- Graha bedham
Graha bedham of a rāgam (musical scale), in
Carnatic music (South Indian classical music), is the process (or result of the process) of shifting the śruti (Tonic note) to another note in the rāgam and arriving at a different rāgam."Graha" literally means "position" and "bedham" means "change". Since the position of the śruti is changed (pitch of the drone), it is called "Graha bedham" or "Śruti bedham".
Definitions
Modal shift of the Tonic note to higher notes of a rāgam, while retaining the note's positions (
swara sthānas - sthāna means position/ pitch), results in different rāgams. This is called Graha bedham or Śruti bedham.Practical demo
A simple practical demonstration of Graha bedham can be taken up by playing the structure of a rāgam with the drone set to Sa (Shadjam). Then if we keep playing the same keys/ notes, while shifting the drone to another note in the rāgam to form the new śruti/ tonic note, the result is a different rāgam.
Example Illustration
When Graha bedham is applied on Sankarabharanam's notes, it yields 5 other major
Melakarta rāgams, namely, "Kalyani","Hanumatodi ", "Natabhairavi ", "Kharaharapriya " and "Harikambhoji ".Ragavardhini
Keeravani
Notes on above table
*The difference between this set and "Mohanam" set shown above it, is that the 3rd note differs between E and D# (reference note purpose only). Hence, "Sivaranjani" differs from Mohanam by one note - G2 in place of G3, Revati differs from Madhyamavati by one note - R1 in place of R2, while Sunadhavinodhini differs from Hindolam in all notes other than S (as that step is equivalent of shifting down S by one note while retaining all other notes of Hindolam).
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
