Vedic accent in taittiriya samhita

[Nikhil Rao]

Is there a living tradition of Taitiiriya Yajurveda in
Maharashtra ?. Also, isnt there a marked difference in
the recitation of the rk samhita  and taittiiriya
samhita in south india for the svarita. rgvedis always
recite the svarita (for a syllables with the deergha
matra ) in the same way as a yajurvedis recite the
deergha svarita, right ?.  Also the svarita for
letters with non-deergha matra is  emphasized more
than in yajurvedic tradition. The treatment of
anusvara is also
different.

Thanks,
Nikhil

--- Madhav Deshpande <mmdesh at UMICH.EDU> wrote:
> Bharat Gupta has given a good description of the
> musicalized recitation of
> the TS and the microtonal gaps between different
> notes.  There is no doubt
> that the current recitation of the TS, especially in
> south India, is far
> more musicalized, as compared to the recitation of
> the same Samhita in the
> region of Maharashtra, where the musical distances
> between Udaatta,
> Anudaatta, and Svarita are much smaller.
> Historically, it seems to me
> that a certain distinction must be made between the
> musicalized renderings
> of the Vedic accents, and the Vedic accents as
> described by Panini and
> Praatizaakhyas.  Particularly, in the case of
> Panini, his description of
> accents is not limited to Vedic, but the same accent
> rules apply to all of
> Sanskrit derived by his grammatical system, and even
> contemporary dialects
> of spoken Sanskrit differed in regional accents (cf.
> P's rule: udak ca
> vipaaza.h).  This being the case, it is more
> reasonable to assume that the
> Accents of Sanskrit (including Vedic and Bhaazaa)
> were, by Panini's time,
> not musicalized as yet, except of course in the case
> of the Saamaveda.
> The high and low distinctions of accent/pitch are
> only relative highs and
> lows, while the default middle range itself
> fluctuated from person to
> person.  This is why Patanjali and the
> Praatizaakhyas describe high and
> low accents not in any absolute terms, i.e. by their
> exact correlation to
> any specific musical distances, but they say that
> these high and low
> distinctions apply within a given register
> (samaanayame) of a given
> person, and this register itself may differ from
> person to person.
>         It is indeed the case that Saamavedic
> Zik.saas like that of
> Naarada relate different accents to notes of a
> musical scale.  However,
> this correlation occurred most likely in the Saaman
> traditions, and not in
> other traditions.  Even the Naaradazik.saa (1.3)
> says that the Udaatta and
> Anudaatta differ only by one note in the RV
> recitation, they differ by two
> notes in the recitation of the (more musical?)
> Gaathaas, and they differ
> by three notes in the Saaman recitation.  Thus, the
> RV (and possibly the
> YV and AV accents as well) were originally not
> musicalized at all.
> However, with the loss of accents in the classical
> language, the
> musicalization of Vedic recitation steadily
> progressed over time.
>
>                                 Madhav Deshpande
>
> On Sat, 22 Jan 2000, Bharat Gupt wrote:
>
> > > but rather "Today what
> > > would a Brahmin priest of the taittiriya samhita
> school call the accent
> > > marked by a vertical line above the syllable and
> chanted by him as a high
> > > note, and what would he call the unmarked
> syllable chanted by him as a
> > > midnote?"
> > > In other words "Is the naming of the accents in
> the introduction of this
> > > chanting book an error?"
> > >
> > > Many thanks in advance,
> > >
> > > Harry Spier
> >
> > >
> > > [Krishna Kalale]  The letter with a vertical
> line on top - is known as
> > > udAtta (high note)
> > > The letter unmarked is svarita (middle note)
> and the letter with a
> > > horizontal line (like a minus sign) below it is
> known as anudAtta.
> > >    (lower note)
> > > Krishna Kalale
> >
> > Broadly speaking the Anudaatta, Udaatta and
> Svarita svaras of Rgveda paatha and the
> > Saam, including the Taittiriiyapratitshaakhya, as
> heard today, can be equated with Ni,
> > Sa, and Ri of the North Indian Kafi scale
> (Kharaharapriya of the Karnataka melas).  This
> > means that Horizontal line in written text
> indicates the Anudaatta, unmarked is Udaatta
> > and the vertical line marked is Svarita.  This is
> contrary  to  what is found written
> > in the book mentioned by Prof. Spier.
> >
> > All the modern scholars and recorders of Vedic
> chants from Fox- Strangways (1914) have
> > noted that in musical pitch Svarita today is
> higher than Udatta. Not only the vertical
> > line indicates it but in some recitation tradition
> the reciter raises his head up to
> > indicate the rise of pitch of Svarita and brings
> it down to indicate Anudaataa.
> >
> > The saying "samaahaarah svaritah", has often led
> to the belief that Svarita lies in
> > between the Udaatta and Anudaatta. Hence it has
> also been interpreted as the circumflex
> > note, in which the pitch rises and then falls down
> even to Anudaatta. But that is only
> > part of the general tradition of rendering in
> Indian singing, recitation or paatha,
> > Vedic or Laukika.  The notes are always used not
> by jumping from one to another but with
> >  a glide. These glides becomes gamaka and other
> alankaaras in secular music.
> >
> > The point of pitch to which the Svarita goes is
> the definitional location of the svara
> > called svarita and this pitch is higher than that
> of Udaatta.
> >
> > The Paniniya "samaahaarah svaritah" is to be
> understood not in terms of the pitch of the
> > note in comparison to the pitch of Udaatta, but in
> terms of the musical interval on the
> > scale, that is to say, that while Udaatta is a
> four s'ruti(microtonal interval) note,
> > Anudaata is a two s'ruti note, the Svarita is a
> three s'ruti note. The example as above,
> > Sa, Ni and Ri respectively.
> >
> > It may also be noted that Abhinavagupta has
> elaborated on the samaahaar by explaining
> > the s'ruti intervals.
> >
> > For a very detailed survey of nearly a hundred
> years of research and recording of chants
> > , it may be useul to refer to THE SAMAN CHANTS BY
> GH TARLEKAR, 1985 Indian Musical
> > Society, Baroda and a review of it by me in
> Journal of the Sangeet Natak Academy, March
> > 1987. Number 83.
> >
> > Bharat Gupt
> >
>
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