UPMSP Intermediate Instrumental Music cheat sheet

Nada (sound) is of two kinds: anahata (unstruck, cosmic) and ahata (struck, produced by effort); all instrumental music belongs to ahata nada.

Shruti: the smallest perceptible interval. The classical theoretical figure is 22 shrutis in an octave; practical performance uses 12 swaras.

Saptak (seven notes): Shadja, Rishabh, Gandhar, Madhyam, Pancham, Dhaivat, Nishad, abbreviated Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Dha Ni.

Komal, tivra, and shuddha: Re, Ga, Dha, Ni have komal forms; Ma has a tivra form; Sa and Pa are fixed (achala).

Sthayi: Mandra (lower), Madhya (middle), and Tar (upper) registers. A performer's tonic Sa is chosen to fit the instrument and voice.

Vadi (amsa) is the principal note, samvadi the second most important (usually a fourth or fifth from vadi), anuvadi are supporting notes, and vivadi are dissonant or avoided notes.

Aroha (ascending) and avaroha (descending) define a raga's melodic outline; aroha-avaroha may be vakra (crooked, non-sequential) in ragas such as Kafi or Desh.

Alankar (ornament) includes meend (glide), kan (grace note), murki (quick turn), gamak (heavy oscillation), and andolan (slow swing).

Vedic period: instruments were grouped as tata (string), avanaddha (percussion), sushira (wind), and ghana (solid/idiophone) - the ancestor of the fourfold classification.

Bharata's Natyashastra (c. 200 BCE-200 CE) describes string, wind, and percussion instruments and the concept of shruti and grama.

Sarngadeva's Sangita Ratnakara (13th century) is the major medieval treatise on raga, tala, and instruments, defining the prabandha forms.

The veena lineage runs from ancient harp-type veenas through the rudra veena of the medieval period to the present-day Saraswati veena of Carnatic music.

The sitar is generally attributed to Amir Khusrau (13th century) or to later 18th-century developments; the fretted, gourd-based design matured in the Lucknow and Jaipur lineages.

The sarod developed from the Afghan rabab; the modern metal-bodied, fretless sarod is associated with the Senia Bangash lineage (Amjad Ali Khan's family).

The harmonium was introduced in the 19th century, initially resisted by All India Radio; it became accepted in accompaniment after the 1970s.

Instrumental gharanas: Maihar (Allauddin Khan), Imdadkhani (Imdad Khan, Vilayat Khan), Senia (Ravi Shankar's lineage), and Kirana for vocal music.

Fourfold classical classification: Tat Vadya (string), Sushir Vadya (wind), Avanaddha Vadya (membranophone, skin-covered), Ghana Vadya (solid, non-membrane idiophone).

Tat Vadya subdivides into tata (plucked) and vitata (bowed); sitar, sarod, veena, and sarangi are tat; the violin is bowed and adopted into Indian music.

Sushir Vadya: flute (bansuri), shehnai, nagaswaram, and harmonium (reed-driven, technically a free-reed aerophone).

Avanaddha Vadya: tabla, pakhavaj, mridangam, and dholak - sound produced by a stretched membrane over a resonating body.

Ghana Vadya: jaltarang, manjira, ghatam, and kartal - struck or rubbed solid bodies without a stretched membrane.

Sitar construction: a long neck with movable curved frets, a large tumba (gourd resonator), sympathetic tarab strings, and jawari (bridge) for buzzing resonance.

Sarod construction: a carved wooden body, a metal or horn fingerboard without frets, and a metal plate bridge producing a deep, sustained tone; played with a coconut-shell plectrum (java).

Tabla construction: the dayan (right, treble) is tuned by wooden gatta blocks; the bayan (left, bass) uses a syahi (black paste) for its gliding pitch, tuned by tapping the gatta.

Alap: unmetered, gradual exposition of a raga from mandra to tar register, moving through the vadi and characteristic phrases before any tala begins.

Jod: the metrical but unpulsed section following alap, introducing a rhythmic gait without tabla; jhala is the fast, stroked climactic section.

Gat: the instrumental composition, usually in Tintal or Jhaptal, with sthayi and antara; masitkhani gat is slow (vilambit) and razakhani gat is fast (drut).

Tuning: Sa is set on the instrument to the performer's tonic; the sitar's frets are adjusted for the chosen scale, and the tarab strings are tuned to the raga's notes.

Raga Yaman practice: begin alap on Ni or Re, establish tivra Ma and the Ga-Ni samvadi pair, and resolve phrases on Sa.

Raga Bhairav practice: use andolan on komal Re and komal Dha; the aroha is slow and the avaroha emphasises the komal Dha.

Raga Malkauns practice: avoid Re and Pa entirely; the vadi Ma and samvadi Sa give the raga its grave late-night character.

Tala accompaniment: the tabla player follows the gat's theka; the soloist signals sam and tala changes by a head or hand gesture, and the tihai (repeated phrase ending on sam) closes a section.