The Kanchi Seer has said that Brahmins are (and were) part and parcel of Dravidian culture always and they are not immigrants like some Dravidian Movements (and others) claim and believe.
I don't know how much of this is based on credible historical facts - but am sure interested to know how far we can go back in time on this issue with acceptable (close to fact) theories.
I wonder what fundamental property of our brain makes us appreciate musical tunes (or raagaas).
How is it that there seems to be an almost definite distinction between what is in-tune and what is out-of-tune (abaswaram)?
Assuming that SOUND is a continuum - extending from negative infinity (base tune) to positive infinity (high pitch) - is there an analytic definition of what sequences of sounds will constitute "in-tune" and what constitutes "out-of-tune"?
And what is it that a Musical System - like say Carnatic - is trying to achieve by binding itself into rules. Is it just trying to operate on a restricted (discrete) domain instead of the whole of the Sound Continuum? If yes, what is the point of doing that?
I tried looking at the definition of Raaga (in Carnatic terms) as a function F that maps the finite set (1, 2, 3... n) into the Sound Continuum with a given set of rules. For eg., one rule might be -
--> F(x) always belongs to one of (Sa, R1, R2, ..... , Ni2) in some scale and not to intermediate sounds. Like the sound between Sa and Ri1.
I am in the process of building this definition into a more complete form. May be an analytic definition already exists and is well known. But I am still on the look out for one and when I am in that process I wont keep myself from trying to build my own definitions. It is fun trying to make these things analytic.
Please pool in your ideas if any. I have just drafted my own without actually trying to spend time in bringing them to any kind of final form! :-)