Devi Krithi - Himadri Suthe Pahimam - Shyama Shastry

Hello to all and wishing you a very happy Navarathri/Dasara festival. My interest in music has peaked over the past couple of years.I am really fortunate to have friends with excellent tastes and deep knowledge in music. My heartfelt thanks to all of them. Please do keep sharing your knowledge and treasures with others. A lot of music has been composed on Devi. Shyama Shastry is part of the Musical Trinity of Carnatic Music (along with Thyagaraja and Muthuswami Dikshitar) and his music is really mind blowing. He has composed the least among the trinity (about 65) but each of his song is an exquisite gem.

Today let us listen to one such gem in Kalyani ragam called 'himAdri sUthe, pAhi mAm'.I have been a fan of this song for a long time now. This is one of my favs in Kalyani ragam. I first heard it when we were watching G V Iyer's 'Hamsageethe' which was an adaptation of a novel by TaRaSu. In that movie this song is sung by Balamurali for Anant Nag (and somebody else whose name I do not remember now for his guru). I must have watched this movie during high school time and since then this song has been one of my favs. The lyrics for the song -

Raga: kalyANi / Tala: rUpakam
P: himAdrisutE pAhimAm varadE paradEvatE
A: sumErumaddhya vAsini shrI kAmAkSi
C1: hEmagAtri paHNkajanEtri mataHNgAtmajE sarOjabhava harIsha sura munIndranutE
C2: ambujAri nibhavadanE mauktikamaNihArashObhamAna gaLE bhakta kalpa latE
C3: shyAmakRSNa sOdari gauri paramEshvari girijAla nIlavENi kIravANi shrI lalitE

I think the song is aptly set in Kalyani ragam. Kalyani (or mechakalyani) is the 65th ragam in the sampurna melakarta scheme. It should probably be the most popular and easily recognised ragam.

Please listen to Shri T V Shankaranarayanan sing this gem composed by Shyama Shastry -