Musical Instruments and Artists: Tata, Sushira, Avanaddha, Ghana

Questions on musical instruments are among the easiest in the Art and Culture section, because they come in only three shapes. The paper names an instrument and asks which of the four classes it belongs to, or names an artist and asks which instrument he or she played, or names a folk instrument and asks for its state. None of it can be worked out; all of it can be memorised. These notes give the classification first, then the instruments class by class, then the artist pairs, and finally the folk instruments that the state examinations are fond of.

The four-fold classification of the Natya Shastra

Bharata Muni's Natya Shastra divides instruments into four classes, and that division is still the one an examiner uses. Tata vadya are the stringed instruments, where a stretched string makes the sound. Sushira vadya are the wind instruments, where air in a hollow column makes it. Avanaddha vadya are the instruments covered with a stretched skin, that is, the drums. Ghana vadya are the solid instruments of metal, wood or clay that sound when struck or shaken and need no tuning. The first and the last are the ones candidates confuse: the ghatam is a clay pot with nothing stretched over it, so it is ghana, while the santoor has strings, so it is tata even though it is struck with sticks.

String instruments

The sitar is the best known Hindustani plucked instrument, with a long fretted neck, sympathetic strings and a gourd resonator; the surbahar is its deeper bass relative. The sarod has no frets and a metal fingerboard, which gives it its gliding sound. The sarangi is bowed and is prized for coming closest to the human voice, which is why it accompanies khayal and thumri. The veena family is the oldest: the Saraswati veena of Carnatic music, the Rudra veena of the dhrupad tradition and the Vichitra veena played without frets. The santoor from Kashmir is a trapezoid box of many strings struck with light wooden mallets. The tanpura supplies the drone behind every classical performance, and the violin, taken from Europe, has become the standard melodic accompaniment in Carnatic concerts.

Wind and percussion

Among wind instruments the bansuri is the bamboo transverse flute, the shehnai a double reed instrument played at weddings and temple processions in the north, and the nadaswaram its much longer southern counterpart, always paired with the thavil drum. The pungi or been is the snake charmer's instrument of Rajasthan, the algoza a pair of flutes blown together in Punjab and Rajasthan, and the conch or shankh is blown at rituals. Among drums, the tabla is a pair, a wooden dayan and a metal bayan, and is the standard accompaniment for khayal, thumri and kathak. The pakhawaj is the barrel drum of dhrupad, and the mridangam its Carnatic counterpart, the chief percussion of a kacheri and of Bharatanatyam. The khol belongs to Vaishnava kirtan in Assam, Bengal and Odisha, the chenda to the temple arts and Kathakali of Kerala, the mizhavu to Koodiyattam, and the pung to Manipur, where the drummers' Pung Cholom is a dance in itself.

The artists the paper names

Allauddin Khan of Maihar is the teacher behind much of this list, having trained Ravi Shankar, his own son Ali Akbar Khan and his daughter Annapurna Devi. Among the highest civilian honours, the Bharat Ratna has gone to the Carnatic singer M. S. Subbulakshmi in 1998, the sitar player Ravi Shankar in 1999, the shehnai player Bismillah Khan and the playback singer Lata Mangeshkar in 2001, and the khayal singer Bhimsen Joshi in 2009. The Sangeet Natak Akademi Award is the regular national recognition for performers, and its highest honour is the Akademi Ratna, or fellowship.

Folk and regional instruments

State examinations ask for the home state of a folk instrument far more often than for anything technical. The ravanahatha, a spike fiddle played with a bow, and the kamaicha of the Manganiyar musicians belong to Rajasthan. The tumbi, the algoza, the chimta and the dhol belong to Punjab. Assam has the pepa made from a buffalo horn, the gogona and the dhol of Bihu, and shares the khol with Bengal and Odisha, where the dhak sounds at Durga Puja. The dotara belongs to the Baul singers of Bengal. The pena is the fiddle of Manipur and the pung its drum. Kashmir has the santoor, the rabab and the tumbaknari. The ektara, a single string over a gourd, is carried by wandering singers everywhere from Bengal to Rajasthan. Remember the pairing with dance as well: chenda with Kathakali, mizhavu with Koodiyattam, mridangam with Bharatanatyam, pung with Manipuri and tabla with Kathak.