PSEB Matric Music Instrumental common mistakes
PSEB Matric Music Instrumental · Understand the traps and how to avoid them.
Writing Vishnu Digambar notation symbols into a Bhatkhande-style answer (or vice versa), e.g. using a dot above for tar saptak in a Bhatkhande bandish, or placing the sam cross on the wrong side of the vibhag line.
Candidates learn both systems in the same year and memorise symbol lists in isolation, so under exam pressure they mix the two conventions; they also rarely practise writing a full bandish end-to-end in one system.
What to do instead
Build two separate one-page symbol keys in your own hand - one for Bhatkhande (bar lines, sam/vibhag marks, avagraha, dots for mandra/tar) and one for Vishnu Digambar (Devanagari sargam with its own octave and tala marks). Write the same bandish out twice, once in each system, and get both checked; in the exam state at the top which system you are using.
Defining pakad, vadi and samvadi by copying aroha-avaroha, e.g. giving the full aroha as the pakad, or naming the most frequent note as vadi without justifying it.
Aroha and pakad look similar on paper, and textbooks sometimes list vadi without explanation, so candidates memorise labels rather than the musical reason behind each.
What to do instead
For each prescribed raga, write a short pakad of three to five notes that actually catches the raga's identity (its characteristic phrase, often with a vakra movement), then separately mark vadi and samvadi and note how often they are elongated or held. Test yourself by asking: could this phrase belong to a different raga? If yes, it is not the pakad.
Confusing tala terminology in written answers - calling khali a tali, counting vibhag as matra, or writing the sam only at the start of a cycle and not on the repeat.
Matra, vibhag, tali, khali and sam are taught as a vocabulary list rather than as a structure, so candidates cannot map them onto a specific tala when writing its notation.
What to do instead
For each prescribed tala draw a matra row numbered 1 to the total, group it into vibhag with vertical lines, then mark tali with the traditional clap number and khali with an X or the standard symbol. Recite it with hand claps and waves while pointing at the row, then write it from memory with the symbols in the correct positions.
Giving a single time of performance for a raga without noting that some ragas are sung at a transitional hour, or assigning a time that contradicts the raga's own nature (e.g. placing a late-night raga at midday).
Time is memorised as a table of labels per raga, so candidates never learn the sandhi-prakash idea of twilight ragas or the reasoning that links a raga's mood and note movement to its hour.
What to do instead
Group prescribed ragas by time band (morning, afternoon, evening, night, twilight) rather than by name, and for each band note one or two ragas and the reason (e.g. a raga using komal re and dha with a calm ascent tends to the morning). Include the transitional ragas explicitly and say which two periods they straddle.
Describing a raga's jati as simply 'audav' or 'sampurna' when the ascent and descent differ, or ignoring the distinction between shadav and audav in one direction only.
Candidates count notes once, usually in the aroha, and stop; they do not check the avaroha separately, so mixed jati (e.g. audav-sampurna) is missed.
What to do instead
For every prescribed raga, count the notes in aroha and avaroha separately and write the jati as a pair, e.g. audav-sampurna. Then list which note is omitted in each direction. Practise by covering the avaroha and reconstructing it from the pakad and characteristic phrases.
Treating sargam, lakshan geet and bandish as interchangeable names for a song, so the answer describes a bandish when asked for a lakshan geet or vice versa.
All three are compositions set in a raga and tala, and candidates learn one example of each without comparing their purposes, so the defining features blur.
What to do instead
Write a one-line definition of each with its function: sargam uses note names as lyrics for practice, lakshan geet has words that describe the raga's own lakshan (vadi, samvadi, time, notes), bandish is a poetic composition in a tala with sthai and antara. For each, name its structural parts and give one short original example in a prescribed raga.
Answering history questions with a single name and date and no context, or attributing a contribution to the wrong figure (e.g. crediting the modern notation system to the wrong reformer, or mixing up which musician wrote a famous treatise).
History is revised as a list of names and years, and candidates do not connect each person to a specific, checkable contribution.
What to do instead
Build a two-column chart per period: name and one concrete contribution with a date or century. For each figure write one sentence you could defend in an exam. Where you are unsure of a date, write the century and say so rather than inventing precision.
Naming a gharana but describing its style with generic words like 'sweet' or 'emotional' instead of specific technical markers such as treatment of a particular note, use of a particular composition form, or tempo preference.
Gharana is taught as a list of places and famous names, so candidates have no vocabulary for style and fall back on vague adjectives.
What to do instead
For each gharana you study, note two or three concrete markers: characteristic phrases or note treatments, preferred forms and tempo, and one representative musician. Compare two gharanas of the same instrument side by side in a table so the contrast is explicit.
Classifying an instrument by appearance rather than by the sound-producing mechanism, e.g. calling a drum a string instrument because it has a membrane, or missing that a stick-struck string instrument belongs with strings.
The standard fourfold classification (string, wind, percussion, and the membranophone/solid categories as taught) is remembered as a list of examples, not as a rule, so unfamiliar instruments cannot be placed.
What to do instead
Learn the rule first: what vibrates to make the sound - a stretched string, an air column, a stretched membrane, or a solid body. Then sort a mixed list of instruments using only the rule, and for each write the vibrating element in a few words. Apply the same rule to tuning questions to explain why string tension and length change pitch.
In practical preparation, practising alankaras and ragas only at one speed and without the tabla, so the exam rendition loses laya control, the sam drifts, and the candidate cannot recover after a mistake.
Practice happens alone and at a comfortable tempo; candidates never rehearse with a metronome or a partner, and they stop and restart whenever they err instead of learning to continue.
What to do instead
Rehearse each alankara and raga at three tempos with a metronome or tabla app, marking the sam aloud. Practise deliberate recovery: continue through a wrong note and rejoin on the next sam. Do at least a few full mock renditions with a friend keeping tala so the exam conditions, including accompaniment, are familiar.