Singing in the ramayana gole
The Hindu traditions in Guyana date back to when the indentured immigrants came and some of them started to find ways to keep the traditions alive. One of the traditions is the singing of chowtaal and ramayana in groups, or goles.
Chowtaals are songs sung at Phagwah time. The Ramayana is the story of Rama and Sita, which exists in various versions. The Tulsidas version - the Shri Ramcharitmanas is the popular one in Guyana.
So, how does the gole work? The groups used to be men, usually from a village and affiliated with a mandir. The men mostly had to learn Hindi or Awadhi, or they would have learnt by rote the sounds. The tunes are called 'baani'.
The instruments are the dholak which keeps the rythmn and the jaal which the singers use to keep the time.
I have been singing Ramayana since 1987 or thereabouts when a random group was formed which consisted of men from all over Georgetown who had been part of other village goles. We called our selves the Torchlight Ramayana Gole since we had torchlights in blackout. The Ramayana we used , some of them had big writing which we could have seen with lamplight or candle light.. like it must have been back in the day. The name changed to the Amar Deep Ramayana Gole.. still to do with light.
The older men died or could not come anymore. The need to know to read the Devnagari Hindi script meant that there was a smaller pool of people who could sing.
The availability of the transliterated text of the Ramayana meant that the goles could be revived. This is a sample of a page from the Gita Press Ramayana
(click on the image to enlarge it)
It is difficult to talk about singing, without having some audio, so we have to work on that for this blog.
How does it work?
The gole is organised into two sides, facing each other. One side 'raises' the relevant baani or tune - it could be a few lines from a bhajan or song, and then the other side will repeat. Each one of the metres in the Ramayana has a different set of tunes. We usually sing the sumiran, the chowpaii and the dohas. There are also chands which some goles would sing, and the other shlokas.
The singing is described as 'lusty' , in other words not much tune or harmony or melody. the trouble is, that because we think we are singing lustily, we believe that we do not need to be in sync and we often realise the fallacy of thinking we could sing 'any how'. It is also a challenge when singing rapidly to a faster beat, to pronounce all the Hindi words.. and we hope and pray that we are not cursing God when we are singing. I have a fear that one day there will be a fluent Hindi scholar in the audience who might be horrified and might ask us to stop singing.
The joy of singing this style though, is that it is like singing in the bathroom without worrying too much about how good your voice is or whether you are in beat or not. Many of the people who like kirtan find the gole style a challenge because of the faster pace and the need to raise the joyful voice unto the Lord.
The gole goes around to different mandirs and households on invitation. There are different parts of the Ramayana which are sung for different occassions. Each gole would have their favourite parts. Our gole likes the Shivari Katha when Lord Rama talks about the nine forms of devotion. Other parts are the part when Sugriva is dying and Lord Rama tells Tara not to mourn.
Many people have had different reactions when listening to the gole. Many people appreciate the keeping of the traditions and the joy of the group singing. Other people like the heavy rythmn. Some people think it is too noisy.
One traveller from the USA, a young doctor of Christian Marathi origins said that the two hours he spent listening to the gole practice were the best in his travels,, since he felt the connection through time and space with the group that was singing.
Chowtaals are songs sung at Phagwah time. The Ramayana is the story of Rama and Sita, which exists in various versions. The Tulsidas version - the Shri Ramcharitmanas is the popular one in Guyana.
So, how does the gole work? The groups used to be men, usually from a village and affiliated with a mandir. The men mostly had to learn Hindi or Awadhi, or they would have learnt by rote the sounds. The tunes are called 'baani'.
The instruments are the dholak which keeps the rythmn and the jaal which the singers use to keep the time.
I have been singing Ramayana since 1987 or thereabouts when a random group was formed which consisted of men from all over Georgetown who had been part of other village goles. We called our selves the Torchlight Ramayana Gole since we had torchlights in blackout. The Ramayana we used , some of them had big writing which we could have seen with lamplight or candle light.. like it must have been back in the day. The name changed to the Amar Deep Ramayana Gole.. still to do with light.
The older men died or could not come anymore. The need to know to read the Devnagari Hindi script meant that there was a smaller pool of people who could sing.
The availability of the transliterated text of the Ramayana meant that the goles could be revived. This is a sample of a page from the Gita Press Ramayana
It is difficult to talk about singing, without having some audio, so we have to work on that for this blog.
How does it work?
The gole is organised into two sides, facing each other. One side 'raises' the relevant baani or tune - it could be a few lines from a bhajan or song, and then the other side will repeat. Each one of the metres in the Ramayana has a different set of tunes. We usually sing the sumiran, the chowpaii and the dohas. There are also chands which some goles would sing, and the other shlokas.
The singing is described as 'lusty' , in other words not much tune or harmony or melody. the trouble is, that because we think we are singing lustily, we believe that we do not need to be in sync and we often realise the fallacy of thinking we could sing 'any how'. It is also a challenge when singing rapidly to a faster beat, to pronounce all the Hindi words.. and we hope and pray that we are not cursing God when we are singing. I have a fear that one day there will be a fluent Hindi scholar in the audience who might be horrified and might ask us to stop singing.
The joy of singing this style though, is that it is like singing in the bathroom without worrying too much about how good your voice is or whether you are in beat or not. Many of the people who like kirtan find the gole style a challenge because of the faster pace and the need to raise the joyful voice unto the Lord.
The gole goes around to different mandirs and households on invitation. There are different parts of the Ramayana which are sung for different occassions. Each gole would have their favourite parts. Our gole likes the Shivari Katha when Lord Rama talks about the nine forms of devotion. Other parts are the part when Sugriva is dying and Lord Rama tells Tara not to mourn.
Many people have had different reactions when listening to the gole. Many people appreciate the keeping of the traditions and the joy of the group singing. Other people like the heavy rythmn. Some people think it is too noisy.
One traveller from the USA, a young doctor of Christian Marathi origins said that the two hours he spent listening to the gole practice were the best in his travels,, since he felt the connection through time and space with the group that was singing.
I am that young doctor and, truly, the Ramayana chants I observed were absolutely the highlight of my travels through Guyana. There is a certain connectedness in Guyanese Hinduism that cannot be found anywhere else in the world, the type that exudes peace and fosters a strong sense of community. Was truly a blessing to bear witness to this beauty.
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