BY K. V. RAMACHANDRAN ¹

Music is that which pleaseth the ear! But what pleases one ear sometimes repels another. Everyone likes the music of his own country best, perhaps because his ear is accustomed only to it. When you look deeper and investigate music to which you are not accustomed, you find that it has some characteristics which the music you know does not have. What, for instance, is the difference between the music of the western countries and that of India? The first is harmony, the second is melody, you will be told–but what exactly does this mean?

A note or Svara is a pleasing musical sound. If you sing or play a number of these one after the other, in single file so to say thus–Sa Ga Pa Sa–you have built up a tune. Melody is a general word that describes all music which is a succession of notes. The systems of music prevalent in China, Japan, Persia and India, which employ notes in succession always and never together, are said to have melody as their chief feature. If instead of playing the notes, Sa Ga Pa Sa, one after the other, we sound them all together, we have built up a new kind of sound pattern called a chord. The chord is the unit on which the harmony of European music is built. Harmony is the simultaneous combination of sounds of different pitch. To study harmony is to study the nature of chords, their varieties and the laws that regulate their treatment. Whatever the system, melody is the soul of music; but in Europe melody has been over-run by harmony, the forest has smothered the trees. In European music, melody is a mysterious term that denotes vaguely a succession of notes, and like the mysteries is seldom if ever taught. Melody in Europe is either derived from harmony or represents harmony or depends on harmony for its effect. Instead of the picture–melody, the back-ground, harmony, has come to occupy the place of the picture, in Europe. The European’s pre-occupation with harmony is so excessive that when he listens to music which has no harmonic background, he is at a loss to understand. Likewise the Oriental to whom melody is the whole story is distracted and confused by the harmonic complement, when he listens to European music. It is said of Goldsmith that he went to Holland to teach the Dutch, English; but when he landed there he realised that he had to learn Dutch before he could teach them English. Likewise music is a language too. It has to be learnt before it becomes intelligible. Though the purpose of music is to please, it has evolved distinct and dissimilar forms and developed into complex and elaborate arts in Europe and Asia. If an European wishes to understand Asiatic music, he should not be disappointed, if he fails to see in it those features with which he was familiar in his own and which he thought were all-important. He should judge the alien systems by their own laws and standards. In the same way an Oriental cannot readily appreciate European music unless he familiarises himself with the intricacies of its form.

Melody, we said, had an undetermined position in European music. One did not know whether it had to be developed or arranged or accompanied. But an entire art of Melody independent of language and harmony at the same time has been developed in India and the East. The composer in the East is concerned with melody and rhythm mostly and little else. Though the note or ‘svara’ is the basis of all music, exigencies of harmony have made the note in European music a subordinate unit, a ‘flat’ sound so to say, useful for building up chords, but by itself of little utility. In India the note is the chief element and it is not flat, but plastic; it has an additional dimension. One could hop from note to note and derive countless melodies by the process in Europe. But to hop from note to note without an inter-connecting sound-movement, is not only not allowed, but is certain to kill Indian music. In terms of certain exclusive, inter-note movements only could one pass from note to note. Such movements are no mere embellishments or ornaments, but vital parts of the notes themselves–their eddies, over-flows. The note plus the movement forms an indivisible whole.

In distinction to the flat notes of European music, we may call the units of Indian music–modelled notes or notes with an additional dimension; with these units, the Indian artists fashioned what we may call ‘Tone Paintings’ or ‘Music Poems’ known as Ragas. To vary the metaphor, they visualised shapes and forms of tonal movement–and built up an unique kind of melodic architecture out of them. A Melodic Art which developed independently of language, later interpreted the written word of the poet and the improvised gesture of the dancer. Immense is the melody material of India; and immense the music-forms derived from it. European melody material consists of 3 scales–the major scale, the minor scale and the harmonic minor scale–and one primitive device, modulation. The primary source of music–the human voice, is itself an accompaniment in Europe. While instruments have developed, the voice, if it has not atrophied, has made little contribution to the Art.

The reach of the human voice is about 3 octaves and all Indian and Oriental music which is voice-music, is confined to this range. But the capacity of the ear to hear, extends to several octaves. European music we may call ear-music, in the sense that it strives to measure up to the listening capacity of the ear. In the process, it had to dethrone the voice.

The principle of harmony is a principle of nature. When you twang the brass string of a well tuned Tambura, you hear not one note, but a whole series of notes–called by scientists ‘harmonics’. A note thus is a group of notes of which one stands out and dominates the rest. This note, the unaided ear readily recognizes, rather than the group of which it is a part. The note is therefore something analogous to the chord. The chord makes explicit what is implicit in a note, in a novel and readily recognizable form. If we exteriorise or objectivise all the factors that build a note, we may derive something similar to the chord. The development of harmony is a matter of a few hundred years in Europe. The conditions of congregational worship in churches wherein a variety of voices gathered, favoured the development of part-singing.

Every voice had, in accordance with its pitch and capacity, to find accommodation in the choir. This circumstance gave birth to the art of blending melodies–the so-called ‘Counter Point’. The growth and development of instruments, demanded the impersonalisation of the music. Harmony was developed on the instruments only, and some great musicians of recent centuries who visualised the Possibilities of harmony, enriched European music with their great symphonies and sonatas.

There is one other element which has inspired not only music, but all the arts–ryhthm, which you know as Tala in Music and Dance, and metre in Poetry. The interaction of rhythm, melody and harmony has evolved the musical art of Europe. Rhythm was the spring from which grew the triple arts of Song, Dance and Instrumentation denoted by the name Sangita–in India. According to ancient Indian ideas, Dance was some kind of visible music and instrumentation some kind of audible dance. Thanks to a series of highly gifted musicians, Europe has made extraordinary progress in its pursuit and development of harmony–one of the elements of music. But rhythm and melody cannot be said to have kept pace with this wonderful harmonic progress. With double, triple and quadruple times, we have exhausted the rhythmic material of Europe–a poverty against which their great composers contended in vain. Indian musicians have perfected an extraordinary variety of rhythms, specially adapted for the triple arts of Song, Dance and Instrumentation. They have explored the intricacies of the Talas and made great contribution to the world’s knowledge of rhythm. In European music which evolved out of groups of people gathered in churches, it was the least gifted who determined the time measure. In India the Vocal Soloist with gifts of rhythmic imagination shaped the art; and he sang to a highly critical and intellectual audience; between these rhythm made extraordinary progress. On the Mridanga named ‘tom tom’ (by an early generation of Europeans), India has developed an art of rhythmic accompaniment for which there is no parallel in Europe.

The path of the singer and the drummer is at the same time one and different. One may say that the two move in two different dimensions which are yet inseparable. On the drum we have developed an extraordinary language–half syllabic, half melodic. Remarkable compositions were once improvised in this language; and an entire orchestra, made up of members of the drum family, was assembled to interpret these. Survivals of this Unique orchestra are to be seen in Malabar, Burma and Java. Europe is still far away from the rhythmic refinements of drum orchestration, with rhythm as the chief medium of expression.

In what direction could Indian music improve? Europeans would promptly answer ‘harmony’ forgetting that their art also could improve considerably in the directions of rhythm and melody. India has got the utmost out of melody–certainly far more than Europe has. It has got the utmost out of rhythm. There is no need to superimpose harmony on the rich Melody tradition which has grown out of and thriven on the voice. In Europe the poverty of the rhythmic and melodic materials made harmony a necessity. Harmony rightly superseded melody in Europe, but not so in India. The melody is sufficiently rich to constitute an art. But it is possible and perhaps desirable to develop an indigenous school of ‘harmonic’ music on our instruments, not in competition with the existing melodic tradition but distinct and separate, because our orchestra has neither the need nor the intention to overrun our vocal music or let it atrophy, as in Europe. Our harmony should not be an imitation, a counterfeit of European harmony. Indian music should discover the seeds of harmonic development from within itself. India has forgotten more music than Europe has created. The term Vadya denoted a school of orchestration and one of India’s legacies to Java and Bali islands is this Vadya. This music is a blend of the drum and string orchestras practised on groups of metallaphones, in which Indian melodies and rhythms have taken a polyphonous disguise.

The polyphony does not, like that of Europe, confuse and distract the Indian, but constitutes a pleasing ornament to his Ragas and Talas. And the European whom Indian music repels, yet enjoys the instrumentation immensely. Makers of Indian orchestral music would do well to study the instrumental technique of Java and Bali.