Kanakangi
Kanakangi raga is the 1st Melakarta raga among the 72 ragas that constitute the Melakarta system of Carnatic music. Kanakangi literally means ‘the one who is golden bodied’. The Muthuswami Dikshitar school calls this raga Kanakambari and it is indeed a golden raga that evokes love and submission.
Arohana: S R1 G1 M1 P D1 N1 S
Avarohana: S N1 D1 P M1 G1 R1 S
Kanakangi is a sampurna raga meaning it has all the seven swaras in it. As is seen in the arohana and avarohana, it consists of all shuddha swaras. The notes are shadjam, shuddha rishabham, shuddha gandharam, shuddha madhyamam, panjamam, shuddha dhaivatham and shuddha nishadham. The suffix ‘1’ given to the swaras Ri, Ga, Ma, Da and Ni denotes that these are all shuddha swaras.
Kanakangi has 11 janya ragas and some of them are Kanakatody, Karnataka Shuddha Saveri and Lavangi. This raga is not popularly sung in concerts and the reason is unknown. To eliminate the vivadi dosha of this raga, Dikshitar has made use of vakra swaras in his compositions.
There are a few famous compositions in this raga which are Sri Gananatham Bhajamyaham by Thyagaraja, Kanakangaka by Koteeswara Iyer and Sreesa Putraya by Dr. M. Balamuralikrishna. A popular film song in Kanakangi raga is Moham Ennum from the Tamil movie Sindhu Bhairavi. This is a wonderful composition by Ilayaraja sung by Dr. K. J. Yesudas.