units “[1]

Adi Talam is a total of 8 counts, denoted by one chatusra laghu followed by 2 drutams.

**Figure 1 : Components of Adi Tala [4] ; Notation of First Line of Swarajathi in Ragam Khamas in Adi Tala**

Angas

“Angas are the constituent parts of a tala. Anga means limb. Among the 6 angas, the three that are frequently used in the talas of songs are Anudrutam, Drutam and Laghu and the three that are more rare and occasionally encountered in Ragam Talam Pallavis are guru(equivalent to 2 laghus and denoted by S), plutam(equivalent to 3 laghus and denoted by Ś) and kakapadam(equivalent to 4 laghus) .”[1]

See Suladi Sapta Talas for more details on how each of these talas have different angas. (most have laghu and drutam, while only Jhampa tala has the anudrutam)

Jāti

“Jāti(jathi) means a class or group. The Jāti of a tala is determined by its laghu. The five Jātis , namely varieties of laghu are Tisra(3), Chatusra(4), Khanda(5), Mishra(7) and Sankeerna(9). “[1]

See Suladi Sapta Talas for more details about how each of these talas has 5 Jātis based on the different laghus.

Kriya

“Kriya refers to the action unit in tāla. There were different types of kriyas. These were classified basically into two groups, sounded (saśabda kriya (sk)) and soundless (niḥśabda kriya(nk)). The duration between two kriyas becomes the basic measuring unit”[4]

In Adi Tala, the (saśabda kriya (sk)) is the beat of the hand while (niḥśabda kriyas(nk) are the wave and counting silently with the fingers.

Kalā

The theoretical definition — “Kalā(kalaa) in general means a part of a whole. In the context of tāla it refers to the finite time-fragments with which the whole tala structure is put together. Kalā is also the basic analytical unit in terms of which the duration of the entire tala is expressed.”[5]

Music notations of songs refer to Kalai. Let us look at specific examples to get a better understanding of Kalai.

Note: Referring to Units and Subunits because the terms ‘akshara’ and ‘matra’ seem to have different definitions based on context.

1-Kalai (1 beat per count)

Gitam — Padumanabha in Triputa tala (1 subunit per beat)
Varnam — Chalamela in Ata tala (4 subunits per beat)
Dinamani Vamsha in Adi tala (4 subunits per beat)
Shri Nathadi Guru Guho in Adi tala (2 subunits per beat)

Source: Sangita Sampradaya Pradarshini (English Translation)

2-Kalai (2 beats per count)

In notations, it will be explicitly stated that the song is in 2-kalai

Brocheva in Adi tala 2-kalai (4 subunits per beat, 2 beats per count)

Graha

“Graha means position. And in this context, also called eduppu, the particular position where the song begins. And when it begins at the very start, it is called samam.”[1]

Many songs begin at samam; there are also many songs that start at 1.5 beats after samam. The song Himadrisuthe in Ragam Kalyani composed by Shri Shyama Sastri in Roopaka talam, which is normally put as 3 beats, starts at the second beat.

See Eduppu — the pivotal point where the lyrics commence in the tala cycle for more details and examples of songs with different eduppus.

Yati

“Yatis are various rhythmic patterns ‘that occur in the words or swara passages of songs.
Srotovaha Yati widens gradually like a river
P D N(3)
M P D N(4)
G M P D N(5)
Gopuchcha Yati tapers down like a cow’s tail
G M P D N(5)
M P D N(4)
P D N(3)
In Mridanga Yati, the pattern increases towards the center and then decreases similar to the shape of the instrument mridangam.
Svara Pattern : R G, M; P,; M; G, R and Duration : 1 2 3 4 3 2 1 subunits
And reverse pattern is the Damaru yati where it is narrow at the center and widens at the sides.
In Sama Yati, it is a regular pattern while vishama yati is an irregular pattern. “[1]

Marga and Prastara

Including these which are more advanced theory concepts for the sake of completeness.

For more details, see KALA, MATRA, LAYA AND MARGA, BY Shri N RAMANATHAN

Poetic Definition of ‘Minutest Movement of Time’

Wikipedia has this complicated definition for a second :

“The second is the base unit of time in the International System of Units (SI), commonly understood and historically defined as 1⁄86400 of a day.”
The Sanskrit-English dictionary translates ‘kshana’ as second or measure of time.

Smt Vidya Shankar introduces us to a much more poetic definition of ‘kshana’ from the Sangîta Samaya Sāra, 7th chapter, verse 2 :

“A kshana is described as the time taken by a sharp needle(sūchi) to pierce a hundred lotus petals arranged on top of another.[1]

(perhaps, the lotus petals that have already fallen from the flower and are being strung together into a garland)

And building on this definition of kshana as the minutest time unit, the author Pārsadéva gives a table of units and subunits, connecting this kshana ultimately to the anudrutam and drutam”[1]