KArvai – Silent space represented by a comma or dot in notation.
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Gati or Nadai – Pulse or gait of the tala. It is not too relevant here, but we will adhere to the convention of referring to the subunits of Aksharas as ‘subunits’ and not ‘matras’. The term ‘matra’ actually refers to duration of 4 Aksharas. These are erroneously referred to as ‘matras’ by some, but we will avoid that connotation in the interest of adhering to the original definition in musical treatises. Subunits – The units contained within an akshara. Similarly the Akshara could contain a variety of subunits that represent a Tishra gati, Chaturashra gati, Khanda gati, Mishra gati or Sankeerna gati. One litre could be a measurement for any liquid, water, milk or juice.
![what is the meaning of daruvu in carnatic music theory what is the meaning of daruvu in carnatic music theory](https://i0.wp.com/www.musicnamaste.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/img_history_hires.jpg)
A good analogy is just as one litre is a measuring unit for volume, an Akshara is a measuring unit for Tala. An Akshara can carry any number of subunits within it, upon which depends the classification of the gati of the tala. Note that Aksharas are just measuring units for tala. When no other details are specified, we assume that the Adi tala is in Chaturashra gati and rendered with 4 subunits in each Akshara. Normally Adi tala would be considered to have 8 Aksharas. A tala can be expressed in terms of the number of Aksharas. BACK TO LAYA Learn the terminologies used in Laya in Carnatic Music such as Aksharas, Gatis, Kalais, Jatis and many other terms.Īkshara – Fundamental units that make up a tala.