Indian Raga

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Ragas & Talas

A raga is a scale that has between 5 and 8 notes

Ragas depend on the time of day, the season and the mood

Raga scales are used in microtones unlike music now which uses semitones.

A tala is a pattern of beats that sets the rhythm

A Raga is the term for combing the ragas and talas

Ragas mainly involve improvisation based on notes of the raga and rhythm of the tala

Ragas are never written down. They are passed from generation to generation aurally

North India students join school of players called Gharana

For the people of india it is spiritually important to get involved in indian classical music.

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Instruments

Sitar- Large long necked string instrument. *5 strings are plucked to create the melody and the other 2 are used to create a drone noise.*They have sympathetic strings underneath the main strings.

Tambura - it is a similar shape to the sitar it usually has 4 metal strings but some of them can have up to 6.* usually used as a backing instrument

Tabla - It is a pair of drums* the smaller, higher drum is called the Tabla or Dayan.*The larger, lower-sounding drum is called the Baya

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The melody is improvised on the sitar

The sitar player choses the raga and makes up the melody using the notes in a scale

The notes of a raga scale are : sa, re, ga, ma, pa, dha and ni

Each note is either shudh (natural), Tivra (sharp) or komal (flat)

some ragas have rules for individual notes in the scale.

notes could be quickly that can also be decorated or made slightly sharper or flatter using microtones

the table sets the rhythm

The table is the percussion section.