Back to roots Sukanya Vijayakumar’s Gitanjali uses 72 Melakartha
ragas NEW Sukanya Vijaykumar Venkatamukhi, the court musician of
Tanjore king Vijaya Raghava in the 16th century is considered
the original composer of 72 melakartha ragas. Sukanya Vijaya
Kumar claims that Carnatic music exponents use 15-20 Melakartha
ragas to compose, perform and teach. This led the musician to
bring out a CD of Rabindranath Tagore’s classical work
“Gitanjali” having 18 songs using 72 Melakartha ragas. “Why is
it that there is not a single female music composer/master in
the history of Indian classical and western music? Why only
“great masters” and not “great ladies”. These were the questions
that have tormented me from my student days and encouraged me to
do this experiment,” says Sukanya. She has also brought B.M.
Shri’s English songs. Send this article to Friends by Chennai
and Tamil Nadu