Ranga Puravihara

Audio rendition: AGAM (a fusion rock band) and MS

Notes post listening

Reflection:

The minute either of the singers started, rangaaaa, the feeling that it evoked was exactly similar - the familiarity of a deep connect to something so much older than me and in me. I knew the words to this song but do not remember ever learning. I couldn’t stop singing or crying - is sound a more powerful medium through which memory evokes? Or is it the sound that I listen to, which in this case is Carnatic, which I have been exposed as a child through my mother who was a brilliant singer but never got us into it as she didn’t enjoy learning (it was part of the South Indian tradition that she was not allowed to say no to) it and whom we lost way too early in life. She was so, so good at it - hers was what you call a temple voice. The music then brings in all this as I hear, the memory and the fact that I sound exactly like her when I sing adds to the angst of it. So are you ever in the space of listening to music (one that is familiar, connected and your favourite) without the past? Can Hearing as defined by Pierce possible here?