SOUTH ASIA RESEARCH, Vol.16, No.2, Autumn 1996

PERFORMING IDENTITIES: MUSIC FESTIVALS IN NORTH AMERICA Kathryn Hansen

It is 9 a.m. in Cleveland and the beginning of what promises to be an extraordinary event.l Soon the speeches will commence and the governor’s proclamation will be read, declaring April 18 and 19, 1992, as Saint Tyagaraja Days throughout the state of Ohio. But now scores of musicians are coming up and sitting on the carpeted stage. Vocalists and instrumentalists, amateurs and professionals, women and men, old and young crowd together until there is room only in the wings. After a flute prelude, they launch into brisk unison singing, commencing with Jagadanandakaraka, a composition enumerating the 108 names of Lord Rama, composed in the raga Nata. This is followed immediately by three equally wordy but lively, rhythmic pieces set to different ghana (heavy, serious) ragas. The chorus falters a bit on the multiple stanzas of composition number four, Kanakana in raga Varali, musically the most challenging of the pieces, but the leaders at the front pull the laggards along. Endarõ mahanubhavula, a homage in Telugu to all the great souls who have gone before, brings the group singing triumphantly to an end. The paflcamma krids- the five gems or masterworks - have been completed, and another Tyagaraja festival has officially begun. The Tyagaraja festival, known to its participants as an aradhana utsavam (or a jayanti, when held on the birth rather than death anniversary of the poet-composer), has in the past decade become the most popular annual celebration for South Indians resident in North America. At least one hundred such observances are held in the United States and Canada every year. Commencing about fifteen years ago in Toronto, Cleveland,

1 Much of the research on which this article is based was undertaken with the assistance of a grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (1992-94), whose support is most gratefully acknowledged. I also wish to thank the American Institute of Indian Studies for a fellowship that enabled me to study Karnatak music in India in 1990-91. This essay draws upon my observation of a number of Tyagarja festivals, including those held in Cleveland in 1992 and 1987, in the New York/New Jersey area in 1992-93, in Tiruvaiyaru in 1978, and in Madurai in 1991. Vasudha Narayanan, Norman Cutler, Stuart Blackburn, David Shulman, and T. Temple Tuttle commented on an earlier draft of this essay, and their suggestions were extremely helpful. I am particularly indebted to Carla Petievich, my collaborator on the SSHRCC-funded project, whose assistance contributed significantly to the success of this research. Whatever flaws remain in the work are of course my own.

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Chicago, Madison, Milwaukee, Atlanta, and Queens, these festivals have since spread to other cities and to the recently-built Hindu temples. Like similar events all over India and elsewhere around the world, their prototype is the yearly commemoration in Tiruvaiyaru in Tanjavur district, . In the U.S. and Canada, the festivals take place in areas with significant concentrations of immigrants from the four southern states of India: Kerala, Tamil Nadu, , and Karnataka. Produced locally by small groups of volunteers, they receive their staunchest support from amateur musicians, music teachers, and lovers of Karnatak music--the classical music system of South India. Audiences are overwhelmingly of South Indian origin, with Tamil and Telugu speakers predominating. Many festivals originated as small-scale observances in private homes. Lately they have taken on a grander, more public character as community size and resources have expanded. Common venues are university or high school auditoria, churches, and multi-functional halls within South Indian-style temple complexes. The attachment of diasporic South Indians to the Tyagaraja festival illustrates the major role played by the performative arts in the reinvention of cultural identities that occurs following migration. Celebrations in which music and dance figure centrally have become ubiquitous in the public culture of Indian communities in the diaspora, yet only recently has attention focused on the expressive life of immigrant groups in general and of South Asians in particular. As part of a larger project to document changes in text and context as art forms from the Indian subcontinent move into new locales, this essay undertakes to describe the dynamics of the transplantation of one particular festival. The Tyagaraja music festival provides an illuminating example of how cultural performances that are highly specific, even parochial, in their origins, can acquire extended layers of meaning as they move into transnational territory. Although the figure of Tyagaraja has served as a significant icon for South Indians since the early twentieth century, the upsurge in Tyagaraja festivals worldwide is quite a recent phenomenon. This essay is necessarily too preliminary to explain fully the reasons for the festival’s growing global popularity. However, it is possible at this point to identify three central concerns shared by festival participants that are addressed directly and indirectly throughout the celebration. These concerns--the reproduction of culture, the building of community, and the construction of transnational identity - help to explain the role the Tyagaraja festival plays in the new landscape created by the growing presence of South Indians in the U.S. and Canada. Of these concerns, the reproduction of culture is most frequently suggested by the festival’s organisers and participants as their principal aim, typically in the form of assertions that the festival’s function is to transmit musical tradition from one generation to the next. By honouring Kamatak music’s historical figures and present- day leaders and by providing an opportunity for both amateurs and professionals to

Downloaded from sar.sagepub.com at University of Texas Libraries on November 28, 2015 157 perform, the festival creates an arena for passing on valued cultural traditions, transplanting them, as it were, into new soil. Through its rituals and rhetoric, moreover, the festival situates music performance and learning within a matrix of Hindu devotionalism, asserting a bond between art and belief that is understood as a distinctive sign of ’Indian culture.’ At the level of social organisation, the Tyagaraja festival draws disparate groups together through its participatory order of events and generates a sense of common purpose. Although public festivals characteristically obliterate certain boundaries and erect others, the increased need for group articulation and cohesion among recent immigrants seems to underlie the elaboration of this aspect of the celebration. Community-building occurs both through the reinterpretation of the vocabularies of service (seva) and devotion (bhakti) and through creative adaptations to the new and to a certain extent alien environment. Less intentional, less explicitly acknowledged perhaps, is the powerful process by which transnational identity is negotiated within the festival proceedings. As a cultural space that links the diaspora with the homeland, the festival demarcates an arena of exchange and contestation between South Asia and the North American landscape. Even as festival participants forge a bond with the past through remembrance of a culture hero, they cement present ties with the artistic community in India, setting up flows of capital via cultural patronage. Those involved in the festival, especially in the capacity of organisers but also as performers or simple spectators, demonstrate that they are preserving their Indianness, even though they have settled outside India. By producing a major cultural event, immigrants strive to legitimise their presence on North American soil and validate their status--that of the ’non-resident’ Indian (NRI)--among ’resident’ Indians back home. Viewed from these various perspectives, this festival (like cultural performances in general) offers its participants a superfluity of meanings. It operates on a number of levels, and individuals and sub-groups take from it what they need (and give what they have). Indeed, the Tyagaraja festival is characterised by a complexity of structure and a richness of symbolism that make it a particularly versatile medium for diasporic interaction. Multiple strands are incorporated within the discrete sections that constitute the festival’s temporal order of events, an order that has remained fairly standard even after the shift to the North American environment. But before turning to these, first a few words about Tyagaraja. Tyagaraja (Ty5ga Brahmam, 1767-1847) belonged to a highly respected line of viiggeyakäras or poet-composers who crafted poems of praise to the gods and also composed the musical settings that best displayed them. While such a dual role was not uncommon, Tyagaraja’s unique contribution to Karnatak music history was to develop the lqiti, a tripartite genre of composition that greatly enhanced the musical

Downloaded from sar.sagepub.com at University of Texas Libraries on November 28, 2015 158 sophistication of devotional song. Tyagaraja is generally thought to be the most eminent of the early nineteenth-century triad of composers (the ’Trinity’), which includes his contemporaries Muttusvami Ddcsitar and gyama Sastri, although debate surrounds their relative merits. His importance in South Indian cultural history stems from his large corpus of enduringly popular pieces, yet his compositional activity is never conceived as separate from his stature as an enlightened being. Tyagaraja’s devotion to his chosen deity, Rama, and his selfless dedication to music, are seamlessly woven together in the eyes of his admirers, who revere him as their sadguru (true master). His poetic utterances are treasured as a compendium of wisdom on philosophy, religion, and moral conduct. Called the patron saint of Karnatak music, Tyagaraja’s hyphenated identity as saint-composer pervades the festivals that honour him. 2

A Day at the Cleveland Festival Given the devotional ethos that frames the event, it is not surprising that the festival day begins with rituals of worship (piiji or abhisekam) to both Tyagaraja and Rama. During a typical piiji, a devotee makes offerings of various sanctified substances to the icons of Tyagaraja and Lord Rama. At the Cleveland festival in 1992, a temple priest officiated on behalf of a small congregation consisting of those involved most closely in the festival. The image of Tyagaraja was the often-encountered reproduction which depicts the composer seated on the ground, singing and playing an upright tanpura (a drone instrument used for accompaniment). Placed directly above this picture was a framed portrait of Rama accompanied by S1t8, Laksmana, and Hanuman. The priest lights incense, garlands the portraits, and concludes the ceremony with anati, circling a tray with a small wick lamp before the images and extending it to the devotees, who receive its flame as a blessing and prostrate themselves before the altar. Little of the audience is on hand at this early hour, and those who are present are not required to participate; they may be visiting one another, busying themselves with the festival preparations, or minding children. After the worship ceremony, if the images have not already been moved to the side of the stage, this is done, and there they remain for the duration of the festival, where they are visible but do not dominate. Participants assert that these rituals are required to sanctify the event and honour the saint and his ista deva (chosen deity). It is important to make the customary offering and to be able to report that ’the day began with pooja in the traditional manner’ (Shanker 1990). None

2 Useful biographical sources include Ramanujachari and Raghavan’s The Spiritual Heritage of Tyagaraja (1981) and Jackson’s two books, Tyagarja: Life and Lyrics (1991) and Tyagarja and the Renewal of Tradition (1994). Transliterated texts and English translations of the composer’s songs are contained in Ramanujachari and Raghavan (1981), Jackson (1991), and Compositions of Tyagarja, ed. T. K. Govinda Rao (1995).

Downloaded from sar.sagepub.com at University of Texas Libraries on November 28, 2015 159 the less the minor degree of attention directed toward the opening worship ceremony suggests that it may function more like the preliminary rituals enacted before a stage performance (e.g., the piirvarafiga described in the Sanskrit treatise on dramatic art, Bharata’s Na!YaSastra), rather than as a central event in the festival proceedings. The principal medium for offering homage, after all, is to be music. The next event is generally the group singing of the paifcaratna laritis, although this may be preceded by a few simple hymns or 6hajans, perhaps performed by children. The hubbub in the hall increases, more people arrive, and as the participants assemble on the stage for the choral tribute, the festival finds its centre. Being able to sing or play all five of the paíIcaratna laitis marks a certain stage of musical accomplishment, usually achieved after some years of study and practice. The musicians who participate in this segment of the festival, particularly the amateurs in the diaspora community who have less time for music and less access to learning opportunities than their counterparts in India, have committed themselves to demonstrating a significant degree of competence in Kamatak music. They often prepare specially for this event, rehearsing the pieces with a teacher or group of friends. Where once the drumming maestro Ramnad R. Raghavan came to Cleveland from Wesleyan University in Connecticut to coach the group of singers for participation in the festival, now an invited artist from India generally performs this function. Other music teachers in other cities play a similar role among the local enthusiasts who wish to join. Even after rehearsals, it is a common sight both here and in India to find the performers closely following the musical notations in their copy books or looking to others for guidance during the group singing. The paflcamma performance is the first wholehearted manifestation of bhakti (religious attachment, love) at the festival. Those who revere Tyagaraja explain that the singing of these elaborate works is an act of devotion, a means of showing honour and loyalty to the composer as the sadguru, the supreme teacher of Karnatak music. The musicians characterise themselves as engaged in sailgitopisana, musical worship or loving service to the deity/guru. Although the primary figure of veneration throughout the festival is Tyagaraja, devotion is also manifest toward Rama and members of his entourage, especially his adoring monkey-attendant, Hanuman. In so far as vocal music is considered foundational in Kamatak music, song lyrics contribute an important layer of meaning to a composition, even when it is played on musical instruments. Thus as musicians sing or play the paífcaratna kritis or any of Tyägaräja’s other kirtanas, they identify with the sentiments voiced in the texts, which for the most part exalt the poet’s favoured deity. Tyagaraja’s personal devotion, articulated in his inspired utterances, becomes the conduit through which the assembled singers can approach the divine. The collective performance of the paifcaratna kritis, however, represents something more than the sum of the parts, more than the combined knowledge and devotion of the individuals on the stage. Unlike solo performance (the norm in Karnatak classical

Downloaded from sar.sagepub.com at University of Texas Libraries on November 28, 2015 160 recitals), congregational song is an enactment of community and, more specifically, it is a representation for the community itself of its special relationship with their culture hero. By singing together for the sadguru, members of the group annually affirm their connections with each other.3 The act of unison singing, placed at the start of a celebration that brings into the present the words, music, and faith of a powerful figure from the past, reestablishes the collective identity of those assembled. It links them with groups who celebrate similarly in other places and at other times. Singing the paticaraina laitis normally takes one hour. What follows and occupies the long middle portion of the day is the most democratic and participatory event of the festival - the offering of musical tribute by individuals. This is essentially an open microphone, with certain ground rules: all compositions must be by Tyagaraja ; each person’s performance time is limited to five minutes; no alapana, elaboration, or improvisation is allowed, only the flxed parts of the composition, its pallavi, anupallavi and carariam; percussion accompaniment is rarely provided; lqitis should be repeated as little as possible. Every level of skill is welcomed, and in actuality one gets to hear the young and the old, the beginner and the advanced, the talented and the not so tuneful. Sometimes the participants are grouped by age or by category of performance such as vocal and instrumental. Participants are usually asked to register in advance as places are limited. Depending on the particular locale, these limits still permit sixty or more performers to take the stage during this section of the festival day. The unadorned, unaccompanied singing of Tyagaraja’s compositions during this period offers a rare opportunity for the listener to glimpse the clarity of melodic lines, the beauty of ragas, and the emotional power that some singers can draw from within. When a singer, especially a professional, sits on the bare stage and opens her or his heart to sing without the support of accompanying instruments, the demonstration of humility can be moving indeed. Here again one witnesses a reenactment: the musical self is presented as a member of a band of followers emulating the simplicity and selflessness that the sadguru so perfectly exemplifies. Inevitably a few performers use this part of the festival to compete or exhibit their knowledge. Those who are mature artists, however, call forth exquisite expressions of emotion, making their tribute a gift to the audience as well as to the presiding saint.

3 This interpretation is by no means incompatible with the ideology of bhakti. Congregational worship is considered beneficial because it hastens the acquisition of devotion; ’in a bunch, one banana warms and ripens all others,’ as A. K. Ramanujan explains. His diagram of mutual ties among devotees linked to a guru suggests the ways in which devotion to a common figure not only promotes devotion but strengthens the bonds among members. (Ramanujan 1981:146.) Norman Cutler brought this reference to my attention.

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In the North American environment, this part of the festival has increasingly been given over to children who are studying Karnatak music. Indian adults who arrived ii the United States and Canada between ten and twenty years ago frequently express a fear that their offspring are losing touch with their parents’ values and identity. To counter this perceived erosion of ’Indianness,’ many parents have tried to provide instruction for their children in religion, arts, languages, and other elements of Indian culture. It is particularly common for South Indian parents to stress the learning of Karnatak music. Annual participation in Tyagaraja festivals is a focal point for their children, comparable to the yearly piano recital for the children’s classmates who learn Western music. Some children have an affinity for performance from a young age, and they eagerly take to the stage. Child prodigies seem to hold a particular fascination for South Indians (as for music fans generally), and young talent is nurtured with enthusiasm. Family and friends - but mostly mothers - provide a great deal of encouragement to their youngsters, bringing them to the festivals, enrolling them, and praising them for their performances. The children get additional reinforcement when they see others like themselves, and the challenge to measure up to their peers may motivate them to excel. Viewing and supporting the performance of children reinforces the parents’ sense of identity as well. Pride and pleasure result from seeing their young ones on the stage, and the children’s display assuages the parents’ sense of culture loss. Part of the warm emotion that fills the hall during the often disorganised troopings to and fro of the children comes from the joy of the elders at hearing their language spoken, their songs sung by the next generation. The witnessing of even mediocre musicianship gives them confidence that Indianness is being maintained. In some festivals, part of the programme is organised as a competition, with trophies awarded to the best student performance in each age group. The North Jersey Music Lovers, for example, structure their Tyagaraja Aradhana by holding two sessions during the midday: first a music competition for children, and second individual participation by children and adults on a non-competitive basis. The Cleveland festival recently introduced a competition for children held the day before the main aradhanä. Senior performers act as judges, and trophies are presented by age group and performance medium. All receive participation certificates. While these practices illustrate a trend towards organising the children’s role in the Tyagaraja festival as a competition, the older bhakti-oriented ideology persists side by side, stressing the equality of all performers and all music that is offered with sincerity and humility. As the musical mood deepens inside the concert hall, the festivities outside are becoming merrier. Friends meet after a long time, family members are introduced, children run about and play, and smells from the kitchen begin to permeate the air. About halfway through the individual performances the music is interrupted by the collective partaking of a South Indian feast. The meal is provided free to all attendees,

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served from large pots onto styrofoam lunch trays. This part of the programme is firmly in the hands of a committee of women who have planned, shopped, cooked, and transported huge quantities of rice, lentils, vegetables, sweets, savouries, and pickles. Knowing that their participation is essential to the success of the festival, they can now enjoy the satisfaction and power that comes from feeding large numbers of people. In 1992, the Cleveland festival utilised 130 cooks, all volunteers from the community. Each one prepared a dish of ten quarts’ size.4 In Chicago, the Tyagaraja Utsavam brochure listed the names of the 65 cooks who contributed food and published full menus of the five meals served during the two days of music.5 During mealtime, the commensal dining replicates the festive atmosphere at a large Indian wedding. All are welcomed and served graciously. An ebullience spreads as people line up, receive their portions, and fill their stomachs. Once more a sense of community is established, this time through the most persistent marker of ethnicity: food. The final item on the day’s programme, for which the maximum number of people congregate, is the concert by professional musicians late in the afternoon or evening. The concert is conducted like a regular Karnatak music recital (kacceri). The performing group generally consists of a solo vocalist or instrumentalist, an accompanying instrumentalist (usually a violinist), and several percussionists: there must always be a 111[idarigam (drum); but the kaífjirii (tambourine), morsirig (mouth harp), and ghafam (claypot) are optional. The musical ensemble first performs a number of short fixed compositions, proceeds to a central exposition of a longer raga with an introductory free rhythm section (alapani), various kinds of rhythmic improvisation ( niraval, kalpana svara), and solo section for percussion ( tani avartanam), and finishes with a medley of lighter pieces. It is not necessary to restrict oneself to the compositions of Tyagaraja. The number of artists and their prestige depend upon the financial resources and scale of the festival. Smaller festivals invite artists from the immediate locality, whereas larger festivals contract top-ranking performers from India. At Cleveland in 1992, five prestigious artists were booked: two soloists (U. Srinivas on mandolin and N. Ramani on flute), two percussionists (Guruvayur Dorai on mridangam and Zakir Hussain on tabla) and a violinist (Kanyakumari). This format facilitated question-and-answer duets (jugalbandi) not only between the two principals but also between the drummers. It also introduced a Hindustani musician (and that too, one of megastar stature - Zakir Hussain) into a Kamatak team, breaking new ground. The tributes section of the programme, by showcasing the efforts of those living and growing up in North America, demonstrates to the audience the values and skills

4 A reviewer for Sruti magazine in India commented on the ’steady flow of food and music at the Cleveland aradhana.’ (S. Sankaran 1991) 5 Personal communication, Vasudha Narayanan; annual brochure courtesy of T.E.S. Raghavan.

Downloaded from sar.sagepub.com at University of Texas Libraries on November 28, 2015 163 that are sought to be inculcated with Kamatak musical instruction. Performance techniques are to be developed together with the appropriate attitudes of devotion and humility. The evening concert, by contrast, represents the height of artistic achievement produced by the tradition. It stresses not only the mastery of highly complex structures of rhythm and melody, but the extraordinary capacity of top-ranking musicians to reach beyond, to tap their originality and spontaneously create pleasing new patterns. In the best of performances, the majesty of the musical system itself is on display. A superior concert communicates a superior level of civilisational accomplishment, giving those who identify with it a sense of deep pride. The audience follows for hours the mind-boggling musical feats of the vidvans (experts) and leaves the concert in a state of elation. While this state may be shortlived, of longer duration perhaps is the listener’s renewed belief in the sophistication - even the superiority - of South Indian culture.

Prestige, Patronage, and Participation The perception of Kamatak music as a prestigious cultural achievement may assist both first- and second-generation diaspora residents in deflecting the demeaning stereotypes of themselves that they routinely encounter in the North American media, educational system, and society at large. Although some Indiaphiles and even a percentage of Indo- Americans discount the existence of discrimination, a quick media survey towards the end of 1994 confirmed that stereotyping of South Asians was pervasive. On mainstream television, the ’naive immigrant’ type surfaced in Mujibur and Sirajul, two Bangladeshi shopkeepers who appeared on David Letterman’s ’Late Show.’ The popular sitcom ’Seinfeld’ ridiculed a character named Baboo (pronounced akin to ’baboon’), a Pakistani restaurateur. Apu, a Gujarati convenience store owner, showed up on ’The Simpsons’ (Kumar 1994:7). An unfortunate outbreak of pneumonic plague in western India presented an occasion for all-too-familiar representations of India as a backward, even medieval, Third World country in most national newspapers (Sohoni 1994:29). In the wake of the World Trade Centre bombing in New York City, South Asian mosques in the U.S. were attacked, while Hindu groups attempting to gain permission to build temples in New Jersey ran into opposition from local residents and faced collective character assassination as ’terrorists.’ Against this backdrop of almost daily distortion and misrepresentation, the Tyagaraja festival celebrates cultural attainment, supplying a very different image of India, especially to those young people who have never been to the South Asian subcontinent. In addition to the musical events, Tyagaraja festivals usually include speeches of welcome and an awards ceremony to honour veteran musicians, two segments that reveal an interesting complementarity. The inclusion of elected state and local officials on the dais, or the publication of their proxy letters of congratulation in the annual

Downloaded from sar.sagepub.com at University of Texas Libraries on November 28, 2015 164 souvenir, points to politicians’ recognition of the growing influence of the professional class of South Asians and their increased participation in electoral politics. Framing speeches such as that by the Governor of Ohio make explicit the emerging patron-client networks between diasporic groups and their new cultural and political leaders. These networks are based on the interdependence between immigrants seeking access to community facilities, in partnership with public institutions like Cleveland State University, site of the Cleveland Tyagaraja festival, and officials who wish to clanm the allegiance of ethnic voting blocs. The awards ceremonies work in an opposite direction, to strengthen the ties of the diasporic community back to the homeland. The extension of honours and recognition to Indian musicians by groups based outside India emphasises both the enduring locus of cultural authority ’back home’ and the emerging role of the diaspora community as patron. These mutual ties operate within a new global environment for Indian music, in which the assistance of non-resident Indian cultural organisations is increasingly sought by India-based artists who wish to tour outside the country. Sponsors such as the Tyagaraja festival organisers have replaced the Anglo-American arts organisations and university music departments that were so active in underwriting tours by Indian musicians in the 1960s and 1970s. As between politicians and ethnic minorities, hers too a relationship of interdependence is emerging, but one in which the reverse flow of honours and honoraria toward India balances an outpouring of cultural expertise and ‘authenticity.’ Other features of the North American festival include educational lectures and the singing of simple devotional hymns, for example and nima sarikirtanas. Festivals that emphasise children’s participation, such as that organised by the North Jersey Music Lovers, often include an essay-writing competition wherein students demonstrate their knowledge of Tyagaraja’s life and his place in Karnatak music. Some aspects of Tyagaraja festivals as celebrated in India have not been widely adopted in the North American context because of difficulties in executing their performance, or a shift of emphasis. It is rare to find an enactment of uilchavritti, in which an individual impersonating Tyagaraja leads a group of devotees and goes out begging for alms. This practice could be mistaken for panhandling, perpetuating ’Third World’ stereotypes. Another tradition found in India but not in the U.S. is the akhanda ganam, or uninterrupted singing for a long duration, i.e. 24 or 48 hours, without pause. Usually interpreted as representing a superlative degree of devotion, akhM4a recitation of sacred texts such as the ~idi granth and the Rämcaritminas is found among diaspora Sikhs and North Indian Hindus respectively, but seems to be rarely associated with Tyagaraja. Another ritual considered obligatory for Tyagaraja festivals in the Indian environment is the Aiijancya utsavam or dedication to Hanumän, employed to close the festival. It is

Downloaded from sar.sagepub.com at University of Texas Libraries on November 28, 2015 165 not readily apparent why this practice has been dropped from the North American festival. Particularly when contrasted with the culture of South Asian art music, which places a premium on lengthy periods of apprenticeship and relentlessly high standards of performance, the Tyagaraja festival as it has developed in North America projects an inclusive, democratic image. The festival seems designed to maximise contact between its symbols, rituals, and practices and the individuals who make up the community. Participation is encouraged by all ages, both genders, and multiple skill levels, and there is space for everyone to contribute and get involved, whether in a musical or organisational capacity. Such non-hierarchical, participatory activity conforms to a pattern of civil society that arguably underpins social organisation in liberal democracies like Canada and the U.S. By this reasoning, the TyagarAia festival could be said to have adapted itself to the larger ideological framework into which it is being transplanted. However, social behaviour that is marked by participation and voluntarism also has deep roots in the ideology of bhakti, a cultural system of meaning carried over from India. Bhakti, originally a non ritualistic, nonhierarchical mode of approaching the divine, has historically placed great emphasis on the use of the expressive arts as vehicles for mystical realisation. Singing the names of the deity, enacting the stories of gods and goddesses, and even simply hearing the praise of god through music or poetry, are recognised as powerful methods of gaining grace. In this understanding, participation is immersion. It is significant that one of the meanings of bhakti, from the Sanskrit root bhaj, is to participate, to share intimately. Bhakti aesthetic theory maintains that even without volition, participation through singing and hearing can lead to transformation, to intuitive recognition of the transcendent. Collective activities within the bhakti tradition additionally articulate the value of voluntary service. In the Tyagaraja festival, no coercion is brought to bear on those who do not wish to participate in the main stage events or in behind-the-scenes organisation. No fees are charged for admission to any of the day’s events, even the high-profile concerts by professional artists. Instead, small groups of friends assume responsibility for the most active roles in planning and financing. Acts of assistance are acknowledged as service to a higher cause. Thus, attendees are asked to make donations for the support of the festival, but the spirit in which they should do so, with open hearts filled with the warm sentiments of the occasion, is emphasised at least as much as the financial needs of the organisation. Donations of time and labour as well as monetary gifts should be offered freely. Again, the conceptual framework of bhakti supplies the underlying notion of seva or service. Seva, like hearing or singing, is considered by participants to be an avenue for realisation, and one that ideally bypasses the mind and its constant striving. Performing tasks for others in a disinterested, selfless way is considered an active kind of engagement that promotes the welfare of all.

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The organisers who work tirelessly to produce these festivals take strength from such beliefs. The concept of seva thus operates as a sort of recruitment strategy, helping to harness the talents and energies of a large number of people towards a common goal. Origins in South India: The Tiruvaiyaru Festival Organisers generally assert that they are ’following tradition’ when asked about the different kinds of activities that make up their festivals or the particular arrangement of events in the festival day. The tradition that is most often cited is that of the Tyagaraja Aradhana Utsavam at Tiruvaiyaru. This is where the pair of customs--group singing of the paífcaratna kritis and individual offering of musical tributes--was established. (Srinivasan 1991: 7) Dissimilarities between Tiruvaiyaru and the diaspora festivals are also manifold, the most obvious being the shifting of its date. North American festivals are frequently not held on Bahula Paficami, the death anniversary of Tyagaraja, which ordinarily falls in the first week of January. Residents of the northeast United States and Canada argue that the weather at that time of year is prohibitive, and they routinely shift the aradhana date closer to springtime and Tyagaraja’s birthday, which occurs in May. However, the weather cannot be the sole factor affecting the date of observance. In Florida, where the weather is not so different from South India’s, it is reported that one group held the festival on the American holiday of Thanksgiving, another celebrated it on Bahula Paficami in January, and two others observed it a few months later. (Narayanan 1992) These alterations have led to uncertainty among participants as to whether it is Tyagaraja’s birth or death anniversary that is being commemorated. None the less, the massive festival at Tiruvaiyaru is invoked as the model celebration and prototype for Tyagaraja observances all over the world. Tiruvaiyaru is the village in which Tyagaraja resided for most of his life, and its festival occurs on land adjoining his sdmadru, the memorial site near the river where the mortal remains of the saint are buried. Commemorative rites were started immediately after the composer’s demise in 1847, and by this reckoning 1992 marked the 145th anniversary. Yet in its present form the Tiruvaiyaru festival dates only to 1941; its golden jubilee was observed in 1991 (Srinivasan 1991: 7). During the twentieth century, the observances at Tiruvaiyaru have become occasions for clashes, lawsuits, and controversy. Access to the memorial site is presently regulated by court order, with rival groups assigned specific times when they are permitted to carry out their ceremonies. Since Indian television started national broadcasts of the mainstage events such as the paficaraina singing, the festival has attracted ever larger crowds, more and more artists who wish to perform, and plenty of criticism for commercialism and declining standards. The Tiruvaiyaru festival is truly a contested site where complex social transactions occur. Yet Tiruvaiydiu’s aradhana retains its stature as the authorising festival and source of legitimacy for all offerings to Tyagaraja. In the remainder of this essay, I take a brief

Downloaded from sar.sagepub.com at University of Texas Libraries on November 28, 2015 167 look at its history, consider the connections between Tyagaraja festivals and places, and offer some thoughts on how the dynamics of competition and segmentation play out within the transnational Indian arts network. The history of the Tiruvaiyaru Tyagaraja festival is itself a telling narrative of the invention of tradition. For the first sixty years after the composer’s death, Tyagaraja’s music was slowly spread by his direct disciples and their followers, who separated into three branches identified by the place-names Umayalapuram, Tdlaisthanam and Walajapet (Raghavan 1981:15). As printing presses became more common in South India, oral modes of transmission were aided by the publication of Tyagaraja’s lyrics in songbooks compiled and edited by his students (Jackson 1994:135). At the samaem, relatives and disciples erected a small stone structure enclosing a tulasi plant, which they visited once a year on the death anniversary. By 1905, this structure was in a state of disrepair, and the Umaydlapuram brothers, Krsna and Sundara Bhagavatar, were prompted to renovate it and reinstitute worship ceremonies. It was several years later that the annual aradhana took on its larger public character. Meanwhile, the first biographies of Tyagaraja were written, and legends of his life circulated among the populace through the medium of the , a popular art-form that combines dramatic narration and song. The first biographies were composed in Telugu by Venkataramana Bhdgavatar (1781-1874) and his son Krunasvami Bhagavatar (b. 1824) of the Walajapet branch of followers.6 Venkataramana also wrote elaborate poems celebrating his master in Sanskrit. Between 1871 and 1903, Krsna Bhagavatar was active in presenting that linked Ty>garkja’s songs to episodes of the Ramayana as well as to incidents from Tyägaräja’s own life (Jackson 1994: 136-7). Another famous harikatha performer, Narasimha Bhägavatar, collected Tyägaräja’s lyrics and life story together in a Telugu volume that was published in Madras in 1908. Through the medium of the popular harikatha, the legends of the poet-composer were kept alive and elaborated until he emerged into greater prominence in the twentieth century. Harikatha performances remained a central feature in the annual celebrations at Tiruvaiyaru through the 1940s, particularly as performed by Banni Bai, the disciple of the important patron, Nagaratnammal. With the addition of the alms-gathering processional known as uflchayQt6, the inclusion of many more musicians, expansion of rituals by priests, and large-scale feeding of Brahmins, the festival began to assume a grander form after 1907. The change in Tyagaraja’s popularity coincided with the nationalist period, when he appears to have become a symbol of essential Indian values and a culture hero. Tyagaraja’s achievements ranked him with the famed singers of the centuries-earlier bhakti revival - Mira Bai, Purandaradasa, and Kabir. He began to be celebrated as ’the Beethoven of

6 These biographies are discussed and presented in English translation in Jackson 1994: 57-79.

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South India’ and was seized upon as a synthesiser of native traditions, a creative genius (Jackson 1991: 95). Rival organisations now emerged in Tiruvaiyaru, each of which held separate annual functions to honour Tyagaraja. These were known as the ’large’ and ’small’ factions (periya and cinna kacci). In the 1920s and 30s, the ’small’ party congregated on the Kaveri ghat, celebrating the aradhana for five days, the last of which coincided with Tyagaraja’s death anniversary, whereas the ’large’ group met at the Sanskrit College and began their four-day celebration on the anniversary day itself. Together the Nrjdhani celebrations spanned nine days. Each party sponsored its own feeding, worship, music recitals, and harikathas, but they had to cooperate with each other on timing their access to the sacred memorial. Neither faction permitted women to appear on the concert stage during the Aradhana utsavam, despite the fact that women artists such as Vina Dhanammal, M.S. Subbulakshmi, and others had already achieved prominence (T. Sankaran 1988: 34). Around this time, Bangalore Nagaratnammal, a distinguished patron of the arts and musician of the professional (deva&dquo; or courtesan) class, become a devotee of Tyagaraja and undertook to erect a proper temple in his honour. The temple with its marble murti (image) of Tyagaraja was consecrated in 1925. Nagaratnammal established a third section of the annual festival featuring access for female performers, which met in front of the in a plantain grove. Around 1940, she acquired a large plot of land and donated it to the festival so that the growing crowds could be accommodated, a move which facilitated the merger of the three factions for joint celebrations (Jackson 1994: 146). Nagaratnammal’s disciple, the harikatha artist Banni BA!, recounts in her biography how increasing devotion to Tyagaraja induced Nagaratnammal to move permanently to Tiruvaiyaru, where she died in 1952; her sanigin was built very near to Tyiigariija IS.7 In 1941, the three factions came together with the formation of a united committee, the Sri Tyagabrahma Mahotsava Sabha, under whose auspices the festival in Tiruvaiyaru has been held ever since (Srinivasan 1991: 7). During the 1940s group singing of the paflcamma kptis was introduced (Jackson 1994: 141). Despite the unified banner, each group preserves the right to conduct its own religious observances. In addition to questions of access, there continue to be disagreements over ritual practices, for example whether the graddha ritual (offerings to ancestors) should be performed. One group claims that it is a compulsory practice for Brahmins, while another contends that in so far as Tyagaraja had joined an ascetic order shortly before he died, he had

7 Vasudha Narayanan graciously shared with me her unpublished translation of Banni Bai’s account of Nagaratnammal’s life. William Jackson has provided a synopsis of this biography and T. Sankaran’s together with his interpretive comments in Jackson 1994: 145-163.

Downloaded from sar.sagepub.com at University of Texas Libraries on November 28, 2015 169 entered into the casteless state of sannyas (renunciation), for which s~raddha is not enjoined. Another source of contention developed when Tyagaraja’s patriline terminated within two generations. One line of succession is observed through Tyagaraja’s elder brother, Jalpe§an or Japyesa, with whom the composer had disagreements resulting in the partition of the family property. A rival line based on matrilineal succession is maintained by the descendants of Tyagaraja’s wife’s brother. Tyigar4ja’s grand-niece and great grand-nephews in this line inherited Tyagaraja’s personal image of the deity Rama, and it now forms the central focus for their own aradhana festival held in Tanjavur every year, which they consider to be the only legitimate celebration (Tuttle 1992). Another division developed between the two small towns with which Tyagaraja’s life history is linked. On the one hand there is Tiruvarur, his birthplace, an ancient ksetra or cultural and religious centre (Raghavan 1981:8). It was at Tiruvarur that the great temple dedicated to Lord Tyagaraja stood, the manifestation of Siva for whom Tyagaraja was named. Tiruvarur, perhaps not coincidentally, was the birthplace of the other two members of the Karnatak music trinity, Muttusvami DIkuitar and Syama Sastri. Twenty miles away is Tiruvaiyaru, the place where Tyagaraja spent most of his life, wrote his compositions, and died. Here too stood a famous temple, dedicated to Paficanadisvara, ’lord of the five rivers,’ whose praise is found in the poems of the Tamil 8aivite poets, although Tiruvaiyaru derived its sanctity fundamentally from the proximity of the Kaveri river with its rich delta. Competition between the two places, one the seat of the deity Tyagaraja enshrined in the temple, the other the seat of the musician Tyagaraja at the samadhi, threads through the legends and emerges in the festivals celebrated today. Tiruvaiyaru has enjoyed hegemony in this unequal rivalry for some time. Its enormous festival attracts pilgrims from all over the south and the north of India, and live coverage of its events is broadcast by Doordarshan (India’s state-run television network) throughout the country. Inevitably perhaps, Tiruvaiyaru has also come to represent the evils of corruption, sycophantism, and publicity-seeking that beset the Kamatak music scene. A case study is provided by back-to-back reports in Sruti magazine of birthday celebrations for Tyagaraja held in Tiruvarur and Tiruvaiyaru in 1986. In Tiruvarur, home of the entire Trinity, the Kanchi Sankara Mutt (a Hindu religious body) renovated the houses that had belonged to the musicians’ families and then organised a festival attracting very large crowds and coverage on All-India Radio and Doordarshan. Meanwhile in Tiruvaiyaru, a much smaller observance of Tyagaraja’s birthday was carried out by fifty musicians from Madras. They took a procession through the streets to several temples, singing en route, and then started a 24-hour non - stop performance that concluded after 253 laitis had been rendered. A Sruti reporter

Downloaded from sar.sagepub.com at University of Texas Libraries on November 28, 2015 170 praised the latter group for its endurance in the scorching heat of May, while lamenting the lack of participation by the local people who had no idea that it was the saint’s jayanâ. The neglected jayan6 observance in Tiruvaiyaru formed a ’ridiculous’ contrast to the fame of its annual aradhana festival, even as the dedication and sincerity of its participants marked the event as ’sublime’ in the eyes of the reporter; the bigger Tiruvärür function amounted to merely a display of ’pomp and show’ ( Sruti Staff 1986; Thyagu 1986). In this and other possible examples, festivals and places are connected in a circular logic. Significantly, in neither Tiruvaiyaru nor Tiruvarur were the celebrations mounted by the inhabitants of the sacred locality; the organisers and main participants were outsiders who saw themselves as ’pilgrims.’ None the less, the proceedings of the festivals are interpreted as though they perfectly reflect the nature of the place and those who live there: the place’s prestige rises or falls according to how successful the festival is judged to be. Conversely, the festival’s success depends upon its location at a reputed, sanctified site. If a festival succeeds, its success is credited to the auspiciousness of its locale. If it fails in some way, perhaps there was a temporary defect in the bounty of the natural environment. Lamenting the lacklustre performance of the paifcaratna krids at the Tiruvaiy5ru festival in 1991, N. Srinivasan recited a long list of musical giants who used to grace the occasion. Then he remarked: ’Perhaps the flourish is also related to the flow of water in the Kaveri on whose banks the event is held. The greater emotional attachment and commitment to the aradhana shown by the earlier generation vidwans possibly paralleled the copiousness of the river’s flow in those years; the river was practically dry this year’ (Srinivasan 1991: 8). Negotiating the Expanded Cultural Landscape Temples and festivals have played a major role in the territorialisation of South India since early times. Kings, Brahmins, and other powerful groups have cemented their relationships to localities by constructing and endowing temples and sponsoring festivals. The establishment of a temple or festival sanctifies the local territory, transforming it into a sacred place, a ksetra.8 1fie notion of ksetra not only links the locality with transcendent sacrality; it also inscribes the locality in a wider geographic system. Only those sacred places that attract others from outside the locality, that draw pilgrims, retain their stature as ksetras. Rivalry between parallel sites develops as they compete to fulfil their requirements for pilgrims, resources, patronage, and fame.

8 These ideas have been elaborated by many scholars, but particularly relevant for diaspora studies is Fred W. Clothey’s discussion (Clothey 1983: 194-200). It is noteworthy that since 1977 and the founding of the Śri Venkateswara Temple at Penn Hills near Pittsburgh, more than fifty new Hindu temples have been established in the U.S.

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A similar constellation of beliefs about locality, sacrality, and prestige is apparent in the common South Indian practice of joining proper names with individuals’ native places. Among musicians, examples such as Madurai Seshagopalan, Palghat Mani Iyer, Mysore T. Chowdiah, the Bombay Sisters, Hyderabad Brothers and so on abound. By attaching their place of origin to their names, artists not only distinguish themselves from others with similar names, they credit the communities that nurtured their talent and link themselves to the histories of their regions. The assemblage of place-names signifies the extent of Karnatak music’s domain; as the list grows, the culture’s collective glory is magnified. It is noteworthy that this practice is being continued to some extent in the diaspora. One of the organisers of the Cleveland festival, a katljb-ff (tambourine) player, is known as ’Cleveland Balasubramaniam.’ In an ironic forecast of a future in which Karnatak music’s centre has shifted entirely to the diaspora, a Sruti staffer predicts that at the annual music season in Madras in the year 2027, the chief item will be an appearance of the Baltimore Brothers, with special accompaniment provided by Melbourne Mahadevan and Toronto Tanga Vel (S. Sankaran 1991: 35). Summing up these observations, the connections between music festivals, sacred sites, and personages illustrate the general principle of ’localisation of the universal’ (Clothey 1983:195). Within this larger context, the transplantation of Tyagaraja festivals to the diaspora can be understood as one instance of a continual process of reterritorialisation. Here, the effort to situate the music festival in a new locale follows a period of displacement ensuing upon migration. Through the reproduction of territorially-specific rituals and festivals, the new site is invested with the properties of sacrality and prestige. Symbols tied to localities - forms that might otherwise be called parochial - are in this instance highly effective in connecting groups to new places and rerooting people’s cultural lives (Jackson 1991: 106). As the celebration of festivals for Tyagaraja becomes localised in the new territory, the process of segmentation also sets in. Rival localities and organisations vie with each other to claim audiences, artists, and recognition. Tiruv5r r and Tiruvaiyaru are matched by pairs like Cleveland and Chicago, or Dayton and Columbus, jockeying for position. What is noteworthy is the choice of forum for projecting these new diasporic loyalties. Person-to-person speech serves as a primary medium of exchange, enhanced in North America by the ease of long-distance telephone communication. High-tech modes are also widely employed: computer bulletin boards link Karnatak music lovers, fax and e- mail assist organisers in quickly putting together concert programmes, and videotaping provides an instant archive for every cultural performance. But old-fashioned magazine columns and letters to the editor still serve in the playing out of local contests. Curiously, opinions about events in North America are channelled through Karnatak music’s capital thousands of miles away, the most popular print medium for these debates being Srud, the Indian music and dance magazine published in Madras.

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As an illustration of how print journalism is used to contest diasporic space, consider an exchange in several issues of Sruti in 1990-91. In the August 1990 issue an author from Westerville, Ohio, published an article called ‘Aradhanas Abroad,’ in which she recounted details of the Cleveland Tyagaraja aradhana and a combined Tyagaraja- Purandaradasa function held in Dayton. Seven issues and months later, the magazine published a letter from a reader from Columbus, who protested because the author of the previous article, although living in a suburb of Columbus, had failed to mention the annual festival for Tyagaraja and Purandaradasa held in that city. In Columbus’s favour, she stressed that its festival was the only programme in that area that brought together people from the whole Indian community, and that people attended from all over Ohio as well as from outside the state. Six months after that, the author of the original article responded, pointing out that the Columbus event had no invited artists performing; its evening concert featured its own organiser, she stated, implying that the group was ingrown and artistically undistinguished. Somewhat cryptically, she admonished her critic: ’in an attempt to vie with one another in celebrating the aradhana, one should not forget the spirit of Tyagaraja or that of his compositions’ (Shanker 1990; ’A Camatic Music-Lover’ 1991; Shanker 1991). What is curious in this altercation is that rivals living only a few miles apart resort to the pages of a journal that is published halfway around the world and reaches them only after a considerable duration. The dispute is publicised before a widely dispersed readership, of whom a majority are presumably resident Indians. If Tiruvarur and Tiruvaiyaru engaged in mutual recriminations through the pages of a New Delhi newspaper, one would perhaps have a parallel situation. Yet such an occurrence is not inconceivable, especially if one group were suddenly to be awarded a large subsidy by the Indian government. In the NRI (Non-Resident Indians’) case, the benefits to be gained by publicly detailing grievances are not material; they are in the realm of reputation, recognition, and respectability. These reports and complaints make appeals for acknowledgement of the new locales that patronise Kamatak music. They attempt to establish place-name recognition in India for new kse&m and to sort out the emerging hierarchy among them. Moreover, disputes about Tyagaraja festivals in the diaspora revolve around a broader, more problematic issue. Are Indians in North America genuinely interested in and devoted to Kamatak music? Is NRI attachment to Tyagaraja and his festival up to the standard found in India? Could it even be superior? In competing with each other for recognition in India, NRIs are demonstrating their accomplishments and challenging India itself. According to T. Temple Tuttle, an ethnomusicologist who has been involved in the organisation of the Cleveland festival since its inception, the abiding objective of the Indian community in North America is to preserve tradition better than is being done in India (conversation, April 20, 1992). At one level, this desire to outdo

Downloaded from sar.sagepub.com at University of Texas Libraries on November 28, 2015 173 the homeland betrays an insecurity about the lack of cultural pedigree among NRIs. Some of those who organise festivals, establish music societies, teach their children, and otherwise engage with the arts, have little previous training in such areas. Their families were not the ones who produced concert performers or led sa6has, and even attendance at programmes was something they became interested in only after settling abroad. One also hears organisers say that given the uncertain future of their cultural traditions in their new environment and the ease with which their children are becoming mainstreamed, they must work even harder to strengthen their community organisations and promote Indian arts. A sense of urgency energises them, and they feel slighted and misunderstood when their considerable efforts are not given credit. At another level, some organisers feel that only in the diaspora can the performing arts escape the pressures towards commercialisation, nepotism, declining taste, and other problems that are perceived as rampant in India. Theirs is a mission to restore sobriety and high standards to the concert scene both in terms of production values and aesthetics. These aspirations trigger anxieties back in India that run through the pages of Sruti. Will the banner of Karnatak music ultimately pass outside the subcontinent? What would that mean for the sacred connection between the music and its home territory? Can the relationship between art and the transcendent so powerfully symbolised in Tyagaraja be preserved in the supposedly godless, materialistic West?

List of References

’A -Lover,’ 1991. ’Aradhanas Abroad,’ Sruti 78 (March), 8. Clothey, F.W., 1983. Rhythm and Intent: Ritual Studies from South India. Madras: Blackie & Son Publishers. Jackson, W., 1991. Tyagarja: Life and Lyrics. Madras: Oxford University Press. Jackson, W.J., 1994. Tyagarja and the Renewal of Tradition. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers. Kumar, M., 1994. ’Mujibur and Baboo in America,’ India Currents (San Jose, CA), 8:8 (November), 7. Narayanan, V., 1992. ’Creating the South Indian "Hindu" Experience in the United States.’ In R.B. Williams, ed., Modern Transmission of Hindu Traditions in India and Abroad (Chambersburg, PA: Anima Publications), 147-176. Raghavan, V., 1981. ’Saint Tyagarja: Introductory Thesis.’ In C. Ramanujachari and V. Raghavan, The Spiritual Heritage of Tyagarja (Madras: Sri Ramakrishna Math), 1-206. Ramanujan, A.K., trans., 1981. Hymns for the Drowning: Poems for Visnu by Nammalvar. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Rao, T.K.G., ed., 1995. Compositions of Tyagarja. Madras: Ganamandir Publications.

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Sangeet Natak Academy Bulletin, 1967. Special Tyagarja Number. (October- December) Sankaran, S., 1991. ’Carnatic Music & NRIs,’ Sruti 77 (February), 35. Sankaran, T., 1988. ’Ariyakudi: Attitude Towards the Fair Sex,’ Sruti 42 (March), 34. Shanker, M., 1990. ’Aradhanas Abroad,’ Sruti 71 (August), 15. Shanker, M., 1991. ’Response to CM Lover,’ Sruti 84 (September), 6. Sohoni, N.K., 1994. ’The Bias that Plagues the Media,’ India Currents, 8:8 (November), 29. Srinivasan, N., 1991. ’Tyagaraja Aradhana in Tiruvaiyaru: Mahotsava Sabha’s Golden Jubilee Programme,’ Sruti 77 (February), 7-8. Sruti Staff, 1986. ’Tiruvarur Trinity Jayanti Festival.’ Sruti #3 (June-July), 13. Tharu, S. and K. Lalita, eds., 1991. Women Writing in India, Vol. 1. New York: The Feminist Press. Thyagu, 1986. ’Jayanti in Tiruvaiyaru: Sublime plus Ridiculous.’ Sruti 23 (June-July), 13. Tuttle, T.T., 1992. ’The Thyagaraja Aradhana in Historical Perspective.’ In souvenir brochure for the 15th Year Celebration of Sri Tyagarja Music Festival at Cleveland State University and Siva Vishnu Temple, n.p. ’United States of Little Indias: Hindu Revival in an Alien Land,’ 1992. In Little India (Reading, PA), (November) 14. Williams, R.B., ed., 1992. Modern Transmission of Hindu Traditions in India and Abroad. Chambersburg, PA: Anima Publications.

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