The Tihai That Misses Sam by Two Matras
A Kathak candidate has a 12-minute Intermediate practical slot - 8 minutes of performance, 4 minutes of viva - and has set her lehra for teentaal (16 matras, vibhags 4+4+4+4, tali on 1, 5 and 13, khali on 9) at 60 bpm, so one avartan lasts 16 seconds. Her closing tihai is built from three identical five-matran phrases and she begins it on sam. In the last rehearsal the tabla player stopped and said, 'Your tihai does not land on sam; the examiner will mark your laya.' Her guru is travelling and cannot be consulted. She has one evening, no chance to learn new bols, and must justify the arithmetic aloud in the viva in under a minute. She also knows this examiner often asks a candidate to repeat the same tihai at double speed.
1. Where does the tihai actually end, and what is the cleanest repair available to her tonight? Show the arithmetic.
Read the worked answer
Locate the error. Three phrases of 5 matras = 15 matras. Beginning on sam (matra 1), they occupy matras 1–15, so the last bol sounds on matra 15. Sam of the next avartan is the 17th matra counted from her entry (matras 16, then 1). She is therefore two matras short of sam - not one, which is the mistake the tabla player's phrasing invites.
General rule to quote in viva: entry matra + length − 1 = 17 for a landing on sam. So a 15-matran tihai must enter on matra 3; a 16-matran tihai on matra 2; a 17-matran tihai on matra 1.
Options.
- (a) Keep the identical three phrases and enter on matra 3, filling matras 1–2 with a plain 'dha dha' from her existing vocabulary. Check: 3 + 15 − 1 = 17, last bol on sam.
- (b) Add two matras of bols at the end to reach 17. Rejected: it invents material the night before and risks the phrases no longer being identical, which is what makes it a tihai.
- (c) Stretch each phrase to 5⅓ matras. Impossible in matra-counted nritta.
Choose (a). It is the only repair that preserves the definition of a tihai (three identical phrases), uses no new material, and is easy to say aloud: 'fifteen matras entered on matra three lands on sam because three plus fifteen minus one is seventeen.' Rehearse with the lehra until the delayed entry is audible, and mark the landing with a firm 'dha'.
2. The examiner asks for the same tihai at dugun. What actually changes, and what must she protect?
Read the worked answer
What changes: only duration. The matra count, the entry point and the arithmetic are identical - an avartan is still 16 matras but now lasts 8 seconds instead of 16. Dugun is the same composition at twice the density of time, not a different composition.
What must be protected:
- Clarity of bols. At double speed candidates collapse 'tirakita' into an unarticulated blur; the examiner marks the loss of syllables.
- Identity of the three phrases. All three must be recognisably the same phrase; rushing usually speeds up unevenly and the third repetition shortens.
- The landing on sam. Being early is the standard failure - she must hear the lehra rather than counting ahead of it.
- The entry. She still enters on matra 3; speeding up does not licence starting on sam again.
Judgement call. If the tihai is not clean at dugun after two attempts, better to demonstrate dugun in tatkar - which she controls and which the syllabus expects - and keep the tihai at barabar laya, saying plainly why: 'The tihai is clearer at barabar; I will show dugun in tatkar.' Examiners reward control and an honest reason over raw speed. Racing a tihai to prove laya usually proves the opposite.