Music History: The Classical Period

Here is a further link to music of the Classical Period.

This is a link to the website of the school I used to attend. Truly fantastic resource.

There are not as many sound samples as I would have liked, so there will be more videos on the way.

click here for classical

Indian Music and Instrumentation

The present system of Indian music is based upon two important pillars:

• Rag
• Tal
  

Rag is the melodic form while tal is the rhythmic.

Rag has a system of seven notes which are arranged in a means not unlike Western scales. However when we look closely we see that it is quite different what we are familiar with.

The Tal (rhythmic forms) are also very complex. Many common rhythmic patterns exist. They revolve around repeating patterns of beats.

The interpretation of the rag and the tal is not the same all over India. Today there are two major traditions of classical music. There is the north Indian and the south Indian tradition. The North Indian tradition is known as the HIndustani Sangeet and the south Indian is called Carnatic Sangeet Both systems are fundamentally similar but differ in nomenclature and performance practice.

Attention all Students/Learners

this is all you need to remember for your exams

• Many western instruments are peculiar to India
• The most famous Indian instruments are the sitar and tabla However there are many more that the average person may not be familiar with.
• All of this makes up the complex and exciting field of Indian classical music.
• Its understanding easily consumes an entire lifetime