{"id":5635,"date":"2008-04-10T14:54:08","date_gmt":"2008-04-10T13:54:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/?p=5635"},"modified":"2008-04-10T14:54:52","modified_gmt":"2008-04-10T13:54:52","slug":"learn-to-play-mrdanga","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/?p=5635","title":{"rendered":"Learn to play Mrdanga"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Sita Pati Das<\/strong><\/p>\n

To help strengthen our mrdanga playing culture, I have produced a book with 50 bonafide mrdanga beats in it. These beats are all notated using a “tablature-style” notation, like the one below:<\/p>\n

<\/center> <\/p>\n

These beats are taken from standard ISKCON kirtan beats and beats used by mrdanga players in the Vrndavana 24-hour kirtan.<\/p>\n

You can download the book from the following link:
\nThe Art and Science of Harinam Sankirtan Yaj\u00f1a<\/a><\/p>\n

By learning and teaching to play the mrdanga properly we can preserve and strengthen our Vaisnava culture and heritage, as we simultaneously adopt and adapt new innovations and assimilate existing elements in the cultural space that we are expanding into. Staying connected to our core allows us to deal with new elements in a healthy, non-fanatical way.<\/p>\n

There is ongoing controversy surrounding the use of djembe drums in ISKCON Vaisnava kirtan. Recently we had the mercy of Bada Hari das, who came to our annual Vaisnava Retreat for preaching staff in Brisbane. After one kirtan there featuring a djembe drum he shared a saying, apparently common around New Rama Reti, Alachua: “When a djembe plays a gandharva falls from the sky”. After that we shelved the djembe for the rest of the retreat. Generally we use mrdangas, and sometimes use the djembe to fortify the bottom end in big kirtans.<\/p>\n

I’m agnostic on the djembe. Some devotees object to the materials used to make it, but of course you can get djembes made from synthetic materials, similar to our Balaram mrdangas. Personally I prefer and play the mrdanga, and if I were to use another drum in kirtan I prefer the darbuka, or Egyptian tabla. I think that there are two reasons why djembes are rising in popularity in ISKCON kirtan. One reason is that they are relatively easy to play, or begin to play, compared to a mrdanga. To play the mrdanga effectively in kirtan takes a longer time and a greater amount of practice. Another reason is that djembes are easier to obtain than mrdangas. They are sold in most drum shops in modern cities, and can be supported with spare parts, maintenance, and professional tuning, easily and widely.<\/p>\n

One of the drawbacks of the easier entry level of djembes is that djembe players inexperienced in playing mrdanga beats sometimes play the drum in such a way that it does not reinforce the mrdanga beat, but clashes with or overrides it.<\/p>\n

A stronger culture of mrdanga playing and proficiency in ISKCON, combined with more local production of mrdangas using locally available technologies, materials, and designs, will have the effect of reducing the influx of djembes, and will also assist to make the integration of the djembe and other drums more organic. This way the djembe will not replace the mrdanga or compete with it, but rather in instances where it is present it will complement it.<\/p>\n

So I hope that devotees will take advantage of this book to strengthen the culture of mrdanga playing in ISKCON.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"HareBy Sita Pati Das<\/strong><\/p>\n

To help strengthen our mrdanga playing culture, I have produced a book with 50 bonafide mrdanga beats in it. These beats are all notated using a “tablature-style” notation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5635","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-sita-pati-das"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5635","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5635"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5635\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}