No single musician has done more than Pandit Ravi Shankar (left) to popularize Indian classical music worldwide, across cultures, languages and races. If this web site is to disseminate information on our music around the world, thanks to the internet, Ravi Shankar is the rightful symbol for our meager efforts.  
The Authors: We are Ramni Prasad, 78, a retired automobile engineer and L. Dayal, 80, a retired civil servant, living in Patna, India. We are not musicologists. Our claim for presenting this narrative rests solely on the addiction to classical music we have maintained over past 60 years. That should make this essay proper food for the uninitiated who just love music, but would like to know what it is all about.

Opening Notes:

India’s music, with a history of development over several centuries, going back to the Vedic period (about 1500 years before Christ) is a deep and vast sea not easy to fathom.

       What is unique about India’s classical music? Compared to other forms of art, all music is universal in nature, as its material is human voice or sound which is not specific to territories and cultures. Poetry, for example, is closely cultural since its material is language which is nothing but a repository of such thoughts and experiences as have been shared in a particular culture over the ages. The fact remains, however, that music too, somewhat indirectly, is an expression of a given cultural tradition. The subtle relationship of music and culture is the field of the social anthropologist; we would, as laymen, indicate certain features of Indian music which are unique to it. For example, India’s music works on the principle of melody, rather than harmony as in Western music. The Indian mind had speculated over the cosmic one-ness of creation much ahead of any other civilization in the world; great civilizations like China, Babylon (modern Iraq) and Egypt arose earlier than the Vedic civilization of the Aryans, but their mind could not reach up to cosmic reality. Convergence, rather than duality, of opposites has been unique to the Indian mind - hence melody. The other distinctive feature is the preoccupation with numbers, with mathematics. The concept of Taal is a wholesale exercise in mathematics. This is allied to the concept of Time which is the framework of our classical music. Time is broken down into minutest units making up a discipline within which the performer must stay. Different dimensions of the music are expressed in numbers. There are 7 swars, 22 imperceptible sounds, shruti, between two swars, 3 saptaks (mandra, madhyam, and taar), 2 stages in all Kheyal singing, sthayi (stable) and antaraa (rising), 3 motions, laya (alaap, madhya laya, and drut laya), and so on. Finally, the hallmark of Indian music is the limitless field it offers for improvisation and virtuosity. It is not orchestrated, and is not written down, unlike Western music. While the framework imposes great discipline, within the area the performer can bring his or her genius into full play. Does this not remind you of the markedly individualistic nature of Hindu religion, where spiritual experience is a matter between the person and God, not in need of any organizational and collective system, as in Judaism and Christianity? Indeed, sometimes the improvisations presented by great masters are so inspirational that they themselves would find it hard to repeat them.

Limits to Our Task: South Indian Music

	The greatest figure in South Indian music in modern times, M.S. Subbulakshmi, was proficient in both schools.

 At this stage, let us point out we are not going to give a comprehensive survey of Indian music. We would refer only to classical music of North India, with which we are familiar. South Indian music, generally called “Carnatac” music, has traditions as magnificent as in the North. There are, however, certain unique features. The sound frequency of every note is markedly high. The Raags have been carefully listed out and numbered, and sometimes they are referred to by their number. For example, Raag Vachaspati would be announced as Number 54. (Does it reflect the meticulous mind of South Indian communities?) The dividing lines between the music of North and South are necessarily becoming lighter in present times, although the high frequency of sound still creates a problem for North Indian listeners. The Raags are mostly the same, but names would be different. Typical South Indian instruments are not in vogue in the North. While Pakhawaj is universally used for South Indian music, as Tabla in the North, the Nadaswaram (a long trumpet) and the Ghatam (the pitcher) are wholly South Indian. All these differences, however, no longer mean a cultural divide. The greatest figure in South Indian music in modern times, M.S. Subbulakshmi, was proficient in both schools. Dr. Rajam, trained in South Indian music, is the doyen of Indian violinists today, North and South put together. Above all, duet performances between North Indian and South Indian artists are now being presented.

How is music communicated? Written or Verbal?

       If our classical music is that old, how has it survived, and developed, over time? Not by being recorded on paper and preserved for posterity, as in Western music. If has been a chain of communication between master and disciple, what is called guru-shisya parampara. And there were no schools where there would be teachers and students. The guru-shisya relationship was totally personal. The student was like a son to the master or a servant who would be living with him in most cases (Ustad Allauddin Khan worked as a domestic servant in the house of his Ustad). This relationship led to the emergence of the Gharana system, which we discuss later.

	Indian classical music, never written and, therefore, never distributed to aspiring musicians, is learned at the feet of one's master. Ustad Allauddin Khan, when learning his craft, even worked as a domestic servant in his master's home.

In modern times, with culture getting democratized and people in general willing- and able- to savor its fruits, classical music could not remain confined to close circles as above, practiced professionally, and enjoyed by the elite. Sometime at the beginning of the past century, efforts were made in Maharastra to bring down on paper the vocal music known through the ages and a system of ‘notation’ was devised. This happened under the guidance of that forerunner of the renaissance of Indian music, Pandit Vishnu Digambar(father of D. V. Paluskar) in the twenties. The whole system was formulated by Pandit Bhatkhande of Poona, who produced four volumes of notations of classical singing handed down from generations. This surely led to increasing number of people coming to learn classical music, particularly girls in middle class families across the country.