Tag: Melody

A Thaat is a parent scale. Raags are derived from the Thaats. Thaat system categorizes the Raags by defining the positions (sharp or flat)of notes. A Thaat cannot be sung or played. A Thaat is just a theoretical ‘Sumpooran’ (Heptatonic) scale.
A musicologist Lochan Kavi developed the first Thaat system in the 15th century. In his book ‘Raag-Trungini’, he writes that at that time there were nearly 16000 Raags mentioned in the old books, stories, and myths, that Lord Krishna’s ‘Gopees’ (he had 365 Gopees) sang for him. Lochan Kavi found that out of all those mentioned, only 36 Raags had distinct scales. Thus he categorized all known Raags to 12 ‘Males’, the Sanskrit word for Thaat.

Then a Southern musicologist Pundit Venkatmukhi, used a mathematical formula to create 72 Thaats. He divided the Octave into two tetra-chords and applied the following rules:

1. Every Thaat must use ‘Sa’ (the keynote or the first note)
   2. Every Thaat must have 7 notes.
   3. Every Thaat must use notes from the upper and lower half (tetra-chords).

If you follow these three rules, it creates 72 unique scales. As hard as it sounds, this method is actually very easy to understand (eventually I will write a post about this).

Unfortunately it didn’t make much sense in the Northern Music, where notes were getting popular in their modern position (same as western notes, with a minimum interval of a semitone). Finally a modern musicologist Pundit Vishnu Narayan Bhatkhunday chose 10 out of the 72 southern Thaats and made them standard ‘10 Thaats of Northern Indian Music‘.

A few things you should know about a Thaat:
These are the amended Thaat rules that musicologist Pundit Vishnu Narayan Bhatkhunday adopted for the Hindustani music.

1. Every Thaat has all and only seven notes. That is one of every note in an octave. If ‘C’ is your ‘S’ (Sa or the keynote), then every Thaat must have all seven ‘C, D, E, F, G, A, B,’ (S, R, G, M, P, D, N) notes.
2. The Flat and Sharp notes (Komal and Tivar) separate one Thaat from another.
3. A Thaat cannot be played, so it doesn’t have to be written in ascending and descending patterns.
4. A Thaat does not have to sound pleasant to ears as it does not contain any rules to play the notes.
5. All Ten Thaat are named after a famous Raag from that Thaat. As ‘Marva’ is a Thaat and it is named after ‘Marva’ Raag, which is the most famous Raag from this Thaat.

In the next post we will see these 10 Thaats and understand how they relate to one another.

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Here are a few very useful words. It is a good idea to use Indian words when playing Indian music, although I will keep using English words besides Indian words through out the blog. This post only includes melody related words. Commonly used rhythmic words were explained in an earlier post. Once again, do not spend too much time memorizing these words before hand. The following list is not in an alphabetical order. I have placed them in a logical order.

Thaat (Parent Scale): (pronounce ‘th’ as in ‘theory’): Thaat is a parent scale, from which the Raags are born. A Thaat always contains all seven notes and only exists in theory, which means a Thaat cannot be played or sung. Once you define how to sing a Thaat’s notes in a certain way, a Raag is born. There are ten Thaats in Northern Indian Music:

1. Bilaval
2. Khamaj
3. Kafi
4. Asavari
5. Bhairvi
6. Kaliaan
7. Marva
8. Poorvi
9. Todi
10. Bhairav

Raag: A Raag is a group of five (minimum) to seven (maximum) notes which sounds pleasant to the ears when sung or played on an musical instruments. Raags are derived from Thaats. There can be 484 unique Raags in every Thaat.

Svara (Note): A musical sound with minimum interval of a semitone is called a Svara. There are twelve Svaras (Notes) in an Octave and they have seven names as shown below

Jati (type): Jati is referred to the scale structure of a Raag. There are three main Jatis:

1. Sumpooran (Heptatonic or 7 notes)
2. Chhadav (Hexatonic or 6 notes) and
3. Audav (Pentatonic or 5 notes)

Vadi Svara (Dominant Note): The most important and most used note (suwar) in a Raag is called the Vadi Svara.
Sumvadi Svara (Sub-dominant Note): The next important note in a Raag is called the Sumvadi Svara. It is always a fourth or fifth from the Vadi note.
Vivadi Svara (Enemy Note): The name explains it all. Using this note will break the Raag. Although really experienced performers do use Vivadi notes in their performance just to show that how comfortable they are with their hold on a Raag. In general, stay away from it.
Verjit Svara (Forbidden Notes): The Notes, which are not used in a Raag, are called Verjit notes. Verjit notes are defined by the Jatis, i.e Heptatonic Raags have none, Hexatonic Raags have one and Pentatonic Raags have two forbidden notes.
Shudh Svara (pure, Natural Note): Notes as they appear in a major scale are assumed in their Shudh (natural) position. R, G, D and N are consider Shudh when they appear in their Tivar position and M is consider shudh when it apears in its Komal position.

Vikrat Svara (Moved Notes): Note which are played in a different position than as they appear in a major scale are called Vikrat Svaras (Sharps and Flats).
Komal Svara (Flat Note): In Northern Indian music all notes except first and fifth have two positions. The lower position is called Komal and the upper is called Tivar. When any of the notes which are Tivar in a natural scale are Vikrat (moved), they are called Komal Svaras (‘R’,’G’,’D’ and ‘N’ second, third, sixth and seventh). The Komal notes are underlined in the notation.
Tivar Svara (Sharp Note): When a note moves one step up from its Komal position that is called a Tivar Svara. Only ‘M’ (fourth) goes Tivar when it is Vikrat (moved). Ma or fourth is komal in a natural scale. A Tivar suwar is written with a standing line on it.

There is not much new to learn about note positions. Only thing to remember is that which notes go flat and which one goes sharp. here is a simple map of all 12 notes from ‘C’:

Aroh : ascending. Every Raag must have an ascending.
Avroh: Descending. Every Raag must have a descending.
Pakad (Catch phrase): The main phrase in a Raag, which gives it a distinguish characteristic, is called Pakad.
Taan: When a group of notes as a phrase is sung in a rhythm, it is called a Taan. There are two main categories of Taans: Spaat Taan and Koot Taan. These were discussed in this post.
Meend (Slur): When notes are changed without breaking the voice or the vibration of a string in a smooth up or down pull, that is a slur or Meend. Sometimes another word ‘Soote’ is used for bowed instruments.
Kun (Grace notes): When while singing or playing one note, another note is slightly touched, that is called a Kun. The Kun (grace) note is written right on top of the main note as:

This means ‘N’ (Nee) is slightly touched when the second ‘Pa’ is played.
Sthaee: The chorus of a song is called Sthaee.
Antra: The verse/s of a song is/are called Antra/s.

sangtar.com > Music Theory > Basic Theory

Melody is based on our ability to hear and perceive changes in frequencies. Although it is more than just the pitch going up and down, but as the frequency goes higher, the note is sharper. In any octave, the highest note always vibrates at the double rate from the lowest note. So an octave is the interval between one musical note and another with half or double its frequency. After the unison, (two things vibrating at the same rate), the octave is the simplest interval in music. The human ear tends to hear both notes (upper and lower) as being essentially ‘the same’. For this reason, notes an octave apart are given the same name in Indian music. The same is true for Western Music. And just like in western notation system, Northern Indian music recognizes 12 places in one octave as Notes. Most musicians use the same notes as we see them on a guitar’s fret or on a piano (equal temperament scale). But it hasn’t been always like this. In ancient times, Indian music was based on the ‘Sharuti’ system. The intervals were measured with sharuties. We will discuss this in Advanced Theory.

Melody of Northern Indian Music is based on the ‘Thaat’ (parent Scale) and ‘Raag’ theory. Raags have their minimum requirements of five notes in an octave. Based on that principle, 484 Raags can be created mathematically from any given ‘Thaa’t’. We will discuss Thaats and that theory in another post.

Every Raag has its own personality. There are many special things about every Raag, which make it possible to separate one Raag from another. I will explain these in the ‘Properties of a Raag’ post.

Even though many popular musician do not study Raags and most of the popular music is not even in any certain Raags, there are many ‘phrasing’ secrets hidden in the Raags, however. Ascending and descending do not make music. Whole art of music is hidden in phrasing. You must have listened to hundreds of songs composed in ‘C’ or ‘E’ major. They still sound different from one another. That is because music we hear affects us in phrases, not scales.

This theory (music in phrases) was the origin of Raags. Raags start with that in mind and grow from there. To learn a Raag you have to learn its ascending or descending etc., but you also must know its flow and important phrases. There are thousands of available lists of hundreds of Raags everywhere, but they have no practical value as one will never know how to proceed from there. A Raag description without its phrases and flow is useless. I am a working composer. I am giving you the only information that is essential to ‘know and play’ Indian music in the real world. I will post the Raags complete with this data. You will find yourself improvising in a certain Raag in no time by mixing and shuffling its phrases and flow.

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