Rhythm (Tala), Tempo (Laya) and Rhythmic Composition
This domain tests the percussion ensemble, tala names, the laya categories, and how a dancer's footwork relates to the cycle.
The percussion pair
Khol is the two-faced barrel drum, played with fingers and palms; taal are the small cymbals. The Gayan sing and the Bayan play. In the sattra, musical office is ranked - Bargayan for the chief singer, Barbayan for the chief drummer - and that hierarchy shapes who leads a tempo change.
Tala and laya
A tala is a fixed cycle of matras with a first beat (sam); laya is the speed at which that cycle runs. Sattriya uses talas including Sutal, Choutal, Domani, Rupak, Trital, Bisam, Ekatal and Khemtal, alongside the tala settings of Borgeet. Laya is classically threefold - bilambit (slow), madhya and drut (fast) - and Borgeet are typically sung in a slow, expansive laya while Jhumura and cadential passages move to madhya or drut.
Composition
The khol bol (syllables such as dha, dhin, ta, na, ge) form the theka; compositions build phrases that cadence back onto sam. When the drummer doubles density, the cycle length in matras does not change - only the number of strokes inside it.
Worked example. A drummer moves from barabar to dugun. The dancer keeps the same tala but doubles the footfalls per cycle, because two strokes now occupy each matra; the cadence must still land on sam. Reasoning: laya changed, tala did not - the test is whether you distinguish cycle from speed.
Traps. Defining tala as "rhythm" in general; confusing sam with the final matra; assuming ghungroo articulate the beat; treating bilambit and drut as different talas.