Revision: Definitions of Indian Raga

This is really for if you've picked music for your last years of school (or perhaps collage for all I know) because you'll get Indian Raga questions in an exam whether it's answering definaitions you can remember or in listening exam questions where you could be asked to reveal something in the piece (eg, an instrument.) Try writeing these definitions on question cards with the answers on the other side of them and randomly pick them out every night until you know them. And for listening listen to the insturments and typical music sequences in Indian Raga until you know them well. Good luck.

Improvisation - make it up on the spot

Drone - sustained or continuous note

Tala - Rhythm with a set of beats

Chaal - eight note rhythimic pattern, used in bhangra

Bols - Words. In musical terms it refers to the words of a composition or tabla notes.

Mantras - Sacred chant

Meend - a slide

Rasa - Musical collaboration

Sam - The first beat of a time cycle or tala.

Shehnai - Indian oboe

Taan(tan) - A runof musical notes

Teental - Common tal of 16 beats

Gharana - School of plyers teaching raga

Bansuri - Alto flute

Synocopation - Accents are shifted from the main beat to the weaker beat, to avoid regular rythm

Rag - Indian musical notes

Alap - A slow rythmless elaboration upon the rag used by vocalists and insrumentalists,

Jhor - second section of music, speeds up slightly

Bandish - Song that forms the final phase of a raga performance

Gat - Theme of an instrumental performance

Jhala - Fast rythmic style of instumental music by a constant plucking of drone strings

Sitar - like a guitar, plays melody, a long necked stringed instrument

Sarod - Stringed instrument

sarangi - Fretless bowed instrument with numerous strings

Tabla - The pair of Indian Hand Drums

Hamonium - Small hand-pumped reed-organ

Dhol - drum used in traditional bhagra

Tampura - A long necked, stringed instrument for providing drone

yikes! ive only heard of the first 2 words

Haha! that's why I thought I'd better share them with the community :) When we were going through them in class I had a slight panic attack.

You definately won't need to recall things as in-depth as that for the GCSE exam.

One of my questions was indentifying "The Tide Is High" as being reggae, although that was a good few years ago now.

Yeah, not all of them will come up. But any random few of the lot apparently will. I was given these by my music department and they know what they're doing, so I trust now it's counted as Indian raga.

Do you still have the 4 areas of study, with 3 sections in each? I think in the exam there was one question on each AoS. I seem to remember the key things to remember for Indian Classical Music were the instruments and that "rag" was a set of notes like a scale.

Ahh, I loved GCSE music. A Level was a lot harder, in the there wasn't a set syllabus as such- questions could be asked on pretty much anything (or so we were told!).

@BBT - syncopation, man!

Hey Heather, I'm pretty sure you've miss spelt one of them, it's a Bansuri, not Bansui, otherwise you're talking about a person. haha

I have one actually, they're beautiful.

I know these 'cause I play Tabla, I had to learn them within the first lesson, fun times frying your brain. haha.

Good luck with your exam!

ohh yeah ive heard of a Tabla, and a Sitar. i just didnt see those =p



wha??

It's when notes are shifted away from the main beat to create a more interesting rhythm. Music would be really dull if there wasn't a bit of syncopation!

For example:

Un-syncopated

1 & 2 & 3 & 4 & 1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &

>   >   >   >   >   >   >   >  



Syncopated

1 & 2 & 3 & 4 & 1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &  ("Best Of You" by the Foo Fighters

>     >     >   >     >     >            uses this rhythm)

You can see that the accents (>) are spread out unevenly in the syncopated example, this makes the music more interesting.

lol

Syncopated it always on the off beat, otherwise you would call it a variation of syncopation. So it's always on the "&"

It doesn't have to always fall on the "&".

I know all execpt the first two.

@Heather
I think u missed out on 'Sur'. It means tune/modulation of voice.

Whoops! :D Thanks for the pointer, Jazz! That oculd've been one heck of a major mistake in my exam! Now I'll remember not to repeat it.

6StringEvil, I didn't know about that one. Thanks for telling me that, I don't think I've so far been taught that one for some reason.

@BHS I know we're doing 6 critereas of study, so far I know what 4 of them are: African Music, Indian raga, musical terms of structure and texture. Although now I'm panicking because I don't know what the other 2 I'm meant to be reviseing are right now!

The funny thing is these things are never taught to us in school. Its like there are handed over to us in the family. so we dont look towards these things as curriculum, something u have to do to clear school.

In a nice way, that strange! So you just seem to automatically get taught them young? That seems like a nice thing to keep learning over the generations.

yeah i remember my granddad teaching me those stuff when i was little. I miss him.

Well at least you have a nice memory of him. It's always nice to remember someone in that close personal way.

It seems like a wonderful tradition you've got there.