PSEB SS Music Instrumental exam-day guide

Lock your programme. Choose the exact items you will play - for example alap, jod or jhala, and one gat in a prescribed taal - and practise them in that fixed order with a tanpura drone, start to finish, without stopping. Do not add new material now; polish what you already have.

Run a full mock once a day for these three days: tune the instrument yourself, announce the raag and taal aloud as you will in the hall, play the whole set, then answer five viva questions out loud. Recording it on a phone and listening back exposes hesitation you cannot hear while playing.

Prepare the oral component. Be able to state, for each raag you offer: aroh, avroh, pakad, vadi, samvadi, jati, the thaat it belongs to and the time of day assigned to it. Be able to give the theka in bols for the taal you play, and to mark sam, khali and tali on your hand.

Prepare short spoken answers on your instrument: its parts, how it is tuned, how you maintain it, the difference between your instrument and a related one, and two or three well-known players of it. Keep each answer to three or four sentences; examiners want accuracy, not length.

Practise lightly - twenty to thirty minutes maximum, at slow speed, plus one full run of your programme. Stop before your hands or embouchure tire. Late marathon practice on the eve makes fingers stiff and nerves worse, and adds nothing you did not already have.

Pack the case using the checklist above and leave it by the door. Fit new strings now if any are doubtful, so they stretch overnight. Confirm your reporting time, the centre, the transport and who is accompanying you, and set two alarms.

Eat normally, avoid loud gatherings, and sleep at your usual time. Do not spend the night watching recordings of other players or reading new theory; unfamiliar material the night before produces doubt, not marks.

Eat a normal, light breakfast. Do a short warm-up - ten to fifteen minutes of slow alankars or long notes - enough to wake the fingers, not enough to tire them. Tune the instrument at home so you arrive with it already close to pitch.

Leave with a buffer that gets you to the centre well before the reporting time. Carry the instrument yourself rather than in a luggage hold or on a rack; heat and knocks undo tuning and can crack a body. Keep spare strings in your pocket, not in the case left outside.

Report, complete attendance, then find a quiet corner. Warm up silently - finger patterns on the fretboard or string, breathing exercises for a wind instrument - and hum your tanpura Sa softly. Do not hold long conversations about who is prepared and who is not.

Re-check tuning as the hall temperature changes, and have your notation sheet open at the first item only. If the wait runs long, keep a small sip of water going and stay off your phone.

Enter when called, greet the panel and take the seat offered. Tune calmly and audibly - the panel expects it. Then announce clearly: the raag, the taal and the item you are about to play. A confident announcement buys you a settled start.

Play at a tempo you can sustain rather than the fastest you can manage. Establish the raag with a clear, unhurried alap before moving to jod or gat, and keep the taal cycle visibly with a hand or foot so the examiner can see you are on sam. If you slip, recover on the next sam rather than stopping dead or apologising at length.

Answer in short, direct sentences; if you do not know something, say so plainly and move on. If asked to repeat a phrase, play exactly what was asked, not a different item. At the end, thank the panel, pack your instrument inside the hall only if told to, and leave quietly without asking for marks.