New kaida and the future

 

Greetings. It's been a pandemic-minute. 

I'm posting a full Delhi Gharana kaida today, with detailed, downloadable .pdf notes, and am looking for feedback re the future.

I'm considering starting a Patreon to share materials, not only for tabla players, but also for musicians curious about the vocabulary and grammar of Indian rhythm in general. 

Survey below, and video below that.

Video:

Notes:

Habibuddin's Nest: interlocking tabla tarang

Greetings fellow travellers!

I hope everyone is doing well in this time of great upheaval and change, and are wearing a mask and washing your hands.

It’s been awhile, but I’ve been thinking about how to reignite this blog, and I have some ideas, so please stay tuned.

First up, I want to share a piece I recently released as part of a film called MUSHROOM. The complete film is available on Vimeo On Demand, and is a 31-minute journey of music, film, photography, sound design, dance and documentary, with a solid appeal to tabla players/nerds/geeks. 

https://vimeo.com/ondemand/mushroomfilm

The video below is part 2 of the film, and I’m making it available for free on this blog for educational and inspirational purposes.

The music is an interlocking tabla tarang, and the visuals are a virtual tabla museum.

Please watch, and I’ll break down the music below (fullscreen, headphones etc):

The soundtrack for the film is here, if you want to listen, or purchase (though I strongly recommend experiencing it with the visual component)

So, what’s happening with the tabla tarang? 

First, maybe, we need to discuss what IS a tabla tarang. We know what tabla is, and tarang means "waves" (and 'waves of tabla' is just about the best thing I can think of!)

Wikipedia says: "The tabla tarang (Hindi: तबला तरंग) is a melodic percussion instrument consisting of between ten and sixteen tuned dayan drums."

Here's Pt Kamlesh Maitra with a 12-dayan tabla tarang:

So, basically, a tabla version of a xylophone or marimba, where each drum would correspond to a single pitch... except! tabla has two pitches per drum: the open 'tun', and the harmonic 'na'. The tun is roughly a minor 7th below the na. So, if na is C, then tun is roughly the D below that. And when I say roughly, I mean it's sorta kinda somewhere around there, depending on a whole lot of factors. More on this later, and how it impacts the melodic and harmonic landscape of tabla tarang. 

If you want to pop out for a sidebar on tabla tarang, here's a video of Pt. Kamalesh Maitra, and a more contemporary take by Andy Skellenger. 

I haven't delved much into tabla tarang as a melodic instrument... I've only played with having a couple of drums clustered around a tabla set, and dropping the occasional na or tun in for flavour. 

however...

I have been thinking about the layering possibilities of tabla tarang for a long time, and i finally dug into it, and I want to share the process, so...

Here we go!

Tabla produces multiple sounds, some pitched, some not. Some resonant, some not. Some can be modulated, some cannot. 

A tabla groove has multiple layers of sounds happening at once. Let's look at a simple dadra theka:

Dha ti Dha Dha tin na Ta ti Dha Dha dhin na

The na part is ( • sound, - no sound):

• - • • - • • - • • - •

The baya pattern is:

• - • • • - - - • • • -

The tin/dhin part is:

- - - - • - - - - - • -

and the ti part is:

- • - - - - - • - - - - 

*the ti also acts as a mute on the preceding na, so is both an event, and the end of an event

I frequently get lost isolating individual sound patterns when practicing tabla. 'what's the na pattern? what's the baya pattern?' etc and what I wanted to do, my 'what happens if?' creative instigation was:

What happens if I take two different compositions, isolate the individual stroke/sound patterns, play them on different pitched drums, and carve out some sort of arrangement?

I chose two heavy traditional compositions that i learned when i was studying with Pandit Anindo Chatterjee in Calcutta in 1999/2000:

A tintal kaida by Habibuddin Khan, Ajrada Gharana (and this is a wonderful feature)

Ghe Ghe Te Te Ghe Ghe Te Te Ghe ne Dhene Dhin na Ge na

Na ge Te Te Ghe Ghe Te Te Ghe ne Dhene Dhin na Ge na

Dhene Dhin na Ge na Na ge Te re ki te Dhene Dhin na 

Ghe Ghe Te Te Ghe ne Dhene Dhin na Ge na Na ge Te te

and a tintal chalan by Wajid Hussain Khan, Lucknow Gharana:

Ghe Ta ge Ghe Ta ge Dhene Dha ge treke Dhin na ge na

Na ge te te Ghe Ta ge Ghe Ta ge Dhene Na ge te te

I chose these two compositions because:

a) they both start with baya only

b) they both feature dhene and dhinna

c) they both end with nagetete

d) they're both sublime, groovy and beautiful

If we look inside at the individual stroke patterns, we see this:

note that the first pattern is twice as long as the 2nd. 

I made a pattern for each one:

Habibuddin Khan composition:

Theme, Variation 1, Variation 2, Theme

Wajid Hussain composition:

Theme, Theme, Variation 1, Theme

I recorded in layers, starting with the Habibuddin Khan kaida (Th, v1, v2, Th):

-the 'tun' part, on 9 different pitched drums, at single speed (so, 9 takes, 9 tracks)

-the 'na' part, on 9 different pitched drums, at single speed 

-the baya parts, on 7 bayas, at single speed

-just the na and tun parts, at double speed, on all 9 pitches

-the baya parts, at double speed on 7 bayas

Then, the Wajid Hussain chalan (Th, Th, v1, Th):

-the tun and na parts together, on 9 different pitched drums, at single speed 

-the baya parts, on 7 bayas, at single speed, incl the 'tak' of Ghe ta ge

-the tun and na parts together, on 9 different pitched drums, at double speed 

-the baya parts, at double speed on 7 bayas

Remember though, each tabla has 2 pitches, so while the harmonics of the drums (na) were tuned to (ascending) 

C, D, D#, G, A, A#, C, D, D#

there are a whole second set of notes in the tun-pattern, and none of them are in tune with the notes in the na-pattern, so this set of drums creates its own harmonic universe. You could redo this piece exactly, but with a different set of drums, it would sound quite different simply because the relationship between na and tun is unique from drum to drum. 

My notes:

note that the patterns are all different lengths, and nest within each other, hence the title

Once all the parts were recorded, I did subtractive editing to remove parts (like carving a statue out of a block of stone), and shape a progression. and yes, the edit was an absolute beast and took hours and my computer squealed frequently. 

on a tech-nerd level: I also rented/borrowed a pile of gear so I could record each drum with a different microphone and preamp combination:

the 9 pitches of tabla & 7 baya with mic & preamp config

also on a nerd level, panning was very important, and with so many tracks, I had to make a panning map to keep track:

The tempo is very VERY slow... 17.5 bpm, so slow that the whole piece is only 6-cycles long. 

The lehara is a combo of organ samples and an incredible bass vocalist by the name of Kurt Sampson. I was inspired by a Phillip Glass piece called Koyaanisqatsi which you should go listen to RIGHT NOW! Then find the film and watch that. 

The video was made during lockdown, and I set up my kitchen table as a photography workbench and photographed/videoed every drum in my apartment, as well as that retro lehara machine and my repair tools. That tripod is taped and locked down, so every drum appears accurately in relation to every other. 

Oh! AND... the video is dedicated to tabla makers, those artisans of wood, copper, iron and skin.

I think that's it, but I want to leave you with a challenge, if you dug this:

Try an interlocking tabla tarang.

-pick a pair of compositions (could be same tala, or different talas)

-pick a set of tabla pitches (could even be just 2, because 4 notes!)

-track just the na pattern on each pitch at single and double

-ditto tun, tete, terekite, dheneghene etc

-then baya

and see what happens.

As I mentioned, I have some ideas for this blog, including not only deep dives into traditional tabla, but also contemporary approaches, creativity in general and some guest posts. Drop me a line if you're interested in anything in particular, or if you have an idea.

Habibuddin's Nest was created with the generous creation and production support of the Ontario Arts Council and the Canada Council for the Arts.

Until next time,
Ta,
E

PS please watch the film! People seem to like it... here's a word-cloud derived from reviews:

Tihai: Endings are Beginnings

I find myself home early from a gig, and energized, so I want to talk tihais. There's a video below if you just want music.

A tihai is a rhythmic pattern that repeats three times, often, but not always, landing on the sam (downbeat) of a tala (rhythmic) cycle. Unique to Indian classical music, both north and south (where it is called a mora), a tihai has 2 main features: the phrase that repeats three times, and the gap between the phrases.

This isn't going to be a scholarly article, just my observations, impressions and philosophy of tihais and all things cyclical. There will be minimal math.

A rhythmic pattern that repeats three times...that could mean, at its shortest: Dha Dha Dha
or, theoretically, a pattern that takes 3 years to complete.

Simple tihai:
Teteketagedighene Dha -
Teteketagedighene Dha -
Teteketagedighene Dha

Tihais can have tihais within them:

Teteketagedighene Dha - Teteketagedighene Dha - Teteketagedighene Dha - - -  - - - -
Teteketagedighene Dha - Teteketagedighene Dha - Teteketagedighene Dha - - -  - - - -
Teteketagedighene Dha - Teteketagedighene Dha - Teteketagedighene Dha

They can be stacked...here's a tihai with 9 tihais within it:

Teteketagedighene Dha Dha Dha - ne Dha Dha Dha - ne Dha Dha Dha - - -  - - - -
Teteketagedighene Dha Dha Dha - ne Dha Dha Dha - ne Dha Dha Dha - - -  - - - -
Teteketagedighene Dha Dha Dha - ne Dha Dha Dha - ne Dha Dha Dha

Or, to use an example from the previous post, 27 tihais in one, with a bit of shorthand:

{DhaTunNaKetete Dha - ne Dha - ne Dha -
DhaTunNaKetete Dha - ne Dha - ne Dha -
DhaTunNaKetete Dha - ne Dha - ne Dha - - -
DhaTunNaKetete Dha - ne Dha - ne Dha -
DhaTunNaKetete Dha - ne Dha - ne Dha -
DhaTunNaKetete Dha - ne Dha - ne Dha - - -
DhaTunNaKetete Dha - ne Dha - ne Dha -
DhaTunNaKetete Dha - ne Dha - ne Dha -
DhaTunNaKetete Dha - ne Dha - ne Dha - - -  - - - -  - - - - } *3

So, that's a huuuuge tihai, made up of three smaller tihais, and each of those smaller tihais is itself made up of three even smaller tihais, and each one of THOSE tihais contains an even smaller tihai! Wild. Indian music was drilling down into particle physics before we even had a microscope on this planet.

Here's a graphic illustration of that:

This monster tintal tihai runs 16-16, 16.5-16.5 and 1-1

So. Math.

If you're in tintal, a 16 beat cycle, and you want to play a tihai that takes 2 tala cycles to complete (starting and ending on the 1st beat of the cycle), you have 33 beats to work with (16x2,+1...the downbeat of the next cycle). You can play an 11 beat phrase (11x3=33) and it will work. Tihais do not have to start from the first beat of a cycle though. They can start from anywhere. Nine. Three. Fourteen-and-a-half. 7-and-two-thirds. Doesn't matter, as long as your math is sound. There are people who can better explain the mathematics of tihais. It's not my speciality.

What I am interested in, though, is the concept. Of tihais, and of cycles.

Endings are Beginnings, Beginnings are Endings

Tihais are both beginnings and endings. Sure, you can play a tihai to finish a kaida, but it also marks the beginning of the next rhythmic cycle, the next chapter. Within a kaida, or an improv, tihais can mark chapters...the end of one section and simultaneously the beginning of the next section.

You've probably heard the expression 'When one door closes, another opens'. The full quote, by Alexander Graham Bell, is:

When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.
-Alexander Graham Bell

Which might be profound, depending on your mood. I certainly find it useful when big, painful changes happen.

Cycles

Rhythmic time in Indian music is based on cycles. A cycle begins, and at the exact moment it finishes, the next cycle starts. One complete rotation of the earth makes one day. The earth orbits the sun, a process that takes 1 year. Our solar system is itself orbiting the centre of our galaxy, which takes about 230 million years. Google tells me that apparently our Milky Way Galaxy is not really orbiting anything, just drifting around aimlessly, but I bet you 230 lakh rupees it's drifting around in a certain raga that we haven't heard yet, in a great a cosmic alapana ;)

Plus I bet the entire universe is spinning. Everything is cycles. Light is cycles. Sound is cycles. Matter is made up of particles that are vibrating...more cycles. Maybe time itself is a cycle. This is heavy:



So. Tihais are cycles within cycles. You could theoretically play a tihai that took 3 years to complete. Call a year a cycle. It'd be a 12 beat cycle, with each beat taking a month. Let's choose January 1st as the downbeat, sam (even though March 21st, the 1st day of spring, is a better downbeat IMHO). Let's also pretend each month has 28 days.

Here's our tihai:
Teteketagedighene Dha - Dha - Dha - - -
Teteketagedighene Dha - Dha - Dha - - -
Teteketagedighene Dha - Dha - Dha -  - -  - -
Teteketagedighene Dha - Dha - Dha - - -
Teteketagedighene Dha - Dha - Dha - - -
Teteketagedighene Dha - Dha - Dha -  - -  - -
Teteketagedighene Dha - Dha - Dha - - -
Teteketagedighene Dha - Dha - Dha - - -
Teteketagedighene Dha - Dha - Dha

January 1: Te
January 7: te
January 14: ke
January 21: ta
February 1: ge
February 7: di
February 14: ghe
February 21: ne
March 1: Dha
March 14: Dha
April 1: Dha (1 month vacation! you deserve it)
etc.

Totally absurd (but someone should totally do it! 52 Kaidas challenge!) BUT! my point is that it's all perception. We measure our lives in the tala of the year. Your childhood a peshkar, teenage years the kaidas. University, maybe relas. Starting a family, gats. The older years, the poetry of parans and chakradars. And we all have a giant final chakradar tihai coming. Which will begin the next cycle.

When you're playing tabla, or any music, you could think of it in this way. Stages of life. I'm FINALLY getting to the video, if you haven't thought 'dude has finally lost his MIND!' and closed the browser window already.



This is a peshkar/kaida/rela that I learned from Pandit Suresh Talwalkar, and i want to do a cycle-by-cycle breakdown. I've wanted to do one of these forever! Maybe open the video in a separate window, and resize things so you can see both the video and the blog at the same time if that's useful. Or just listen.

So:
Cycle 1: Theka, an intro phrase from khali (9th beat) then a tihai from 13¼
DhaDhinna (Dhatunna) DhaDhinna (Dhatunna) DhaDhinna Dha

Cycle 2: Peshkar theme 1, with a variation introduced on the 4th repeat, from 13

Cycle 3: Theme 1 again, with a variation from 5-9, then a tihai from 11⅞
Dha - kreDhaDhinna Dha ( - - terekite)
Dha - kreDhaDhinna Dha ( - - terekite)
Dha - kreDhaDhinna Dha  ... introducing terekite, foreshadowing theme 2...

Cycle 4: Peshkar theme 2, with a variation again introduced on the 4th repeat, from the 13th beat

Cycle 5: Theme 2 again, with the variation from the previous cycle from the 5th beat, and a tihai from 114/8 
Dha - kreDhaDhinna Dha - (DhagenaTerekite) [underlines denotes double]
Dha - kreDhaDhinna Dha - (DhagenaTerekite)
Dha - kreDhaDhinna Dha

Cycle 6: Peshkar theme 2 again, variation from 5, and a tihai from khali (9th beat)
KreDha - KreDha - Dhin na KreDha - KreDha - Thun na Dha -
KreDha - KreDha - Dhin na KreDha - KreDha - Thun na Dha -
KreDha - KreDha - Dhin na KreDha - KreDha - Thun na Dha

Cycle 7: Peshkar theme 2 w variations from 5 and 13 (i call this an idling cycle... prepping for tihai)

Cycle 8: Peshkar tihai:
{Dha - terekite Thin Na - - Dha - kreDha Thin na - -
                                               Dha - kreDha Thin na - -
                                               Dha - kreDha Thin na Dha - - - } *3

Cycle 9: Kaida! Theme, introduced without baya, with a variation & baya introduction from 13

Cycle 10: Kaida theme, full, with a variation from 13

Cycle 11: Minor variation (Ghe na instead of Dha - ) with a Dha Dha variation from 13

Cycle 12: Ghe na variation from 1, Dha Dha variation from 5, filled version from khali and a tihai from 13 (sort of..there's an intro phrase)
ge Dhatidhagena Dha terekite DhatiDhagena Dha - (kena)
                                                 DhatiDhagena Dha - (kena)
                                                 DhatiDhagena Dha

Cycle 13: Now the kaida becomes home base, and rela phrases (of 7 & 9) are introduced, from beat 7, and then again from beat 15
The rela phrase is
Dha terekite TakeDhinneNaNaghene (7)
Dha terekite Dha kitetake DhinneNaNaghene (9)
(I'll use only the numbers from here on in)

Cycle 14: Kaida, rela from 3, kaida, rela from 7, kaida, rela from 11 through to sam
or, A 7-9 A 7-9; a 7-9, 7-9, 7-9
(lower case 'a' means khali)

Cycle 15: A 7-9, 7-9, 7-9; a 7-9, 7    {7 Dha - 7 Dha - 7 Dha}

Cycle 16: A 7-9, 7-9, 7-9; 7-9 7-4-4   {9 Dha - - 9 Dha - - 9 Dha}

Cycle 17: 7-9, 7-9, 7-9, 7-9; 7-9, 7-6    {9 Dha -kat- 9 Dha -kat- 9 Dha} 

Cycle 18: final tihai: 7-9, 7-4-6   7 Dha -ne 7 Dha -ne 7 Dha - (ge- din - ne)
                                                     7 Dha -ne 7 Dha -ne 7 Dha - (ge- din - ne)
                                                     7 Dha -ne 7 Dha -ne 7 Dha

Sooooo. The 1st 18 years of the life of a tabla composition. Lots of drama from 14-18, just like everyone. Note that there are 10 tihais in this progression, one used to start the whole thing going, then others to transition between sections, as punctuation within sections, and to end the piece (and start the next cycle).

That's Rattan Bhamrah on esraj, and this was a concert at Musideum in Toronto, July 8, 2014, as part of my Music:India series. 

Najia Alavi

On a sad note, the main camera was operated by a lovely woman by the name of Najia Alavi. She responded to my call for a volunteer to run a camera in exchange for a pair of tickets. We'd never met. She did an awesome job, as you can see, and we kept in touch periodically. Najia passed away, suddenly, tragically, in May 2015. RIP Najia.

re Surfacing

Hi,

There's a full-on tabla-nerd post below, but first...

I've been absolutely touched and humbled by the response to my previous post. I've tried to respond individually to everyone, both friends and strangers, who have sent emails, shared, retweeted and commented here, and on Facebook and Twitter, but I want to say thank you. Thank you for your support, your encouragement and your kind words. A lot of people have used the word 'brave', and I understand why... it's ok to say 'I broke my arm', but it is still not ok to say 'I'm suffering an affliction of the mind...my thoughts are working against me...I'm working against myself'. That needs to change. If I can play a small part in that, then the vulnerability of opening up about it was absolutely worth it. I'm not sure I was brave. I sure didn't feel brave posting that.

If you are suffering depression, you are not alone. We needn't be brave to talk about it, and to seek help. Recognize your patterns, and discern which ones are helping, and which ones are not. This is a challenge, because they often overlap:

Looping

Depression is a looping disorder. This is purely my definition. Thoughts repeat, get magnified, coloured by anxiety, gaining weight and momentum, spinning faster and faster until they occupy almost the entire bandwidth of your mind. It takes an incredible force to kick out of that loop, but if the wheel is still spinning, it's entirely too easy to be drawn back in. Easy...comforting even (as horrible as that is), because it's familiar. There's a strange satisfaction in worrying, perhaps an evolutionary survival skill that is, while not entirely obsolete, maybe not quite as necessary today as it once was to our ancestors. A wise friend once told me 'worrying is praying for what you don't want to happen'. That has kicked me out of a few loops over the years. Jot it down and use it if you think it'll help.

But! looping is fucking amazing if you're a tabla player. FUCKING AMAZING! How else to repeatedly play a single phrase 100 or 1000 times to develop the muscle memory and technique to reproduce it in the hostile, distraction-laden environment of a stage or recording studio? I'm a looping fanatic. At times one song is on repeat for an entire day while I work on something. Sometimes a week. I learn new music by listening it dozens and dozens of times. It's how I come up with ideas...the very fundamental process of my creativity. I can get a mental centrifuge up to 10,000 RPM in no time, spinning out idea after idea. (Though sometimes nothing comes) Kaida phrases loop in my head, and slow-morph, variation to variation, an incredibly satisfying process that is...whoops....EXACTLY like worrying and simmering self-criticism.

So. How to keep the good looping, and discard the bad looping? Hmm. This is the challenge, for me, anyway. You could, saaay...check your thoughts! But how often? 50, 100 times a day? That ain't gonna work. Thinking about thinking is part of the problem. Think about THAT for a second ;). Thinking about thinking. We are the only beings on earth capable of such a feat (as far as we know...though I think dolphins are probably self-aware, and definitely cats) and it's a blessing 90% of the time. It's huge, and deep, and makes us who we are to a large extent. But when it goes wrong, it is not a good scene. Maybe we're in the awkward teenage years of consciousness...gangly of mind. Again...mindfulness meditation, specifically mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) is vital, if you have a looping brain that likes to chew on its own thoughts. That storm happening immediately in front of you will drift away with your breath, and suddenly appear much less severe, lose power, and eventually dissipate. Find a course, or a regular practice near you, and join up. It's incredibly simple once you know how, but the challenge is maintenance.

I'm not sure if I want this blog to become 52 Kaidas with a side order of depression, so I dunno how much more I will write on this topic. But i might write more.

Now...music.




I recorded this this past summer while I was housesitting for my brother and his family. A break from a routine environment is often inspiring, no?

Jhaptal (10 beats). Two kaidas I learned from Pandit Suresh Talwalkar on 2 different study trips to his Taalyogi Ashram in Pune.

Wait, whaaat? No lehara! (I asked Sureshji why he used vocal leharas in his work, rather than the usual sarangi or harmonuim, to which he replied 'it's like ants crawling on my brain!'. Ha. There's some escape-from-looping wisdom for you right there!). The drum grooves are from a sample library, which I edited into a 10 beat groove from an 8 beat one...recite jhaptal theka..it's right in there.)

The first kaida:
Dha - DhatiDhagena Dhagethinna Dhagena DhageThinnakena
GhenaDhatiDhagena Dhagethinna Dhagena DhageThinnakena

and the second:

Dha-trekeDhetete Kena DhatiDhagena DhageThinnakena
TrekeDhetete KenaDha - DhatiDhagena DhageThinnakena

(note how the second line is a kind of reverse/reply to the first...the opening phrase flipped backwards, like a question)

You'll notice I don't play all the bayan strokes...something I've started to do for 2 reasons:
1. less than perfect technique, aka a weak left hand
2. space, and a more 'drumkit' sound. When you listen to someone playing drumkit, the kickdrum is not all that frequent (unless you're listening to death metal). I'm trying to pick and choose which bayan strokes I play to lend a certain flavour of funkyness to the parts.

Fun exercise: play a kaida phrase, but completely closed...no open baya. Pick one stroke where there would be bayan, and add it in. LOOP! (omg) and repeat. Once it's settled, add another one, somewhere else. Continue until you've added them all in, or you've reached a cool density that floats your boat.

eg:
(all closed)
Ta-trekeThetete Kena TatiTakena TakeThinnakena
TrekeThetete KenaTa - TatiTakena TakeThinnakena

(add Dhe, and hammer it...boom!)
Ta-trekeDhetete Kena TatiTakena TakeThinnakena
TrekeDhetete KenaTa - TatiTakena TakeThinnakena

(add Dha - )
Dha-trekeDhetete Kena TatiTakena TakeThinnakena
TrekeDhetete KenaDha - TatiTakena TakeThinnakena

etc.

Every kaida will have a unique little development you can find, yet another layer in this incredible artform.

I'll leave it there for now. Thanks for reading, thanks again for the support and kindness, and be well.
Ed

PS speaking of looping.... one more:

I recorded this track waaaay back in the day (Feb 2010), but finally made a video with it, slightly remixed, with some added percussion. The video is a giant tabla LOOP (omg!)...a circle of tabla filmed with a GoPro mounted on an Ikea kitchen timer, rotating over the course of an hour, sped up to match the track length. The colours are out-of-focus christmas lights (which litter my apartment) layered underneath for an aurora borealis effect.

The setup

Uthan, Palta Theka, tintal, composed by Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri for a tabla ensemble at the Ali Akbar College of Music in San Rafael California back in the day, taught to me by Ritesh Das. This is one of my very favourite pieces of repertoire. The uthan is gorgeous, 3 speeds, with a monster tihai that repeats the same bol 27 times (DhaTunNa Ketete Dha-neDha-neDha-) starting from the 16th matra, running 16-16, 16.5-16.5 and sam to sam.

The palta theka has an incredibly subtle and beautiful development, gradual and sensual, developing from sparseness to dense groove in a really lovely way, with another monster tihai. The whole thing loops so damn well. *sigh*

Short tintal solo & concert announcements

Hello

I played a short (~25 min) tabla solo yesterday in Toronto (well, Brampton) at the Hindustani Sangeet Society's "Music Fest 2014 - Showcasing the Gwalior Gharana" gig.

(video re-upped w better audio... board mix comes in at 1:42. Thanks to Hardeep Chana for the board mix)



That's the amazing and intuitive Rattan Bhamrah on esraj, playing a lehara in Misra Maand.

The organizer, Vinayak Phatak specifically requested that I play tabla that I learned from Pt. Suresh Talwalkar. I also accompanied Vinayak-ji on his vocal performance, playing the unusual talas Jhoomra and Tilwada.

Nothing new here, repertoire-wise...all three of these pieces have appeared on this blog before.
Peshkar/Kaida/Rela: http://52kaidas.blogspot.ca/2013/03/cycles-collaborative-multimedia.html
Tisra kaida in the Subrata De video: http://52kaidas.blogspot.ca/2014/04/hola-couple-videos-and-concert.html
and the final kaida in my stop-motion video: http://52kaidas.blogspot.ca/2013/02/animated-kaida-tablavision-residency.html

I played a couple more pieces, but they're not ready for primetime yet...

BUT!

I have a tabla solo concert coming up on July 8th at Musideum where I'll take another stab at them. I'm planning 4 talas at this show: rupak, jhaptal, chartal ki sawari and tintal. Let's see if that all fits in my mouth O.o
Listing: http://musideumconcerts.com/styles/page1.html#ed1

On July 29th I'm bringing together a dream team for another gig at Musideum:
Suba Sankaran (voice), Chris Hale (sitar), Justin Gray (bass veena) and I will be presenting an evening of Indian classical music and not-exactly-Indian-classical music.
Listing: http://musideumconcerts.com/styles/page1.html#ed2

Here's a playlist of duets I've done with these 3 stellar musicians separately. I can't WAIT to bring them together.



ok, all for now, thanks for reading/watching/listening!
E

pic from the gig yesterday, by Manraj Singh Pannu

Packed for the gig: have baby powder, will travel.

Jhaptal and Chartal Ki Sawari

Greetings from India.

Here's a little video I made using a recording of a practice session with Jonathan Kay on dilruba and the last 27 minutes of the Delhi To Kolkata Rajdhani Express, pulling into Howrah station. Apologies for the lo-fi-ness of the recording, and esp the baya...combo of recording on my phone, and an old, much played clay baya. (excuses!)

We were practicing for my solo show on Saraswati Puja at Pt Sankha Chatterjee's house in Kolkata, and this was only Jon's 2nd time playing for a tabla solo. The first time was for another solo of mine a couple days before, hence the rehearsal. (Jonathan is a tenor & soprano sax player, studying with vocalist Pandit Shantanu Bhattacharya, but also plays dilriba, esraj and bansuri as well). I also accompanied him in a house concert, and will post later...Hindustani classical sax!

Anyway, here you go:

Composition types played are, in order: Jhaptal: Peshkar, Kaida x3, Paran x3, Gat, Thukra, Chakradar; Chartal Ki Sawari: Mukra, Uthan (my arrangement), Paran, Gat x2, Paran x2; with material from Pt Suresh Talwalkar, Pt Swapan Chaudhuri and material I learned from Subhajyoti Guha, that he learned from Pt Sankha Chatterjee. Delhi, Farukhabad and Lucknow gharanas.

Another solo in Chartal Ki Sawari...longer this time

Hello all,
New video from a concert I played the other night with sitarist Chris Hale:

You might recognize some of the material from these previous posts, but there's a bunch of stuff I haven't played or recorded before. Compositional types abound: mukra, paran, kaida, gat & chakradar. With lots of recitation.


So...

I learned most of the material I play here in a workshop with Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri, and it's all so very beautiful...the way the compositions follow the contours, and especially the sawari (little 'ride' on the last 3 beats of the tala) is really a joy to practice and play. I hope I do it justice.

Tabla has basically 2 types or extended families of composition: improvised, and fixed. I ramble on about the improvised forms (peshkar, kaida, kaida-rela, rela etc) a lot on this blog, so now it's time to focus on the short forms: mukra, gat, paran and chakradar.

I think of these forms as poems...rhythmic poems. One does not tend to improvise on them, though it's common to re-compose, or elaborate on one particular composition to put it in a different tala, or to just make a series of them that are all related. Some compositions have probably hundreds of versions, and every tabla player knows one you've never heard before. Still...they're fixed, not improvised.

The performance practice, unlike the long-forms, is to recite the composition first, then play. The poetry of these compositions lies equally in both realms... the vocalizations, if done well, can stand alone, are very lyrical, and can really illustrate the phrasing, grammar and flow, while the playing part operates on a completely other, abstract level...you hear a set of words (bols), then a musical or sonic representation in which you can 'hear' the words, but the real magic is that the drum sounds will set up accents and patterns that are not audible in the spoken language. One composition might, for example, have a progressive use of the open 'tun' stroke (open RH drum sound): 'tun' can be played alone (tun, di) or combined with open or closed baya (thun, dhin, dhen) and are grouped in combinations with a dizzying array of 'words' or longer phrases: dheneghene, gedighene, dhenegheran-ne, dighene, teteketagedighene, dhenetage, takedhene etc etc and when this happens, it's almost like another level of reality is exposed...the Matrix of Tabla! omg. Did I just go there? I really did. Tabla players DEFINITELY took the red pill ;)

So...the forms:

Mukra is a short composition, usually made up of bols from Pakhawaj. I think of mukras as small flourishes leading into sam...they're not usually a main-course type of composition, but can be very beautiful nonetheless. There is usually a tihai at the end of a Mukra. Mukra means 'face', but I'm not sure how that relates to tabla...perhaps it's more of a glance, or a glimpse of a face? Maybe a mischievous flare of the eyes.

Paran: compositions made up of pakhawaj and/or dance bols, including an ending tihai. Some of these bols are super obscure and cool... 'tunga', for example is pretty awesome, as is this entire phrase:
Ta--watun-ga-wa-tun-ga-dugga dugga tun-ga

Parans can also include entire words, and can take the form of prayers or invocations to Hindu deities. (see if you can find the album 'Masters of Tala -Raja Chatrapati Singh Pakhawaj Solo' for some AMAZING parans... wow)

Chakradar: basically a thukra or a paran (including tihai) that is repeated 3 times (aka Chakradar tihai). So, kind of a giant SUPER-Tihai. The real fun is that there are sub families of Chakradar, with carfully math'd out placements of 'dha' in relation to sam (1st beat). I'm not sure how to explain these at the moment...and besides, they deserve their own post. Later.

Gat: the king of tabla compositions (in certain Gharanas/styles anyway). Gats are super complex poetical forms that often (but not always) do NOT have a tihai. They're so cool, they don't even need a tihai. ;)

Gats often have virtuosic combinations of strokes (they can be quite long...blistering streams over many cycles), can change speeds (eg from chatusra (4s) to double tisra (6s) to misra nadai (7s) etc) all in one composition. There are gats that repeat each bol 2 or 3 or even 4 times in a row: dhenegheran-ne dhenegheran-ne gherenagedhene gherenagedhene etc;, there are gats that rhyme the ends and beginnings of phrases (i.e. finish with a tun, start with a tun, finish w a dhet, start with a dhet etc); the same phrase in 3 or 4 different speeds and on and on. Super rich creative soil, the gat. I do a couple gats in this solo.

Gats are also improv friendly...there are Gat-Kaidas, for example, where the body of the gat becomes a theme for improv. Amazing.

So, here's a time'd, absurdly detailed breakdown of what's happening in this solo:

0:00-2:15 Chris plays alap in Raga Jaunpuri (introduction of the raga, or melodic mode) *at 0:23 I get my list of compositions...basically a sheet that reminds me what I want to play, and in what order, as it's easy to forget in the heat of the moment, for me anyway. The entire compositions are not written there...just the first lines, so I know what's what.)

2:15-2:20 I give Chris the tempo

2:20 Chris starts the lehara (from beat 9) and I mark the first sam, and then adjust my mic stand, which is too low :P

tihai into the next cycle at 2:33, where i show the audience the 11 beats (I've talked about the tala cycle before starting, so now they can hear the pulse and the sawari in action) Chartal ki Sawari is broken down 2-2-2-2-1.5-1.5, and those 1.5s give the last three beats a very cool feel...the Sawari, or 'ride'.

2:43 theka, introducing the baya on beat 9

2:52 mukra (note how he tihai follows the sawari at the end of the tala *swoon*...but then again, ALL the tihais do that!)

3:02 first full cycles of theka (Dhin terekite Dhin na Thun na Kat Ta Dhin..Dha.re Dhin..Dha.re), and Chris improvises for a few cycles, still setting the mood.

3:58 Paran (my adaptation of something I know in tintal), followed by theka, and then a variation of the theka Swapanji taught that is very similar to Ektal (a 12 beat cycle, and an example of a subtle sense of humour ;)

4:34 Paran (from Swapanji), followed by Theka

5:00 Kaida (everything following this is from Swapanji unless noted), starting with single speed, introducing double, then full double, finishing with a tihai and theka (there always theka! the tabla version of idling, or grooving...won't mention it again)

7:26 Gat, recited a couple time then played. This is a Di Padi Gat, meaning that each phrase is played twice, flowing right into...

8:18 another Gat, that finishes with a phrase in Tisra nadai, right into...

8:52 a sort-of-kinda rela I made up on the spot, and barely survive...this is the tabla equivalent of drifting in a car...you're skidding and sliding, still moving forwards, somewhat in control, but maybe not entirely :P My notes simply said 'improv on tisra gat phrase'

9:41 Mukra, recited and played a couple times...lovelovelove this composition! Din Din NaNa kitetake....and those 'Nas' are open Na's...on the rim of the drum, not regular types...mos def a pakhawaj bol.

10:39 Paran, recited and played a couple times...the tihai is some very challenging technique...many many repititions at slow slow speed to get it right, and keep it intact at top speed: Dha - kitetake din . ghere Dha

11:20 Gat. MONSTER Gat. 2 cycle beast of a Gat. Very beautiful composition, but hard. Recite, playplayplay. I kinda break the rules here btw...Gats are supposed to be played Bhari/Khali (like a kaida..version with bass strokes and then a version partially without bass strokes), but I wanted to try to play all the compositions 3 times in a row, you know, just to make it harder O.o

12:33 Paran, and one of my favourite parans ever! Swapanji taught us 3 different tihais for this...i'm playing the simplist one...the hardest one is crazy technical mountain climbing and I can't play it...yet. working on it. This composition is NOT about tunafish, despite what you might think.

13:32 Chakradar (aka super tihai) this one starts out with a couple phrases of 7, in 11 beats...7-11, get it? *facepalm* None of these are easy, but the 2nd palla (repeat) of this one starts on the offbeat, and crosses sam on the offbeat and finishes with a tihai in groups of 5, so yeah...hard. One of the most fun to recite though.

--speed increase--

14:59 Gat...sort of... this is an adaptation of a tintal Gat I learned from Pandit Anindo Chatterjee (I play it at 5:46 if this recording) and my version isn't really all that super...I actually met with Anindoji in Toronto the night before the concert, and he made a very nice chakradar version, but I couldn't get it stable enough to pull off in concert that quickly, so I reverted to my version. *sigh* Next time.

at 15:12 I launch out of the ending phrase of the gat into a Adjrada-y groove, then into a kitcheri-y* version of the Farukhabad Chalan-Kaida I recorded here and this is another wet-road drifting session...I could've played a lot longer, but I could feel the traction slipping, so I bailed into a tihai. Yup...I believe in honesty! ;) *kitcheri-y because I'm mixing in strokes not in the original composition.

16:41 Paran (I talk about this on the video). Some challenging baya work here, and I tag a tihai onto the end that is not part of the original composition Swapanji taught (apologies!) BUT! it IS made up of bols from the original composition, so hopefully that smooths the infraction somewhat.

17:40 final Paran, and it's another 2 cycle beast, crossing sam in the middle of a phrase, and with a tihai that is so precarious that a 1/4 beat error is unrecoverable. I was going to say fatal, but you can always ditch the main 'chute and go to the backup 'chute...i.e., revert to theka and try again! ;)
I tag a tihai onto this composition as well, just to really give it that 'final tihai' feeling.

and if anyone actually read all that, and followed along, get yourself a Tabla Geek patch and sew it on your kurta!

OH! aaaand, i would like to give major props to Chris Hale for his wonderful playing...this tala, and especially this tala with these rhythms is NOT easy to keep lehara for. Awesome job Chris! *Kran* hi-five.

That's all for now, thanks for reading, listening, and oh, hey! if you like what I'm doing here, feel free to buy a track, or an album...everything is over here on Bandcamp.

tata, dinginatoms
E

Great Northeastern Blackout of 2003 tabla solo concert:

It is Aug 14, 2003. My friend Lowell Lybarger is putting on a concert at the University of Toronto. The concert, called 'tabla Tabla TABLA!', is to be an evening of tabla solos by Toronto tabla players, myself included.

But alas! darkness descends upon the land! Dogs and cats, already living together, watch humans stumble around in the dark, and snicker silently as shins spark off low lying furniture (well...the cats do anyway). People in glowyglowy vests direct traffic at intersections with growing piles of donated food and water at their feet. I feel a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror: "Candles!?! WE DON'T OWN ANY (bleeping) CANDLES!!". Beer supplies dwindle, fridges warm and a myriad of flaming beverages are invented. Bartenders dust off long forgotten memories of Prof. Watterson's math class to settle bills for wide-eyed customers. Lovers gaze into each others eyes, hypnotized by the dancing candleflames they find there. (There is, however, no baby boom associated with this, despite the sage predictions of Toronto's other circus mayor, Mel Lastman). The concert is.... cancelled.

Here's some footage of that night.

Fastforward a few months. The lights are back on. Lowell has booked the hall again. The concert has been renamed (hilariously) 'Tabla Power!' and a large gathering of tabla players has come together to geek out and make music.

Here are some excerpts from my performance that night:

 
Cheers.

Double post: Heavy Metal Tabla in Chartal Ki Sawari and 30 min Jhaptal solo video

Well, it's not really heavy metal, but it's definitely not traditional...or is it?

Let's see. Traditional tala? check. Lehara? check. Theka? check. Mukra? Gat? Parans? final Charkradar tihai? checkcheckcheckcheck. Recitation? check. Screaming guitar solo? err....ummm...

Yup, passes the tradition test for me, with the one exception of the sounds, which begs the question...what makes traditional music traditional? Is it the content, vocabulary and grammar? or is it the instruments? pure sounds only? the people who play it? the time or place it is performed? what?

I bent the tabla tradition as much as I could here, and it didn't break.

So, what do we have:
The tala is Chartal ki Sawari, an 11 beat tala:

Dhin terekite Dhin Na Thun Na Kat Ta Dhin..Na..Dhin..Na..

The sawari (lit 'ride') at the end (last 3 beats) is what makes this tala so awesome. Count 'em: Tkt Tkt Tkt Tkt. You can geek-out a bit and count the tala as 3 groups of 4, with the last 4 squeezed into 3 beats:
1...2...3...4...
1...2...3...4...
1..2..3..4..

All the tabla material was taught by Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri in a workshop in Toronto. I'm worried he may disown me after this track, but it had to be done, and as I said, I don't think I've broken the tradition at all.

All the material Swapanji taught us in the workshop followed the sawari beautifully, so, rather than just being material in 11 beats, it is all definitely material in Chartal Ki Sawari. An important, but subtle, distinction.

Material: (in order of appearance)
Mukra (gerenage terekite dhagethrekethunnakena...no recitation)
Gat (takatakataka dheneghene takatakataka dheneghene...)
Paran (Dha KreDha ne Dha Dha kiteDhet Ta...)
Paran (Din Din nanakitetetaka...)
Paran (Takite Dha-ne Dha- Ge di gerenage...)
Paran (TakaterekiteTaka teteketagedighene...)
Paran (dhetedhetedhagetete kredhetetetagetete...no recitation)
Tihai (from a kaida)

I derived the bass-synth lehara from a Jaunpuri gat that sitarist Chris Hale plays...and in fact, I play the same tihai in the video (end of kaida that starts at 0.44) and at the end of the track above. It's a little obscured by drumkit-guitar chaos above though. Here:

Personell:
Ben Riley-drums
Rich Brown-bass
Justin Abedin-guitar
and I played played tabla, vox, recorded, edited, mixed etc
Mastered by Andy Krehm

OK OK THAT'S IT ! Enough hanky-pankying around with this fusion-con-fusion business!!

Here's a Jhaptal solo I played recently. Informal setting, major tabla geekage in the room:

This is a rehash/shorter version of the big Jhaptal solo I played last year, but covers peshkar, kaidas, kaida rela, a sort of palta theka-rela hybrid, parans, thukra and chakradar. Material from my teachers Pt Suresh Talwalkar, Pt Swapan Chaudhuri, Pt Anindo Chaterjee and Sri Subhajyoti Guha, who very generously organized this concert. Thanks Subho!! It should be noted: Rattan and I didn't rehearse at all, and in fact, he arrived at the hall 5 min before we started playing.

Pics:

 

And this concludes this latest post. Thanks for reading, listening and watching. Please post your irate comments about the Chartal Ki Sawari piece below, but you should probably buy the track first ;)

'Cycles' Collaborative Multimedia Creation Laboratory

I'm 4 days into a month-long creation process at an art gallery in Toronto.

Because this is a tabla blog here, I can geek out on what I'm trying to do, but first....here's the first video from the project, a Tintal Peshkar with esraj accompaniment by the amazing Rattan Bhamrah:

Cycles: Part 1 from Ed Hanley on Vimeo.

So...first the project, then what's going on tabla-wise in that video.

The project (which has its own website here: http://www.cycles-film.com/ ) kind of fell into my lap. The folks who book the gallery approached me to see if I would be interested in doing a show. I balked initially, as I'm a musician (and yes, photo and video are also creative languages for me) but I had no idea what I'd do for a 'visual art' show. But I though about it a bit, and thought it might be cool to record a tabla solo, 52 Kaidas style (i.e. in discreet chunks) and crowd-source the accompaniment by recording and sampling anyone who came into the gallery. Then of course, I'd have to shoot music videos for each piece, and THEN, I knew I'd have to stitch it all together into a film.

Did i mention they approached me in mid-February, and the slot they wanted me to fill started March 1st? Yeah. So...I'm still kind of forming the idea of the whole thing as I go.

Much like a Kaida, there are rules, and the fact that there are rules is actually freeing, rather than restricting.

The rules are:
1. record all the parts of a tabla solo (peshkar, kaidas, kaida relas, relas, parans, thukras, chakradars etc) but in different talas (I'm planning Tintal, Jhaptal, Chartal Ki Sawari and Rupak but who knows)

Larry, Udu-ing.

2. Everything has to be created and recorded in the space....audio, video, photos, paintings, dance, you name it (this is one place where it's completely open ended). If someone wants to come down and vocalize bird sounds while they dance around in a feathered suit, I will record it, and I will integrate it into the piece. (tastefully, of course)

3. It has to be all inclusive: if you can clap your hands once, I can sample that clap, and work it into a piece. If you can pluck one note on a guitar, you're in the piece. If you have a FACE, I will take your picture, and you will be in the piece. Open to everyone. 

4. I have to be there, ready for anything, every single day for the entire month of March. And I need to work fast. I cannot agonize over tinytiny details...this project is about raw creation, not crystalline studio perfection. I think that exercising creativity and problem solving skills is important, so this is like a month-long creative boot-camp for me.

5. Ummmm..errr... I'm sure there are more rules, but it's late, and i can't remember. The project website has it all on there already. If you're a Torontonian, stop by. It's a new adventure everyday!

OK! Tabla-time!

I just LOVE this composition!

I learned this from Pandit Suresh Talwalkar in Pune. It's a really lovely arrangement: Peshkar, flowing into a Kaida, flowing into a Rela.

Tihais popping off everywhere, really cool vocabulary, tricky rhythmic phrasing, you name it. And slooooow tempo. I kind of rush through it (and I'm glad I did...the video is over 8 minutes long, which is about 7:45 seconds too long for most of internet-enabled humanity, sadly) but I could hang out on each section for 10 minutes easily.

I'm playing a low D tabla made by Mukta Das, and a baya that he reheaded...a Benares shell that weighs a LOT, very bottom-heavy, and stable.

This is probably (but not definitely) the most traditional presentation of tabla solo material I'll be doing in this project. I'm going to be sampling random strangers, so...there could be tuba, musical saw, gosh...even bongos!

Oh...that video is downloadable! (I'll also upload it to YouTube this evening)

This blog post here talks about how it was made...

I'll cross-post significant videos and recordings here. I recorded a Jhaptal Palta Theka on March 2nd, and now just have to build to accompaniment from whoever turns up, and I have some interesting tabla material planned.

thanks for reading, and head over to Cycles!

OH!

I almost forgot:

This Cycles project is not to be confused with THIS Cycles album, by another Canadian tabla player (high-five!) by the name of Shawn Mativetsky, which you should totally check out. Very cool stuff.

Kaida in Rupak Tal

Greetings!
Happy New Year, and I hope everyone has a stellar 2013!

Here's a quick Kaida in Rupak Tal (7 beat rhythm cycle) to ring in the new year:



So, couple things about this:

Theme
Dha-kiteDhete Dhagena Dha-
KreDhetete KiteDhete Dhagena DhageDhinnagena

I learned this from Pandit Suresh Talwalkar in Pune, on my 2nd study trip, the 'mostly Rupak' trip (as opposed to the 'mostly Jhaptal' trip).

It's a 4-parter, taking 2 cycles of Rupak once you hit double speed.

Very good practice: accenting the Ki and Kre strokes means lots of attention on the baya hand.

The math is awesome: phrases of 11 and 17

The tihai has an 11 microbeat gap, which is played, rather than just left silent:
Dha ge ge ge Di ge ge ge Ta ke ne

Rupak theka is Tin Tin Na Dhin Na Dhin Na , and can also be played 'rin-tin-tin-where's-my-din-din'

I want to post more to this blog, but it's a bit of a production to do an album-level recording every time I want to post...hiring an accompanist, mastering et cetera (esp since the blog really doesn't generate $$ at all) so, I'm going to try a more lo-fi audio-visual approach with backing tracks and/or electric mandolin as accompaniment. I'm still working on new tracks for my album, and will post those as they come up, and I still have to  finish the videos from the Jhaptal Solo in August (omg :P) but hopefully I can generate more posts this way.

Tata!

Jhaptal solo, live, part 3, plus Bonus Video!!

Ok, back to serious business. No explosions or rotoscoped tabla footage. Just one single Kaida. The same Kaida as in the previous tabla-delic post though, for contrast.



I learned this from Pt Suresh Talwalkar in Pune during the Jhaptal Breakdown period. As soon as I heard it, I was in love. The strokes are simple:

Dha-treke Dhinnagena
DhageTete DhageTreke Dhinnagena
DhagenaDha TrekeDhene
DhageTete DhageTreke Thinnakena

Everythink on Kinar, 2 finger Tete.

There are a whole bunch of interesting interactions going on here.

Hey buddy. Treke has TWO flams.
Not. Just. ONE. Got it?

Treke and Tete are really close sonically, but have very different characters, but ONLY if you can get the 't-re' and 'k-re' flams happening. Treke is kind of a squashed Terekite, and can sometimes be a shortform of Terekite…play a Terekite kaida, and replace Terekite w Treke, or vice-versa.
Treke is sort of ••  •• rather than •  •  •  • in the same space. The 2nd flam in Treke is easier (it's essentially a Kre), but that first one…well, it is there one minute, then you speed up and whoosh! it's gone.

The real driving energy for me comes from the Dhinnagena DHA / Dhene DHA groupings. It just has a certain momentum….Dha is the end of a sentence, not the beginning, if that makes sense. The 'Tun' sounds drive into and hilight the Dha.

The Kaida is broken down right along the fault lines of the Tala: 2, 3, 2, 3 and the variations tell such a lovely story, with really small, gradual, incremental changes going on.

Treke Dhinnagena becomes DhageTreke Dhene, and then GhenaDhage Treke

There is a really pretty (albeit concentration testing) transmogrification where we go from

both parts the same:
Dhinagena Dhene…. Dhinagena Dhene

to 2nd pat different:
Dhinnagena Dhene …. Dhene Dhinnagena

to first part joins 2nd part:
Dhene Dhinagena …. Dhene Dhinagena

over the course of a few variations.

The Tihai is something else though: its called a Nauhakka (or Nohakka) tihai. The exact same phrase (including gaps) happens nine times (with a total, in this case, of 27 Dhas). It rolls and rolls and rolls and if you're not paying attention, well….Sam will sneak up on you. It's tricky to define each Palla actually…they can all sort of blend into one another if you're not careful. I flavoured each one differently in the Ten Ragas version, but went straight at it here. It has a kind of floaty relentlessness.

As I mentioned in the Ten Talas post, it leapt out at me as perfect for some kind of non-trad treatment, which brings me once again to comment on the versatility of tabla. It challenges the perception I think a lot of people have of 'drumming' as just a stream of boinks and bonks and thwacks on a drum (heard any good drummer jokes lately? Tabla=/= Bongos!!). There's a deep music here, a rich musical language, and the practice and performance of that language can really change both the player and audience. What else. Oh….

The blog had a makeover! I'm sure you noticed.

Orange and purple!
It's the FUTURE!

I updated the template, and lo and behold! Tabs!! Wow. The possibilties are endless! We are talking triple rainbow potential here people! There's an Albums tab, for just music. A Video tab for just videos, aaaaand the mooooooost exciting thing ever….wait for it….…a GLOSSARY!!

If you're new here, or new to Tabla in general, it might be handy to keep open in another tab. I realize a lot of terminology gets tossed around, and I can't redefine every word in every post.

Anyway…in an effort to keep everyone on the same page, terminology-wise, a glossary is useful.

Now it's Bonus Video time!

Wherein the author does a slight remix of a prevously recorded track (scroll down to #4, Lucknow Rela), and cuts video to it. But not any video. Outerspace video, man. Are you seeing a theme here yet?


I'm developing some Finalcut skills for a video for an upcoming track. It's a solo in Chartal Ki Sawari (11 beats) with material drawn from a workshop with Pt Swapan Chaudhuri. There might be 2 versions of the audio. I'm not sure yet. The one I really really want to make is a kind of massive production, and somewhat daunting on the costliness side of things, what with hiring musicians (sitar, drums, bass and keys) and an engineer and renting a studio. Wanna hear that? Buy some tracks people! I might start an Indiegogo campaign actually.

Did you know that almost all NASA photographs and video are public domain? That today is the 46th anniversary of Star Trek (the original series, puh-leassse)? That this site exists?

Swigert: 'Okay, Houston, we've had a problem here.'
Houston: 'This is Houston. Say again please.'
Lovell: 'Houston, we've had a problem. We've had a main B bus Tabla solo.'
Houston: ' ... O_o '