Indian Classical Ensemble - Note on Hindi Notation

Date for Entry: (Monday 18th September 2017)

Actual Date of Online Entry: (Thursday 24th March 2022)

[WRITTEN AS REPORT]

Dear Diary,

    On Monday 18th September, minutes going to seven in the night was my first night of being a member of the UWI Indian Classical Ensemble. I first saw the teacher Mr. Maharaj and got his permission to join the group. Once he said that I "yes, sure" I rest down my bags and began to get a Tenor pan from the storeroom. I did not know if I had to audition to be in the ensemble. 

    I knew that I was going to have to be on the lookout for any new types of music coming. There was no one to really talk to about what the class was like. I still felt glad that they allowed steelpan to be a part of the group. I know that whatever was to be given for us to learn, I would give it a lot of hard work. I would try my best to do what was given no matter how hard it may come.

    Mr. Maharaj began the class with a welcome. He began to write out some things on the whiteboard which I soon began to understand was the song. But I had a feeling it would be the piece we would be starting off with because of the solfege. I learned that night that they called the solfege SARGAM in their style of music (as their version of Doh, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La, Ti, Doh). 

    In addition to the introduction of the Hindi Sargam, we were given some extra notes. I made sure to write down all of the instructions so that I can learn them and detect them and know how to play them if they should show up in the notation from sir. 

Here are some of the things I learned from the lesson:

Hindi Word / Articulation	English meaning
Thaat	Scale
Thaat Marwa	Main scale
Vedi Swar (Main Note)	Sa (or Doh)
Samuadi Swar (2nd Note)	Re (or Ra)
Jaati – Shaduv	6 up to 6 down
Aaroh (Ascending)	Sa, Re, Ga, Ma, Pa, Dha, Ni Sa (Doh, Re, Me, Fa, Sol, La, Ti Doh)
Avroh (Descending)	Sa, Ni, Dha, Pa, Ma, Ga, Re, Sa. (Doh, Ti, La, Sol, Fa, Me, Ra, Doh)
Pakad	Identifying phrase
Raag	A cluster of notes (melodic structure) that are set to rules, which depicts emotions and is pleasing to the mind of the listener.
Alankar (An Exercise)	An exercise in any particular scale that can be done either fast or slow. Most often times it can be done in simple triple or simple quadruple.
Jeati	Omitted note
	The note is flattened
	Note is to be played an octave Higher
	Note is to be played an octave lower

    We also did seven out of ten alankaars (exercises). Some were tough but easy and we all did in the key of D Major. They are quite similar to the pan examination proficiency exercises that I usually do with Mr. Sharma. I took a picture of the music solfege he wrote out and put it up on the projector. 

Before beginning the piece, were given the pakad to play a very times and after listening to sir singing out the first section, we were given some time to figure out the same on our instruments. We were also given the pattern of the Raag Sohini notes.

    Towards the end of the week, I was sent an email by Mr. Maharaj with a sheet of the ten alankaars. I decided to score it out and put a book together with the course outline that he included for everyone. Over time we were given the ten Indian Thaats from Pundit Bhatkhandi. I also scored them out and had them included in the little 'handbook' that I had complied.

 

Link(s):

1. Indian Classical Handbook.
2. Indian Music Notation Vocabulary (PDF).

 

Daryl Zion M. Ali