Musical Instruments: Classification, Structure and Tuning
What this domain tests
Instrument questions cover the fourfold classification, structural parts, and tuning. You must explain how an instrument produces pitch and how it is tuned to the performer's Sa.
Core rules
- Natyashastra classification: tata (string), sushira (wind), avanaddha (membrane-covered percussion), ghana (solid, struck).
- Tanpura is a tata instrument and a drone. It has a resonator, a long neck, four strings and no frets. The jawari bridge shapes the overtone-rich buzz.
- Tabla is avanaddha: daya (right, treble) and bayan (left, bass). The syahi patches control tone; the bayan is tuned lower and can be glided for meend.
- Sitar is a fretted tata instrument with sympathetic strings; harmonium is a sushira instrument with reeds and a keyboard.
- Tuning is relative to the soloist's Sa. Tanpura is commonly tuned Pa-Sa-Sa-Sa; if Pa is weak or absent in the raga, Ma is used. Tabla is tuned to Sa/Pa.
Worked example
For a raga that avoids Pa, tune the tanpura's first string to Ma rather than Pa. Keep the other strings on Sa. The reasoning is consonance: the drone must not contradict the raga's allowed swaras.
Traps
Calling tabla a tata instrument; saying tanpura has frets; tuning everything to a fixed C; confusing sitar and tanpura; and describing the bayan as the treble drum.