Content; Introduction. Page|1Methodological concepts.
Page|2Bio-musicology.Ethnomusicology.Significance of environment.Psychology of music.Role of music.History and development page|7of Indian music systems.
Ancient India.Medieval India.Modern India.Musical classification of page|9 India.Social construction of page|10Performances in Hindustani Musical system.
Influences on Indian music system. Page|11Instruments of Hindustani (north Indian) page|13musical system. Indian music festivals. Page|Conclusion. Page|References.
Page| Introduction; Dedicated scholars, scientists have conducted several similar studies in the field of music as a social institution, targeting a global approach for any music regardless of genre, with motive to understand music as social practices through processes like ethnographic field work. Ethnomusicologist study musical practices all over the world, tying to establish a relation with the elements of social life. This research seeks to do the same to understand the musical practices, development, functions and influences among the Indian (Hindustani) musical system. The research begins with the understanding of music an important social institution of India, Vedic chants can be understood as the origination or indication of music practices. There are mentions and writings about musical practices, power and performances and its divine origin in the mythological writing of India in forms of ragas. As music practices predates Vedic times there is a need to understand the development evolution and influences of Indian music system on society.
By 16th century, musical unit of India went through classification into two varieties of a musical culture depending upon the area of geographical practices. The classification of carnatic music from Hindustani music was understood as a result of various cultural influences shaping the practices of musical arts. This research intends to understand the evolution of Hindustani music due to the influence of various rulers and leaders of north India and their particular cultural practices Influencing the musical scenario and performances in north India. The social construct and elements were understood through various ways to understand the concept of hierarchy and other social issues such as lineage, which makes up the procedure and practices of performances in Hindustani music, and establish the major units of musical centres and families referred as Gharanas.Methodological concepts; To collect the amount information required to establish a basic understanding of the musical system of India various techniques and methodologies were used. Basic research methodology a tool of anthropology established by the works of Malinowski, Radcliff brown, Franz boas consisted various strategies for data collection in ethnographic fieldwork, techniques like participant and non participant observation, interviews. While in cases of conducting a research on music as a part of society, comes under the discipline of musicology musicologists use anthropological tools to understand the general influence of culture on music and there interrelation.Bio-musicology: The ability to entrain body movements to an external time force or keeper which was marked by Brown, Manken and Wallin.
This feature distinguished the Homo sapiens from other higher mammals. They explained that human beings have the ability to entrain there bodily movements to an external time keeper such as a beating drum and the ability to move rhythmically. This ability was used to establish the influence of music in bodily movements which could be understood as an enforcer of role for each individual in performing such musical arts. Roles of musicians performing Hindustani music are heavily influenced by the factor of amusement and entertainment therefore musician’s ability to create the perfect symphony to attract followers which could be interpreted as a distinction between the soloists and the accompanist.
Ethnomusicology: Branch of musicology that deals with the study of ethnic music and musical origins can be defined as the study of pattern of sounds produced by humans to which the members of a culture conceive as music. Humanly produced music generally have particular common characteristics leading to formations of different genre using different aspects and instruments formed on common origin sharing similar musical notes in different cultural connotations. Entertainment though studied in various aspects, a number of approaches of earlier phase have been done with interest in ethnomusicology. Alan Lomax one of the first ethnomusicologists took interest in the field of entertainment in his article “the cross cultural variations of rhythmic styles” in 1982, the study was focused on musical interactions and the role of rhythm in social relations.
Rhythm plays a role in integration of member by providing common frame work for identification. Rhythmic patterns encourage the members in coordinating their energies and facilitating co-activity.Such rhythmic styles style when passed on through generations may shape various aspects of different cultural traditions.Significance of environment: Environment as the provider of resources influence in shaping the music culture of any society. Resources in the form of raw materials help in formation of various different instruments resulting in production of different sounds. An ethnographic study in the community of bastar of Madhya Pradesh discovered the use of timber for making their music instruments.
Bastar majorly inhabited by Maria/Muria gonds.Kaufman in 1961 gave the general account of musical instrument like drums, fiddle like stringed instrument, flute and wooden clappers. Drums are generally used in events like marriage, community rejoicing and religious ceremonies while kirkir was an instrument played with a bow generally seen among the males while roaming around the field. Dusir was another instrument among the Maria/Muria gonds while its origin and use were rare and ambiguous. These environmental influences on the musical instrument which classifies the sound produced is important to understand as a reason for classification due to environmental and cultural factor among the musical practices followed in northern and southern India while further creating variations among the techniques of the performances to the smallest classification gharana.
Psychology of music: Researchers’ have established a relation between music and its effect on emotions which is directly related to cultural aspects of a musical piece, which was explained as a chord progression or clashing of notes may convey a meaning for a member of particular cultural group while may be irrelevant or not relatable to a member from different cultural group. Psychology behind music plays an important role as it conveys emotion expressed in cultural context through the medium of music.Emotions were surrounded by two different roles played by the listener and the performer.
Listener’s interpretation to a musical work depends on message that has been conveyed through it while performer tries to convey their emotions through the meaning and statements of their art work. This relation between emotion and its interpretation of musical artwork helps in understanding of the underlying characteristic of musical performances such as hierarchy. The ability to harvest the perfect rhythm to attract and effect the emotions of people can be understood as the basic classifications among the soloists and the accompanists.
Role of music: The role of music changes with change in cultural surroundings within a society. Numerous genres of music act as variations among the roles of music in society. Factors like social caste, age, race, socio- economic status control the music of our society, pop music (popular), rap, r;b genres distinguish there audience on the basis of age, race, gender similarly in Hindustani music genres of music are classified on the basis of social factors Sufi, religious hmms, have separated the practices of music on the basis of religion. The cultural influence within a society largely effects the creation of music within a culture. The cultural context evolves with time and adapts within the society thus changing the function of music in culture with time. These even effects the performances through time the privileges to attend performances in early times were dependent on the economical condition and social status and the availability of music was limited.
But with advancement of technology availability and variations of music are wide spared affecting the audience attending performances. History and development of Indian musical system;Ancient India: Music and India share a long history as the mythological (religious) books mentions that Narad the divine sage was the one to introduce the heavenly art of music. According to Hindu beliefs the om mantra is the first sound ever heard and is considered to be the purest due to it being a manifestation of lord Brahma (the creator). In earlier phases the musical content was restricted to devotional and was majorly used for religious practices with time folk music along other forms of Indian music gradually derived their own characteristics. The earliest evidences of music in India trace back to Naadbhrama which was manifested in the Vedic age but it was Sama Veda that was known for evidences of earliest forms of organised music in the form of ragas. ‘Bharata natyashastra’ one of the first clear written work dates back to 4th century A.D, which contains several chapters on the musical practices in India. Music was divided in octaves and 22 keys.
In Successions to this work ‘dathilan’ mentioned the existence of surits. Other works of such importance includes ‘birhaddeshi’ which attempted to define ragas. During the late Vedic music prevailed in the form of chanting verses in musical patterns this form samgana. Ghazal, khayal, tala, gharana were newly established musical genres of this period. ‘Prabandh sangeet’ a form of Indian music which was written in Sanskrit language became popular around 7th century A.D. this resulted in formation of a simpler form which used Hindi language as a medium which was called ‘dhruvpad’. Origin of the ancient Indian music can be traced to Aryans, where music was performed in chanting of Vedas.
Medieval India: the influence begin in the thirteenth century with the invasion of al-ud-din khilji and establishment of Muslim empire in the north. This influence leaded to gradual differentiation between the musical practices of north and south. Tough music was frowned upon by orthodox Islam their acceptance of Sufi music made them extend their patronage to this art. Amir khusrau a member in the court of al-ud-din khilji represented the Muslim attitude to Indian music, After which musical practices of Afghanistan and Kashmir was were introduced to Indian music under the mughal emperors Akbar, Jahangir, shah jahan. Indian musician such as tansen, baiju bawra have influenced the music of north India as performers.
Sanskrit was gradually replaced by dakhni, Bhojpuri, Urdu and Persian language. Though the content was still based on Hindu mythology Muslim singers still sang these with Hindu religious theme. This led to Hindu musicians singing songs dedicated to Muslim saints.
Another important factor was the shift of focus to the presentation, creating an imaginationModern India: Rabindranath Tagore’s work can be marked as a pioneer to modern music. Mass-media including cinema were the most significant influence in modern music. With introduction of sound films people stated introducing songs in the movie for the motive of entertainment which shaped the production of music in India. Indian musical system was entering a new phase by the year 1960’s with interaction among the musical practices of the west and india in works of pt. ravi Shankar’s sitar in beatles album and ali akbar khan performing in new York establishing relations with western music. Classification of Indian musical system; By the end of 16th century invasions influenced the culture and its institution including music in the northern part of India.
Musical practices in northern India were heavily influenced by Muslim culture and religion due to establishment of empires such as Mughals who promoted music in the form of Sufi, Afghanistani and Kashmiri influence of music. While north was interacting with Muslim culture music in the southern India was effected or influenced by western instruments due to the presence of port and establishment of various western colonies in southern India. This western influence led to the formation of carnatic music as a part of music system of India. Carnatic music was heavily influenced by the use of gamakas (vocal gliding/rolling). The basic differences between carnatic and Hindustani music were the use of terminology where carnatic music used connotations such as varnam, kriti, tillana whereas Hindustani music comprised of khayal, drupad, thumri.
While in comparisons of raga carnatic music uses janak and janya raga while ragas in Hindustani music were classified on the basis of 10 thaats and 32 ragang raga. The concert setup also differs accordingly in both forms of Hindustani music carnatic music performances generally comprise of vocals whereas Hindustani music performaces were focused on harmonium and table. Carnatic music is considered as more rigid than the Hindustani music because of their styles of singing. Hindustani music consists of more than one style of singing thus resulting in formation of institutions like gharanas. Social construction of Performances in Hindustani musical system ; There are two major musical roles in Hindustani musical performances. One of soloist and other of accompanist where soloist comprises vocalists, instrumentalists while accompanists were melodic and rhythmic specialist. In a performance accompanists would only join in when the soloist is done with his beginning of the song along with this the eminence of the soloists is maintained through the performance.
Soloists enjoy the privileges of leading and controlling the musical decisions, dynamics of accompanying instrumentalist. These characters represent the social influences on musical performances factors like hierarchy with accompanist being subordinates to soloists. Factors like reward systems, achievement principles were reasons behind the functioning of Indian musical system. This hierarchy in the role of musicians performing Hindustani music still persists with talented, famous musicians becoming soloists and the rest accompanist. Lineages among the soloists are speciality specific with vocalists being selected from special vocalist families similarly the mainstream instrumentalists were selected from their respected special families. Instrumental soloists were members of lineage that was fairly small in nature with diversity in their origin.
Mostly the instrumental soloists traced back their ancestor to great tansen. While families of vocalists were closely connected they still differentiate into two major categories, soloists specialists who were exclusive in their lineage started referring themselves as Kalawants. Similarly there were Khalifas of exclusive musical lineage of vocalist forming a tradition called gharana. Accompanists on the other hand had their own societies and families among which one of the most important one was Mirasis. Members of such musical institutions were generally rural musicians. Mirasis community were major providers of table and sarangi players of Hindustani musical system.
Tough organised in patriarchal lineage, lineage was not the functioning unit among Mirasis. Biradri (brotherhood) was considered as the largest functioning unit among them. Influences on Indian musical system ; Influences on Indian music can be understood as the impact of Indian thoughts and philosophy on Indian classical music and its various custom variations.Influence of iconography: Visualisation and non visual aspects like symbolism started influence music.
After the introduction of videography and paparazzi musicians became conscious about their public images. Musicians attracted to the glamour of mass communication and television telecasting which made them complacent in their attitude towards dedication and delivery of music. Influence of language: Phonic aspects of language of ragas have influenced music immensely. Words in any language can have structural similarity while have different meaning this effect may cause confusion in the interpretation of meaning of songs. Language also acts as a barrier in the interpretation ofInfluence of oral transmission: The Shruti – Smriti tradition, which is an important part of Indian culture and the preservation of ragas.
This process intended to preserve as well as educate people about ragas. The history of ragas is inherited in through This tradition was held as high as a Panchama-Veda.Influence of social organisation:Indian music in its earlier phase evolved as an element of religion and was recognised as a fibre of construction of a person’s religious and social role. Vocals established its supremacy due to its ability to get webbed to words and vice verse which may lead to denial of instrumental music which could only give or repeat melody or a tune. In the evolution of vocal music in northern India led to formation of three different streams, Vocal along with words was used for religious purposes and religious content.
Vocal along with words emphasising on the musical aspects like drupad.Vocal along with words having no concerns towards the meaning of the word. Thought all the three streams of northern Indian music have run concurrently, it was the shift for the Hindustani musicians in there believes towards Muslim religion under the patronage of mughal emperor Akbar. Instruments of Hindustani (north Indian) musical system; Music has been an important and influential part of Indian culture, north Indian music has provided with
