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This is certainly a cool system from a theoretical perspective, and functions as a great mnemonic device, provided you know how the standard Indian alphabet is structured. But fear not, there's a sort of mnemonic for that as well: The first group of consonants are the stops. They are organized first by place of articulation from back to front (there are five of these), and next by the mode of articulation (five of these as well). So the first group (velar) for instance is K kh g gh ng In the katapayadi system these would stand for 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5, respectively. After the stops come the vocalic consonants (y r l v) and then the sibilants (three of them once again back to front in articulation) (mnemonic: 1 thru 7) These are rounded off by 'h', whose placement I must confess I don't fully understand. Having said all this, the practical implications of the katapayadi system for the actual learning and performance of Carnatic music are essentially none. A lot of the older ragas were retrofitted into the system ('dhee-ra'Shankarabharanam for the equivalent of the standard major scale, Shankarabharanam, with dh = 9, r = 2, flipped to give you 29) Still cool though! |