The Music of Hindostan c10: Chapter V. Mode

The Music of Hindostan c10

Language: English

Chapter V. Mode

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THE terms ‘scale’ and ‘mode’ are frequently used as synonymous, because it is often unimportant to insist on the distinction between them. But in their essence they name two primary musical instincts. Scale is the expression of the melodic impulse, mode is ultimately the outcome of the rhythmic impulse. They are relative, not absolute terms; and in two ways. First, any given series of notes may be in a scale, or it may be in a mode, according to the moments of it which we are taking to be important. And, secondly, it can seldom be said that at any given point in a melody a change of mode or scale has taken place; the change requires to be ‘established’, and that is a matter of degree. There is a sense also in which scale ‘is’ established mode. We propose shortly to discuss these points.

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A change of scale is a change in a prescribed order of notes brought about by the melodic impulse. It is a more or less violent change in pitch of some one note which results in musical ‘effect’, exhilarating, pathetic, &c. In the following Song of Somerset, ‘Sovay, Sovay,’ the pathetic flattening at (a) is a purely melodic

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Sovay, Sovay.

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Ex. 208.

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(a)

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effect. It causes the melody to droop a little at that point, and so to give value to the F♯ when it is restored later on. The ear has been cheated for the moment of the major scale it expected, and has been presented with another, the major scale with the flat seventh. It is owing to this species of deception which they involve that such devices are known as *Musica ficta*, feigned music. They come in the first place as vocal accommodations, but they stay as musical effects. They do not establish, they only suggest a new scale. If in this song the F♮'s had been the rule and the F♯'s the exception, we should have said the melody was in another scale (of G) or in a mode (of C). For our present purpose, since we are discussing G not C, it is a change of scale.

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A change of mode is a change in the relative importance not of one note, but of all, brought about by a shift of the rhythmic centre of gravity. The following Folk-song,¹ ‘A sailor's life,’ shows in its three versions a change both of scale and of mode. We may take the germ of the song to be contained in the pentatonic form marked I, which is placed for comparison between two derivatives, II and III.

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¹ From the *Journal of the Folksong Society*. ² A really beautiful instance of the musical process here involved is a shifting ‘Ground’ of Purcell's quoted on p. 176 of E. Walker's *History of Music in England*, 1907.

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*A sailor's life.*

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Ex. 209.

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I is a pentatonic ‘Dor-aeolian’ on D. II and III are only slightly veiled pentatonics, but two important changes have taken place. In II the notes of the scale have not been altered, but, by the rhythmical stress which is thrown upon it, G has become the tonic, and the mode is now a *Mixolydian on G*. In III, though the rhythmic points are not quite the same as in I yet they are not vitally different; but the addition of an F♯ implies a change of scale, which is now a *Mixolydian on D*.²

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It is the custom to consider the C-c scale to be the primary series of notes from which others (D–d, E–e, &c.) are derived, and of which they are modes. But it would be logically as defensible, and historically more correct to consider C–c as a mode of the D–d scale. The fact is that a mode when it is thoroughly established anywhere becomes the scale of that country, or countryside; thus, some of England sings by preference in the Mixolydian, some of it in the Dorian, and so on, Ireland in the Mixolydian and Aeolian. There can be little doubt that the difference between the *Sa-grāma* and the *Ma-grāma*, though it figures as a difference of scale,

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*Sa.* C D E F G ♯ A B C
*Ma.* C D E F G A B C
or
*Sa.* C D E F ♯ G ♯ A B C
*Ma.* C D E F ♯ G A B C

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*Sa.* C D E F ♯ G ♯ A B C
*Ma.* F G A B C ♯ D E F

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was originally a difference of mode

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Thus when mode is thoroughly established it comes to be regarded as scale.

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This distinction between mode and scale is commonly thought to apply only to an antiquated style of music. But the thing is perfectly well known to us in modern music whenever modulation¹ takes place, as a familiar melody from Brahms’s First Symphony shows:

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¹ i.e. modification, taking another ‘mode’, or way of doing things.

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Andante sostenuto. EX. 210. p pp (a) (b)

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The modulation comes at (*a*) in the form of a pathetic flattening of the obvious note, and at (*b*) as a heightening of the meaning by a shift of the melodic centre of gravity. Every musician feels the effect at (*a*) to be quite different from that at (*b*); the first is a difference of scale, the second of mode, and both involve a temporary change of key; the first is like a mechanical, the second like a chemical change. Without some such connecting link as this with our own music we are apt to look on unusual scales and modes, especially when they display such intricacy as the Indian scale (*grāma*) and mode (*mūrchana*) and individualized mode (*rāga*), as merely weird and fanciful. They are, however, formulas which are doing all they can to express the facts of unharmonized melody, if we will let them; and we should approach them in that spirit if we were not hindered by our harmonic preconceptions. For we have to forget a good deal before we hear the beauty in such as this:

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Allegro. ♩=92. Ex. 211. A-la-ka-la - lla lā-ḍa-ga-ga-ni A - la - ka-la - lla la-ḍa-ga-ga-ni A - la-ka-la - lla la - ḍa-ga-ga-ni Yā - rā - mu-ni rī.

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My heart rejoiced, seeing the locks on the forehead of Rāma wave, when he with ease and grace put down the pride of the giant, Mārīcha, and broke the bow of Śiva at the beck of the sage, Viśvamitra.

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If we could treat it as in D minor, with a mere D drone without harmonies, we should be happier; the last bar would then have finality. But the drone is G, and for us this leaves the tune in the air. It takes a long time before we become accustomed to this queer way of looking at things, and can take it as it presents itself. We keep wishing to accommodate the tune by appropriate harmonies at this or that point, and do not easily realize that these introduce subsidiary modes (which we can, however, in virtue of those harmonies, subsume under the main one), but that a change of drone (without harmonies), by introducing a subsidiary mode, merely destroys the principal mode.

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As a preliminary to the consideration of Indian modes we may review our own (omitting the F-f and B-b modes as obsolete):

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Ex. 212.

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They all consist of similar tetrachords; those on C, D, and E being arranged as disjunct to one another, those on G and A as conjunct.¹

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¹ This is not a mere piece of theory. It will be found that melodies in the G and A modes (the Mixolydian and Aeolian) throw much emphasis on the seventh note, the terminal of the second tetrachord, which those in the other modes do not, at any rate to the same extent.

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The mode of D was, we said, the historically prior of all these modes. Its tetrachords are disjunct and similar. We may keep them disjunct, but make them dissimilar; in which case we get, for instance, the A mode transposed down to D:

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Ex. 213.

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Also in these two forms of the D scale we may sharpen the leading note, in which case we get respectively the ‘ascending’ minor:

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Ex. 214.

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and the ‘harmonic’ minor:

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Ex. 215.

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By these three methods, (1) similar tetrachords, (2) dissimilar tetrachords, and (3) scalar alteration, we can account for all the modes we know. There are of course other ways of accounting for them, but this is the plan on which the Indians have worked; only they have carried it further and included every practicable combination of both tetrachords.

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With them modes are ‘pure’ (*śuddha*), or ‘mixed’ (*mishra, saṅkīrṇa*), or ‘altered’ (*chāyālaga, sālanka*).

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They are ‘pure’ when the two tetrachords of which they are composed are similar. In theory every note of a *Rāg* should be consonant (*samvādī*) to some other, and the effect of this would be to make the tetrachords similar, as we have seen that they are in the European modes. But they are similar in others also, such as

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Bhairau. Ex. 216.

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where every note is consonant to some other, and C doubly consonant; and

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Toḍi. Ex. 217.

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in which not C, but A♭ is doubly consonant. Modes are ‘mixed’ when the tetrachords are dissimilar, as in Bilāskhānī Toḍi.

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Ex. 218.

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in which C and A♭ are doubly consonant, but B has no consonant. The Greeks also knew these modes, called them by the same name, *tonoi miktoi*, and defined them in the same way.

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‘Altered’ modes. The words *chāyālaga* and *sālanka* mean different things. *Chāyālaga*, lit. ‘shadowy’, is used in the Panjab, and probably elsewhere, to mean a mode in which the B has been flattened (or the B♭ sharpened). *Sālanka* is not a Sanskrit word at all. It is a piece of *memoria technica*.¹ The seventy-two *melakartas* are divided into thirty-six with F♮, *Śuddhamadhyama*, and thirty-six with F♯, *Pratimadhyama*; and *Sālanka* is the first *melakarta* of the *Pratimadhyamas*. It therefore came to be used as a general term for any *Rāg* that had the F sharpened. At present *Chāyālaga* seems to be used in Hindostan for both the adventitious B♭ and F♯, and *Sālanka* similarly in the Carnatic. Simple instances would be:

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¹ The high-sounding names of the seventy-two South Indian *melakartas* are arranged on a plan so that those who know the key of it can tell at once from the name what the constitution of the particular *melakarta* is.

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Jhinjoti.

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Ex. 219.

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Behāg.

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Ex. 220.

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in these the B♭ and F♯ are alternative, not additional. The principle is extended to other notes, E♭, for instance, in

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Desh.

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Ex. 221.

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This does not account, however, for all the varieties, and the subject needs more investigation; still it carries us some way. All three kinds (‘pure’, ‘mixed’, and ‘altered’) are known to Bharata, though he names them differently. The ‘mixture’ of dissimilar tetrachords he calls the ‘twilight of the *Rāg*’ (*jāti-sādhāraṇa*). For the ‘altered’ *Rāg* he gives no name, but he explains¹ that the *Ma-grāma* can be formed directly, as we should say ‘modally’, from the *Sa-grāma*

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¹ *Nāṭyaśāstra*, adh. 28, śl. 35. ² Monro explains this as ‘adjustment’ in the sense of ‘tuning’. It seems not impossible that it names the ‘joining’ of two tetrachords to form a heptachord.

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C D E | F♯ G A B C

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| F G A B C♯ D E F

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and also by reckoning (*saṃkhyena*), as we should say ‘by scale’,

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C D E F G♯ A B C C D E F♯ G♯ A B C

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He speaks also of the lower tetrachord (*mandragati*, lit. low-going) and upper tetrachord (*tāragati*, high-going), but he does not explain, apparently, how the ‘twilight’ *jātis* were put together. He tells us, for instance, that the compound (*vikṛta*) *jāti*, *ṣadjakaiśikī*, is made up of

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Ṣaḍjī. Ex. 222.

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and

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Gāndhārī. Ex. 223.

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but he does not explain which elements of the simple *jātis* were taken to form the compound. A knowledge of this would contribute a good deal to the history of *Rāga*.

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Students of ancient Greek music agree in this, that there came a time when the *Harmoniā* was replaced by the *Tonos*. The change may have taken centuries; it was placed on record by Ptolemy (A.D. 150). The *Harmoniā*² (lit. joint, union, apposition), which was a section of the gamut consisting of two conjunct tetrachords, was not associated with any definite pitch, but adaptable according to the singer’s needs. The *Tonos* (lit. tension, pitch) was likewise a section of the gamut, but consisted of two tetrachords *plus* the disjunctive tone (which might be between them or beyond them) and formed a complete octave, each *Tonos* being calculated from the same pitch. There seems to be no record in the ancient writers of the *Tonoi* having been sung upon a drone-note; Gevaert makes no mention of it, and to ison, the modern word for drone, is not in Liddell & Scott. But Pachtikos¹ speaks of the drone as being ‘an indisputable relic of the original musical system’. And though the silence of so observant a people as the Greeks is difficult to get over, it is just possible that they took so obvious a thing for granted.² In the *Harmoniā* the notes were related according to their ‘functions’ (*kata dunamin*); the extremes of the tetrachord were ‘fixed’ (*hestēkotes*), the intermediate notes were ‘movable’ (*kineisthai pephūkotes*, or *kīnoumenoi*) and were distributed within a certain prescribed ‘locus of variation’ (*topos tēs kinēseōs*). The ‘functions’ of the intermediate notes meant therefore, apparently, their relations to the extreme notes (of the tetrachord). In the *Tonos*, on the other hand, we see a segment of a stereotyped scale (of two octaves) in which the ‘functions’ of notes within the tetrachord are, though they still exist, no longer of importance, but the individual notes of the scale are related according to their ‘position’ (*kata thesin*) with regard to some one of the notes of this scale taken as tonic and, in India certainly—in Greece perhaps—supplied with a drone.

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¹ *Aismata Hellēnica*, Athens, 1905, Introd., lviii. To ison touto, hoper anantirrētōs einai bebaion leipsanon prohyparchousēs harmonikēs mousikēs, echeitai, &c.

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² There is no mention of the drone in the Sanskrit theorists either.

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Unfortunately it is not possible at present to give such a detailed account of the Indian *Mūrchana* (the equivalent of *Harmoniā*); more will perhaps be possible when Bharata’s *Nātyaśāstra* has been adequately translated. He speaks of the Predominant (*aṃśa*) as the foundation and source of musical charm (*rāga*), as determining the tetrachord (*aṅga*) above (*tāra*) and below (*mandra*), as distinctly perceptible in a combination of different notes, as a prominent (*balin*) note provided with consonances (*samvādī*) and assonances (*anuvādī*), and as giving birth to the initial (*graha*) and final (*nyāsa*) and to three other notes of which the meaning is not given³ (*vinyāsa, apanyāsa*, and *samnyāsa*), but which help in some way to constitute the tetrachord. The initial and final are definitely said to begin and end the tetrachord, and the initial is always a Predominant. Finally, the Predominant may, according to the particular mode, be any one of five notes; and this seems to fix the meaning of Predominant definitely as ‘the note of conjunction of two tetrachords’: for if modern Indian *rāgas* are analysed they will be found, if ‘pure’ or ‘mixed’, to contain from one to five possible points of conjunction; if ‘altered’, more.

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³ But at least it is clear that they named relationships to the terminal (*nyāsa*), and are therefore analogues to the Greek *kīnoumenoi*.

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So that the *aṃśa*¹ seems to take exactly the place of the *mesē* in Greek music, and has the same sort of satellites round it. *Madhyama*, ‘middle,’ accurately translates *mesē*, and it is on the face of it likely that they named originally the same musical fact. We must digress for a moment to discuss *madhyama*.

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¹ The word means a ‘part’ of a whole. Since it appears in manuscripts indifferently with *aṅga* (‘part’), which is a name for the tetrachord, *aṃśa* may originally have meant tetrachord (i.e. ‘part’ of the whole *mūrchana*), and later the note on which the tetrachord started.

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It is noticeable that only two notes of the scale have names with an assignable meaning—*madhyama*, middle, and *pañcama*, fifth. *Ṣaḍja* (‘born of six’) might make a similar claim; but the explanations of it have hitherto been fanciful.² *Madhyama* and *pañcama* are next door neighbours, and of these *madhyama* appears to be the older name, i.e. to be applicable to an earlier state of the scale; for (1) they can hardly be contemporaries, otherwise they would have been called *caturtha* (fourth) and *pañcama*, and (2) since no other note is named by an ordinal number this particular note *pañcama* appears to be so named for distinction, possibly from the *madhyama* (with which it constantly disputed the hegemony). From the earliest times the scale is quoted as consisting of seven notes, the eighth being a repetition; and the *madhyama* divides these seven, in the same way as the *mesē*, into two tetrachords. It may be added that as the other four notes of the scale (*Ṛṣabha*, *Gāndhāra*, *Dhaivata*, and *Niṣāda*) are all apparently place names, they may have been adopted into the scale as the local way of passing from one end of the tetrachord to the other, and hence are of the same nature as the Greek *kīnoumenoi*; and this survives also in the modern scale, for it is these notes, and no others, which are liable to be made flat (*komal*) and very flat (*atikomal*).

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² See Chapter X.

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But by Bharata’s time all the eight notes are clearly defined; they are, as we should write them, (C) D E F G A B C, because the old theory names the upper extremity of the *svara*. The *madhyama* is the note G in a scale C–C, not, as before, in a heptachord D–C; and he has a great deal to say about it. It is the ‘eldest’ (*pravara*), the ‘imperishable’ (*anāśin*), the ‘note fixed by the singers of the *Sāmaveda* in the *Gandharvakalpa*’ (musical treatise), the ‘note which would still subsist though all the other notes of the mode should disappear’. This last delightful hyperbole could not have been applied to the *aṃśa*, which, though it regulated the notes in its tetrachords, was itself liable to be shifted, and the tetrachords with it.

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In modern music *Pa* is the ‘imperishable’ note, i. e. it is never sharpened or flattened as are the other notes, with the exception of *Sa*. So that we see here perhaps the transition from the heptachord consisting of two conjunct tetrachords meeting at the *madhyama*, to an octachord based on the Fifth-relationship of *Sa* and *Pa* (the new *madhyama*) with the movable *aṃśa* doing the work of the old fixed *madhyama*. In other words we have the transition from the *Harmoniā* to the *Tonos*.

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An instance will make this clearer:

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Ex. 224. Ma.

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is a *mūrchana* with two similar tetrachords and with its *madhyama* at A. A, then, is the note of greatest emphasis. Songs sung in this mode came to have a certain character whatever it might be; let us say, sombre. They would then lie on the whole in the upper part of the compass of the mode—not necessarily in the upper register of the voice, for the mode might be taken at any pitch—and the Predominant note (early *madhyama*, later *aṃśa*) would consequently lie low in the song. In order that the low position of the A, on which the character of the song depended, should be effectively felt, a note about the position of F, let us say, assumed the character of fundamental note—the *mūrchana* had of course, as such, no fundamental—and if instruments were used, this fundamental was furnished with a drone. Thus the *mūrchana* (*Harmoniā*) passes into the *Rāg* (*Tonos*):

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Ex. 225. Dr. Am.

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and the *madhyama* (A) of the *mūrchana*, the meeting point of two similar tetrachords, becomes the *aṃśa* of the *Rāg*, the central note of the tessitura, while a new note, C, is now the ‘imperishable’, &c., *madhyama* of the *Rāg*. But in the new *Rāg* there was no need to have the tessitura always in one place, since the character of songs that might be sung in it varied; and it might be moved, without doing much violence to the Rāg, to any note except B♭ and E (of this particular Rāg), because at neither of these points could the amśa be the meeting point of two tetrachords. If it was moved to either of these points, B♭ for instance, there was a tendency to flatten the E and so to develop a different Rāg.

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Let us try to realize this in a melody:

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Shardula-vikridita.¹

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¹ Shardula-vikridita is the name of a Sanskrit metre; and the rhythmical aspect of this melody is discussed in Chapter VIII.

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EX. 226.

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If we put away all thoughts of a tonic as we understand it and simply pick out the most prominent notes of this tune, we should probably say that in the first eight bars they were:

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EX. 227.

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in the next six:

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EX. 228.

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and in the last six:

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EX. 229.

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i. e. G and A twice, and D, E, F, and high and low C once each. The scale therefore might be written:

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EX. 230.

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It is difficult for us not to attach more importance to the low C than is here shown; both because the tune appears to end there, and because, if we emphasize that note, the tune is in our major mode, i. e. in one of the only two that we know. But the tune is, like most Folk-song, circular; after the end it goes back to the beginning and finishes there—in this case probably with the phrase,

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Ex. 231.

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though the D is not thereby made the tonic either; in fact, there is no tonic exactly in our sense. Also, we do not easily put ourselves into the frame of mind of a person who knows not two modes, but from 62 to 162, and are not so easily content to leave off up in the air, so to say.

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But though there is no tonic as we understand it, there is a Predominant (G at the beginning, A in the middle, and either G or A at the end of the song). So that the song is conceived as in one of two modes (*mūrchaṇa*).

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Ex. 232. Ma.

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Ex. 233. Ma.

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Now Indian songs, and probably other non-harmonic songs, are seldom sung twice in the same way, however small the variation each time. Some singers would tend to give prominence to the G of I, some to the A of II. There would also be many songs similar to this one which might be considered to be in mode I or mode II according to the particular singer. These would form a class; and the class would depend largely on the character of the words—sad songs in one class, merry in another, and so on. The words of this particular song are of a reflective nature. And reflection is associated with a low ‘lie’ of the voice. So that songs in these modes might well keep the G, or the A, for their Predominant if jubilant, but if reflective might drag it down to the consonant (*samvādi*) note D, or E.

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Next, if we suppose that with the progress of music this general tendency to have a high Predominant for some songs and a low one for others becomes more defined and scientific, the need would arise to determine precisely how high or how low; and a note would be taken and enforced from which to measure the height of the Predominant. This would be done solely for the musical reason of giving more decided character to the tune, of making explicit what was before implicit. If then a low ‘lie’, such as D or E, was required by the character of the song, and C was chosen as the measuring note or drone, its ‘mode’ would now become a *Rāg* (particularized mode) of the form

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Ex. 234.

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Ex. 235.

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The *Rāg* of this particular song is stated to be *Mand*, a *Rāg* used in the late evening (a possible time for reflection), and it will be seen on turning to the list on p. 151, No. 12, that the Predominant of *Mand* is given in one part of India as D and in another as E.

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A musical purpose of importance is served by this Predominant and its consonant. One of the most effective resources of melody is appoggiatura, i. e. the delaying of a note, the raising of pleasing expectations. This melody from Tristan, for instance,

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Ex. 236.

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owes almost its whole force to the enhancement by appoggiatura of some simple scheme such as:

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Ex. 237.

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The essential condition of appoggiatura is that the delaying note should be felt to be only transitory and the delayed note to be relatively final or permanent. This is effected in our music by the harmony, expressed or implied, which moves on from substantive to passing chord and forces the delaying note to yield. Thus (substantive chords (a) and passing chords (b)):

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Ex. 238.

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And the same is true when the harmonies are only implied, as in the first four bars of this passage from the Ninth Symphony:

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Ex. 239.

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Here the harmonies, implied in the first five bars and expressed in the last five, are:

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Ex. 240.

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and at every place marked *b* the melody gets a purchase on one of the constituent notes of these.

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But when there are no chords at all in question the substantive nature of the delayed note has to be established in some other way. In Indian, as no doubt in ancient Greek and probably (see Chapter VI) in the ecclesiastical melodies, this is done by the Predominant (*aṃśa*, *mesē*, reciting note); notes receive the force of appoggiaturas as they delay this. Thus, in the melody with which we are dealing, D being Predominant and G its consonant (both established by long association) and C the drone (generally expressed), we have appoggiaturas (*b*)

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Ex. 241.

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leading to a substantive note (a) which is either the *aṃśa* (D), or its consonant (G), or the drone (C). This is a particularly easy *Rāg* for us, because C, G, and D are notes we should have no difficulty in feeling to be important; but when, in other *Rāgs*, D and A, or E♭ and A♭, are *aṃśa* and *samvādī* it is not so easy to feel the musical impulse, though it is not hard to understand the principle.

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As we have been tracing points in common between Indian and Greek music, we may notice two more. One, that the salient distinction between the two *grāmas* is found in the four notes, F G A B of the *Sa-grāma* and F G A B♮ of the *Ma-grāma*; and this was precisely the distinction between the Greek ‘lesser complete’ and ‘greater complete’ systems. Only the problem presented itself differently. In Greece the scales were:

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Ex. 242.

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and

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Ex. 243.

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and in India

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Ex. 244.

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and

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Ex. 245.

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The other point of resemblance lies in an apparent recognition of absolute pitch. The lowest note of the Greek systems (the *proslambanomenon*) was of the pitch,

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Ex. 246.

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and the lowest note of the *vīṇā*, the oldest instrument of India, is that same A. It is difficult to say how far Indians were ever, or are now, conscious of absolute pitch. There is an interesting comparison of the notes of the scale to the cries of animals. *Sa* is the note of the peacock. *Ri*, of the *chātaka*, the bird of the rainy season. *Ga*, of the goat. *Ma*, of the crane. *Pa*, of the *koïl*, generally translated cuckoo, but bearing no resemblance in its vocal achievement to our bird; it hammers out a single note when making love in the spring, and its mate joins in, invariably at the distance of a tone, and perhaps a rival lover at the distance of a semitone. *Dha*, of the frog. *Ni*, of the elephant. This has been quoted as showing that the scale was conceived as a matter of absolute pitch; and there is some evidence that the cries of animals always keep the same pitch. It may be so: it would require special knowledge to decide this point. On the other hand, the musicians of to-day have no name for and no means of determining absolute pitch; and they are not usually backward in coining names for, or in devising simple methods of putting into operation, any ideas they may possess.

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The theory of *grāma* has remained barren, just because it was a mere scientific tabulation and did not sufficiently take account of the whole musical fact. It is true that the system of the Carnatic is arranged in accordance with it, and that the musicians of Hindostan hold it as a pious belief. But the musical science of South India is sadly over elaborated; and that of the North has followed quite another classification (see Chapter VI). The essence of the modern music lies in its numerous and intricate *Rāgs*, which, being modes calculated from one tonic and having the compass of an octave, correspond in so far to the *Tonoi*; but which again are very unlike them on account of their being sections not of one scale common to all, but of a variety of scales which practically refuse to be co-ordinated in Northern India, though not so much so in the South. Indian music has in fact retained in full force what, after the introduction of the *Tonoi*, Greek musicians only faintly felt, that distinctive *ēthos* of which Plato and Aristotle spoke so enthusiastically.¹

c10.133

¹ This may explain why, even to a foreigner, the *Rāgs* in the North seem to have more individuality, and why the tone of voice in which natives of Hindostan speak of Carnatic music sounds a little apathetic, whereas Southerners, though for the sake of association they like their own *Rāgams* best, always seem interested in a Hindostani singer.

c10.134

Broadly speaking this transition from the heptachord (*mūrchana*, *harmoniā*) to the octachord (*rāg, tonos*) is the passage from the domination of the Fourth to that of the Fifth, from vocal to instrumental music. The voice discovers the consonance of the Fourth before that of the Fifth. Its upper notes are the more powerful, and the overtones accordingly more audible. Consequently it is in singing the upper notes that the desire to reach a consonant note chiefly makes itself felt. A bass voice, for instance, is singing [Figure: ]. The E above it sounds clearly in his ear: but it is beyond his compass; he therefore takes the lower E as the most obvious consonance. With instruments, however, the case is reversed. It is the lower notes that are the most powerful and yield the clearest overtones; and with these the Fifth comes to be appreciated more than the Fourth. In this respect, besides that mentioned above, the music of the Carnatic shows signs of greater age—of having begun earlier that is, and lived longer, and reached a further, not necessarily a higher, point of development. The *aṃśa* is there less a vital element of *Rāgam*; musicians often cannot tell you which note is *aṃśa*, and the songs make little account of it. This shows that the consonance of the Fourth, which the principle of *aṃśa* emphasizes, is less keenly felt there. And again the songs tend to close on the tonic or the Fifth, whereas in the North there is no such preference; they may end anywhere, but do, for choice, on the first note or with the first phrase of the song, on whatever note it may bring them to rest. Here, for instance, is a typical Carnatic phrase (cp. Ex. 379):

Linked texts (1)

Nāṭyaśāstra — Bharata, Sanskrit