Dasanjali Lesson 6

This lesson will be a review of concepts that we have learnt in lessons 1 thru 5 and we will complete learning the sanchari of the song we started learning in lesson 5.

If you have a keyboard, piano or harmonium at home, practice all the notes that we learn in class on one of those instruments. If you do not have one, you may use the online keyboard, although it is not as easy to use.

Quiz and Practice

• The hundreds of raags in Hindusthani music are grouped under a handful of "buckets" or "categories" or "families". What are these categories called and how many categories are there?
  The raags are categorized under Taats. There are 10 Taats.
• What is the first Taat that we learnt?
  We learnt the Bhilaaval Taat, which consists of the 7 regular notes. Refer to lesson 5 to practice this again.
• What is the first raag that we learnt in the Bhilaaval Taat?
  Bhoopaali, which has only 5 notes in aaroha and avaroha.
• What is such a raag, with 5 notes up and 5 notes down, known as? Audav / Audav.
• Ask someone to play a random regular note in any of the 3 octaves we sing in (N, S ... upto S' R') and guess the note. It is harder than you can imagine initially but with regular practice, your ears will get attuned to the tones and you will ace this in a few weeks.
• What is the taal we used for the song "Hey Prabhu ..."?
  It is called Bhajani Teka, an 8-beat rhythm.
• Practice the 8-beat rhythm, either using your hand as one would use for the Adi taal in Carnatic music or to keep it simpler, 2 sets of 4 beats, mentally remembering to count upto 8 before restarting the count at 1.
• Keep practicing it for about 5 minutes and after some time, try to maintain the steady 8-beat rhythm even while holding a conversation with someone.
• Then, start singing either "Hare Murare" or "Hey Prabhu" at the proper beat and continue to maintain the 8-beat rhythm as you sing the song.
• Remember that the beat for Hare Murare starts on Sam (sounds like "some"), i.e. on the first beat and the beat for Hey Prabhu starts on Khaali, i.e. between the first and second beats.
• As you become more proficient at maintaining your taal while singing, switch between your conversation and your song(s), without losing your place in the taal.
• Sing only the sloka, Shuklaam Bharadharam at the beginning of the song "Gaja Vadana Beduve".
• Practice the Aalaap of Bhoopaali and then the entire song, Hey Prabhu.
• We learn one Taan now. A taan is like an alankaar except that we sing the notes to a beat or taal.

  SR      GP      DS'     DP
  GP      DP      GR      S_
  

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• Finally, end the lesson by singing the familiar song, Rama Kaho.