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Hare Krishna dear devotees, please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Srila
\nPrabhupada.
\nISKCON has become a huge worldwide movement that consists of people from every
\npossible country and language background in the world. It is definitely easy to miss or even
\nnot find the correct Sanskrit pronunciation among its members, as every one of us brings
\npronunciation traits and accents from our native languages. Let alone this, many devotees
\nend up creating their own conventions of how words in songs or mantras should sound, and
\nthese "conventions" are accepted as a standard for the next generation of devotees.
\nTo briefly illustrate what I am talking about, we often hear 'n\u0101ma om' or 'n\u0101mas te
\n[narasimh\u0101ya]', with the first 'a' in 'nama' and 'namas' unnecessarily stretched. The correct
\nway of pronouncing both the examples, even in singing, would be 'nama o\u1e41…' and 'namas
\nte…' – keeping the initial syllable 'na' short. Also, we've heard things like 'hey radhey vraja-
\ndeyvikey', where the vowel 'e' is wrongly changed to 'ey.'
\nSo, if you were ever curious about whether your pronunciation of the standard ISKCON
\nSanskrit prayers and songs is OK or not, there is a good news for you. Nity\u0101nanda D\u0101sa, a
\nstudent of H.G.Gop\u012bpara\u1e47adhana Prabhu, who has been working professionally in the field
\nof Sanskrit for more than 15 years (as a BBT Sanskrit editor & online Sanskrit instructor), has
\ncome up with an online course, which he offers for free to all, and especially the devotees of
\nISKCON. The course is entitled "Sanskrit Pronunciation for ISKCON," and it focuses on the
\ncorrect way of pronouncing and even singing the standard prayers and verses that comprise
\nthe well-known book "Songs of the Vai\u1e63\u1e47ava \u0101c\u0101ryas" by the BBT.
\nThe course has two parts. The first part consists of demo videos, where Nity\u0101nanda D\u0101sa
\nsings or chants through the prayers with a minimal music accompaniment, so that the
\nattention of the listener is solely focused on the pronunciation. You will be encouraged to
\nimbibe the proper Sanskrit sound just by listening to the demos regularly for a certain
\nperiod of time. The second part of the course – tutorials – presents to you the detailed
\nanalysis of every verse, line, and even many words of every prayer. You will be introduced
\nto the foundational principles of Sanskrit chanting and learn how to apply them right away,
\nin your daily spiritual programs. Moreover, the course offers you a downloadable manual,
\nwith all the course notes and more in a PDF form, along with the mp3 playlist that you can
\nuse offline anywhere you go.
\nOverall, it is a unique, unprecedented program that fills a very important need of the
\nISKCON society, and I sincerely hope that devotees will take advantage of this great
\nopportunity to learn and improve their Sanskrit pronunciation and chanting skills for their
\nown, as well as the whole movement's benefit.
\nNow, someone could come and say, "Come on! This is spiritual singing! Don't burden us
\nwith these rules of Sanskrit. It is bhakti, from the heart, pronunciation is not that
\nimportant!"<\/p>\n
All right, prabhu, pronunciation is not that important, as you say, but let's assume you're a
\nnative English speaker, and someone who is very close to you sings on your birthday:
\n"Huppy beerthday tow yow…" How would you feel? Yes, it is cute, especially if the person
\nsang it with love, but it is also true that if you would point out to your friend that the words
\nhave to be pronounced in a certain way, he or she would surely listen to you and eagerly try
\nto adopt the proper way of pronouncing the song – to make you even happier! It's the same
\nlove, and it will find its way to express itself in all areas of reciprocation, including singing
\nand chanting.
\nSo, we love Prabhup\u0101da, previous \u0101c\u0101ryas, Krishna and his incarnations, etc, and many
\nsongs written in their praise just happen to be in Sanskrit. Therefore, motivated by that
\nsame love, let's try to make those songs sound in the way they were meant to, for the
\npleasure of whom they glorify. This would be the right, devotional mood with which we can
\napproach this "Sanskrit Pronunciation for ISKCON" course. So, take it as your loving offering
\nor as an austerity of speech, the results of which you offer to Krishna.
\nThe last point to add is that there is an ancient tradition of spiritual singing in India. For
\nexample, in \u015ar\u012b Vai\u1e63\u1e47ava samprad\u0101ya, M\u0101dhva samprad\u0101ya, Vallabha samprad\u0101ya, and
\nmany other disciplic successions. The members of those spiritual lineages have many
\nSanskrit texts that they regularly chant and sing. Their pronunciation standards are very
\ngood and they maintain the main principles of Sanskrit pronunciation, starting from long
\nand short vowels, even in singing. So I firmly believe that the existing ISKCON devotees
\ncertainly can and should learn, preserve, and even teach to the newcomers the correct
\nSanskrit pronunciation, chanting and singing the basic prayers that all devotees are
\nsupposed to know. And the upcoming course – "Sanskrit pronunciation for ISKCON" very
\nmuch seems to be a step in the right direction.
\nThe course will be going live very soon – on October 15 (Vijaya Da\u015bam\u012b). You can already pre-
\nenrol in and access it here: www.sanskritsense.com
\nAlso, the course will be published on the ISKCON Kirtan Ministry website on the same date:
\nwww.iskconkirtanministry.com
\nyour servant, Shri Krishna Caitanya Swami<\/p>\n