Kerala Plus Two Music case studies
Kerala Plus Two Music · Put your knowledge to work in context.
The Kerala Higher Secondary (Plus Two) Music course is a two-year arts-stream subject taken at the higher secondary level under the Directorate of Higher Secondary Education, Kerala. It suits students who want a formal academic grounding in Indian music rather than only private lessons: the syllabus moves between theory and practice, so a candidate is expected to sing or play, read and write notation, identify ragas and talas, and explain the historical and aesthetic background of what they perform. The Kerala Plus Two Music case studies are 5 cases and about 3,576 words.
1Six Aksharas Against an Eight-Akshara Cycle
The music club of a Higher Secondary school in Thrissur has a twelve-minute slot in the school anniversary programme and has built its Carnatic segment on a kirtanam composed by a Class XII student. The sahitya has four lines, and each line, sung at first speed, takes exactly six aksharas.
679 words, about 3 min2Fact-Checking the School Magazine Article
The student editor of a Higher Secondary school magazine in Kottayam has two days before print and a 700-word article, 'From Bharata to Bhatkhande', submitted by an alumnus. Four sentences worry her: (i) 'Bharata's Natyashastra, commonly dated between about 200 BCE and 200 CE, divides the octave into 22 srutis and names seven svaras'; (ii) 'Sarangadeva's Sangita Ratnakara, written in the thirteenth century, is the treatise that first set out the seventy-two melakarta ragas'; (iii) 'Venkatamakhin's Chaturdandi Prakasika, of the seventeenth century, set out the mela scheme, and the familiar Kanakangi–Ratnangi names were given later by Govindacharya'; (iv) 'Tyagaraja and Muthuswami Dikshitar learnt their art directly from descendants of Sarangadeva.' The editor has no library, twenty minutes with the music teacher, and an author who insists that not one word be altered.
688 words, about 3 min3Filling a Twenty-Two-Minute Festival Slot
The music team of a school in Palakkad has twenty-five minutes on stage at a district youth festival. Three minutes go to introduction, tuning and the sruti box, leaving twenty-two minutes of music.
781 words, about 4 min4Writing Programme Notes from a Second-Hand Description
A Class XII student in Kozhikode must write the programme note for a visiting Hindustani vocalist's forty-minute school recital. There is no recording and no chance to meet the artist.
694 words, about 3 min5Staging a Karuna Padya in Eight Minutes
The arts club of a school in Kannur has eight minutes on stage at a school festival to present a Kathakali padya excerpt. The padya is a heroine's lament, and the club wants to present it in a karuna mood with two singers: one a trained Carnatic student, the other a Kathakali learner.
734 words, about 4 min