There are hundreds of ragas in Carnatic music born from the 72 parent ragas or melakarta ragas. Even half among these parent scales are not heard on music platforms.

In an effort to make them familiar, Carnatic vocalist R.K. Padmanabha has employed these 72 ragas for 72 not-so-familiar compositions of saint-poet Purandaradasa.

Vidwan Padmanabha has chosen and sung these kritis, and the pioneering effort will be released in the form of two CDs, ‘Purandara Mela Mala’ on Sunday at 10.30 a.m. on Our School premises in Banashankari 2nd Stage. His weekly workshop on ‘Purandara Mela Mala’ will start from Sunday at Ramamandira in N.R. Colony at 4 p.m.

The morning event will also see the release of a book with complete notations of the 72 kritis by Vidwan Padmanabha. “While several musicians such as vocalist M. Balamuralikrishna, vainika R.K. Surya Narayana and vocalist Mysore Rangaiah have composed in the 72 melakarta ragas, I chose to expose the scales with Purandaradasa’s compositions to make them more accessible to the public,” says Vidwan Padmanabha, whose coffee-table book on Purandaradasa — a study on how the saint-poet earned the title of ‘Pitaamaha of Carnatic music’ — will also be released on the occasion.

Being a teacher, Vidwan Padmanabha is familiar with the masterpieces of composers right from the 13th century. The lyrics of such compositions are commentaries on social inequalities, apart from bhakti , drawing analogies from mythology, history and culture. Vidwan Padmanabha says he chose Purandaradasa’s kritis to showcase the 72 ragas because the saint-poet’s work reveals he was the foremost to advocate social reforms through in his lyrics and was the greatest teacher in the cultural history of India. “Purandaradasa lead the way for the bhakti-oriented genre to transform into an art form with his pioneering lessons for the beginners,” says Vidwan Padmanabha.