Devotion and Musical Practice in North India

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document in English

humanities/philosophy

school essay

published 04/11/2007

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Summary

The guru-shisya parampara is the system of master/disciple lineage that characterizes the traditional education system of North Indian music. The term parampara, ‘disciplic succession,’ is introduced in the Bhagavad-gita (4.2), when Krsna tells Arjuna: “This Knowledge of yoga was passed down in disciplic succession and in this way the seer-kings knew it.” In the music tradition, the disciplic succession of the family lineage (gharana) is officially continued in the ganda bandham ceremony in which the student is “elevated to the status of a close disciple” with the tie of a thread around the student’s wrist. This gesture and a nazrana payment “freely given with the greatest respect…symbolize the bond” between a student and his guru. The tabla disciple’s devotion to the guru is a form of bhakti devotion in the same way that a yogic disciple submits to the will of a guru in order to master the esoteric practices held within the realm of his teacher’s knowledge. Following the ganda bandham rite, “the new disciple can expect to receive a more intensive training, including techniques and compositions” reserved for close disciples. It has been argued that the “dilution of classical music” in modern day India is due to the decline of the gharana system that seeks the systematic dissemination of musical knowledge to such worthy students, in favor of the music college system which offers a survey education better-suited to hobbyists.

The bond between guru and disciple in the gharana system is argued to be of a spiritual nature by Jim Kippen, whose research in the Lucknow tabla gharana is the most complete existing anthropological account of the traditional system of tabla education.
The quintessentially Hindu school of tabla music is undoubtedly the Banares gharana.
Ustad Afaq Hussain of the Lucknow gharana believes that the process of musical improvisation (upaj) cultivates the concentration developed through technical education (ta'lim)
The tabla player sits in the midpoint of an endless stream of time marked by cycles of tala.
The Muslim use of cilla as a religious practice, similar to the halvet retreat of Sufi devotional practice, 'refers to a spiritual discipline in which a person recites the same prayers each day at the same time and in the same place.
Sahai's testimony reveals how the musical bhakti culture of Banares weaves the religious and musical into a spiritual practice that blurs the line between musician and religious devotee.
Ethics and aesthetics intertwine during study of tabla bol-grammar in the oral text Tabla Ki Alphabet by Ustad Gameh Khan, a nineteenth century master of the Delhi gharana.
The mnemonic meanings given for the syllables na and dhit connote humility and modesty, respectively, that lead the musician to an appropriately humble adab.