Bandish in Hindustani Classical Music an Overview

The oral tradition in Indian music and unlimited potential of raga to grow has led to very little need for written music. The absence of written music in classical music performance has helped to evolve the so-called concept of improvisation or extempore composing which has become a special feature of raga music performance. There are two types of compositions in Hindustani classical music performance - one is a small pre-composed piece called "bandish" which represents raga, tala and genre, the other is extempore composing which is based on what one has learnt and practiced as well as what one thinks at the moment during performance, keeping in mind the rules of the raga and genre. There are musicians who compose good bandishes. However, their caliber as a performer is judged mainly by their ability to compose extempore - compose well, which pleases the qualified listener. Extempore composition is a fairly complex phenomenon involving the functioning of several elements such as (i) the intellectual skill of the performer (ii) his emotional level (iii) his mental and attitudinal conditionings (iv) his inborn / inherent faculties (v) his technical virtuosity and (vi) his background of training and studentship, etc. The Indian musician learns extempore composing during his long hours of training and practice. He familiarizes himself thoroughly with the positions, combinations, movements and expressions of the notes. Ranging from a single note to short and long phrases, the combinations he practices become more and more complex in the arrangement, movement and expression. The notes are explored in different ways in the context of the raga's personality and genre. However, it is the musician's aesthetic sense and his interpretation of the raga rules that decide whether a certain phrase is to be chosen or not. During performance, although he does not necessarily use the same phrases or sequences, he is already equipped with the skill and experience to create any variety of musical phrases. He draws upon this experience. In moments of inspiration he often comes up with something novel and remarkable that he has not tried before.

The function of bandish

Bandish's main function is to constantly provide an artist with schematic plan of a raga and genre, and help him explore directions in which it can be elaborated. Using the tonal framework of the bandish as his foundation plan, the artist composes extempore and comes up with different structures embodying raga and genre according to his capabilities.

Another very important role of bandish is that while developing a genre or elaborating a raga it acts as a unifying force to bind different musical material together through tala, the rhythmic cycle. Although a part of the musical material, bandish stands as a main pillar around which the development of the raga and genre takes place through characteristic phrases. The tala of the bandish offers resting points as well as creative centres during extempore composing, helping progression and supporting the overall structure. It must be remembered that a raga can be elaborated just through extempore composing without the help of a bandish. But while developing a genre one has to use bandish as a central point for extempore composing.

Structure of bandish

Along with tone and time in vocal music, however, there is one more component - words, which form an integral part of music. Tone, time and words combine with each other to form a variety of musical material like alap, tan, sargam phrases, bol phrases and also bandish. The pre-composed bandish in vocal music therefore comprises words either with or without meaning, in addition to raga and tala.

A bandish usually has two parts - sthayi and antara. Very rarely one comes across two antaras.

Bandish terminology

Sthayi: first part of the bandish, which generally covers the lower and middle octaves and accommodates extempore composing in that area.

Sthayi-mukhda: a section of the opening line of the sthayi, which keeps repeating after conclusion of each section of extempore composing in the lower and middle octaves. Sthayi -sam: a particular syllable (note in instrumental music) of the sthayi-mukhda is the sam-point, which falls on the first beat of the rhythmic cycle Antara: second part of the bandish, which generally covers the middle and higher octaves and accommodates extempore composing in that areaAntara-mukhda: a section of the opening line of the antara, which keeps repeating after the conclusion of each section of extempore composing in the middle and higher octaves Antara-sam: a particular syllable (note in instrumental music) of the antara-mukhda is the sam-point, which falls on the first beat of the rhythmic cycle.

The importance of bandish

The abstract quality of music is best represented in the concept of raga in Indian music. The raga comes into being in a "seed" form in the creator's mind and keeps growing like a mighty tree maturing through contemplation and deep reflection. Its actual presentation by its creator as well as by other creative artists who take a liking to it also contribute towards adding that extra dimension.

The nearly infinite potential to expand and grow has made it impossible to confine raga in totality, completely, in any medium. Nevertheless, artists have realized that a raga as also a genre like khayal, thumri, etc., can be condensed in its seed form, encased in a small pre-composed piece - a "bandish" in vocal music and a "gat" in instrumental music.

In the early days bandish acquired phenomenal importance because of the oral tradition, absence of a satisfactory musical script, notation system, printing facilities, technical equipment like tape-recorders, CD players, etc. Music is basically an auditory art perceived through the sense of hearing. Yet, there has been a continuous, conscious effort to assign symbols to notes, beats, tempo, etc., to create a kind of musical script called swarlipi which would be helpful in writing and reading music composition. However, no notation system has so far been able to notate accurately every nuance, regarding movement and expression of vocal or instrumental music. The various ways of approaching and leaving a note, joining two or more notes, the articulation, the weightage given to grace notes, the turns, the modulations of the voice there are a number of such things which are practically impossible to record in notation and thus can only be learnt by listening to actual performance. The notation of a bandish represents only its bare skeleton, which assists in understanding and learning just the outline of a bandish. A bandish confined in notation is dormant, inactive and lifeless. It comes alive only through the voice of a singer and the fingers of an instrumentalist.lt must be remembered that although a bandish provides a schematic plan to elaborate a raga through extempore composing, learning only bandish does not necessarily make one competent extempore composing.

Raga, genre and bandish

A bandish definitely represents a genre. However, it may or may not represent a raga. The existence or being of a raga depends on a particular genre.

1. In classical music or raga-oriented genres khayal, tarana, etc.), it is only the raga which is important. The text of the bandish - words with or without meaning - are only a part of the musical material. A raga is independent of words.

2. In light-classical music or raga-word oriented genres thumri, dadra, etc.), raga is as important as the words are. However, it may not remain as pure as in classical music. Raga and words are interdependent and also independent of each other.

3. In light music or word-oriented genres geet, ghazal, bhajan, etc.), words are of primary importance. Here a raga may not be necessarily present and even if it is there, it does not have an independent existence. Words are independent of raga.

4. Unlike light music, where one person writes the poetry and another composes the music, in classical and light classical music, the poet and composer generally happen to be the same. It is more convenient for the composer to write his own texts.

The compositions in the light music category - geet, ghazal, bhajan, are called sangeet-rachana and not bandish because they are not consciously related to the concept of raga and are not expected to project the raga. Similarly, film music and Indi-pop songs are also called sangeet-rachana. It is only in the classical and light classical music categories that the compositions are called bandish since they represent raga.

Themes and words of bandish

The text used in classical and light classical bandish covers themes which are familiar, ranging from descriptions of nature and its seasons to human emotions and experiences. Bandishes have devotional themes also, yet they are enjoyed more for their emotive quality than their religious content. Although the meaning of the text is significant as it lends emotional colour to music, the musical significance comes from its value in carrying the vocal tones through the vowels, providing variety in vocalization and creating rhythmic patterns through its syllabic tonal structures (e.g. the word "sumira", divided as su+mi+ra). The words of the composition are chosen for their musical quality and may sometimes even undergo slight changes in order to sound more musical (e.g., bant -> batariya) and to meet the demands of the rhythmic structure of the composition. The languages used have been mainly Braj and Hindi. The song-text is not to be judged by poetic standards, since the object is not to project words. As such, the text has to be simple and direct so that it easily reaches the listener.

Complementary themes for slow (vilambit) and the fast (drut) compositions in classical music when sung one after the other naturally evoke similar emotions and give a specific mood to the atmosphere that the raga evokes. It is an effective way to go from the "concrete" in words to the "abstract" in raga music. In semi-classical forms such as thumri and dadra, words try to establish their own identity; consequently the music becomes more concrete. In light music, by contrast, words rule, and music becomes the conveyor of their meaning. If a singer understands the words of a composition and conveys their meaning effectively, a rapport gets established immediately between him and the audience - whether it is classical, light-classical or light music.

Literary aspect

In Hindustani classical vocal music, the literary aspect of the song-text slowly became side-tracked for various reasons, as a result of which the pronunciation of words and their emotional content also began to lose their importance. This led to a general disregard and lack of awareness concerning the literary quality of the text ?? bandish. There also seemed to be less cohesiveness regarding the actual text presented. As a consequence, along with song-text, the tonal structure of bandish also suffered noticeably. Today, even in traditional bandishes, one can come across several versions. There is no guarantee that two disciples of the same guru would present a bandish in its photocopy perfection. Sometimes the guru himself introduces the changes; sometimes students make changes knowingly or unknowingly.Although there is a general agreement about the melodic structure of a bandish and the personality of a raga, the differences lie in the details. This has made it difficult to achieve standardization of ragas in Hindustani music .Hindustani classical music has been mainly a solo or individual performance. Therefore, in addition to extempore structuring of the raga, the artist can also take liberties with a pre-composed bandish. The advantage of this has been the emergence of immense variety within the framework - be it a raga or a bandish. Every artist can give a different perspective of the same raga. As a result, raga's boundaries seem to become limitless and the horizons of beauty have also widened. Artists have tried to take freedom with the bandish and create more space for the raga.

Length of the bandish

In vocal music, ragas have been expressed through different genres. With the changing structure of genres, the structure of bandishes is also undergoing changes to meet new demands - sometimes with the intention of introducing novelty, sometimes because a "need" for change was felt. One can notice that the length of bandish has kept on reducing from ashtapadi to vilambit khayal. Thus, the eight-part-bandish in ashtapadi became a four-part-one (bandish) in dhrupad-dhamar with sthayi, antara, sanchari and abhog. Lately sanchari and abhog have also disappeared. In the khayal genre, the bandish appeared with two parts - sthayi and antara. Recently, especially in vilambit (or slow pace) khayal, bandish has become generally of one part - a sthayi of one rhythmic cycle - antara becoming redundant for various reasons.

Antara

The need for antara needs to be viewed in the context of the tonal structure of the sthayi, the nature of raga, the singer's ability to elaborate and build the structure with the help of sthayi only, and the completeness of the form. Secondly, if sthayi also serves the purpose of antara, the deletion of antara is the natural logical consequence, and should not be seen as a deviation from tradition. One melodic line, one-to/a-cycle bandish is already in vogue in Carnatic music. For example in ragam-tanam-pallavi, a pallavi like "hare ram govinda murari mam pahi..." proves the point. One meaningful line set to one rhythmic cycle is the smallest possible bandish necessary for a vilambit khayal. Before one talks about tradition in the context of sthayi, antara "or" words of the bandish, etc., one must mull over some points:

- Why not compose antaras in the lower octave if the sthayi-sam is in the upper octave?

- Why not sing the whole bandish every time one comes to the "sam", if the entire bandish were that important?

- Why not give the same importance to the meaning and pronunciation of the words in the bandish of khayal as in thumri-dadra or light songs?

- Why are dhrupad-dhamar presentations not considered incomplete when the sanchari or the abhog of the bandish are deleted?

It is also a known fact that in the past, many artists did not sing the antara of a khayal bandish in their concerts for the fear of losing it through plagiarization. Many gurus taught only the sthayi to their students. Was their music incomplete?

All this means that the completeness of khayal genre does not depend on antara alone. It is also observed that the words in vilambit khayal tend to lose their identity in terms of tonal structure and literary meaning because of the slow pace of the development. In drut khayal, since the tempo is fast, words retain their tonal structure and also convey the literary meaning naturally. Repeating one line in drut khayal would definitely amount to monotony. The length of the bandish in drut khayal becomes a necessity .What is important is to give due attention to the pronunciation of words and their meaning. The length of the bandish is immaterial, if it helps in building the form and the raga structure. It is also logical and natural that the khayal uses only the bare minimum of meaningful words in the bandish to bring out the "abstract" content in the raga. In instrumental music, bandish takes the form of a gat with similar parts - sthayi and antara. It is interesting to note that lately many-a-time instrumentalists also use only sthayi to develop the form.

Bandish-words and raga-rasa

Raga being abstract in nature, it is difficult for both the artist and the lay listener to approach it in its bare form. In spite of a good knowledge of theory, musical material and technique, when the artist is in the process of developing a raga, he looks for some outside help to transform the "abstract" in raga into the "concrete". The associations with some commonly "known" elements like meaningful words, visuals, etc. help him in giving character to the raga.

The word rasa is generally translated as emotion or mental state. Since ancient times attempts have been made to attribute specific rasa to specific raga. This is also an attempt to transform the abstract in the raga into the concrete. It is observed that the rasa in music can be experienced best when there is the right kind of visual or verbal association to music.

A number of questions can arise in the context of bandish-words and ragarasa theory:

- Ragas are attributed specific rasas. But very often the themes of the bandish are contradictory to the rasa. For example, raga Bhairavi is supposed to convey karuna rasa (pathos). However, the diverse themes of the bandishes in Bhairavi quite effectively express the raga's characteristics, raga's nature, raga's mood.

- Quite often the themes of the bandish of vilambit and drut khayals sung one after the other in the same raga are diametrically opposite. Their languages could also be different.At times, artists mispronounce the words, not knowing the language. But even when they know the language they cannot use the meaning of the words effectively to colour the notes. In spite of all this, the so-called raga-rasa does not seem to get affected.

- Almost every raga, irrespective of its rasa, seems to create a lively, happy atmosphere when rendered in a fast tempo.

All this goes on to prove that raga-character, raga-mood are intrinsically related to its own musical material and its treatment. It is only the characteristic phrases and their flow, which give it its musical identity and beauty. Raga always remains detached from the "known". It conveys only its musical meaning. It may temporarily seem to take on the meaning of the "known". There are some more queries in this area:

1. Over the years, some ragas have changed considerably retaining their old names. What about their rasa?

2. What is the rasa oímishra ragas - ragas evolved out of the combination of two or more ragas having different rasasi

3. What is the rasa of a newly created raga?

4. Does an audience - Indian or non-Indian, experience the same rasa with the same intensity during a particular raga performance?

5. When different artists present the same raga, does every listener experience the same rasa!

There are many such queries. Under these circumstances, how are words chosen for bandishes!

Bandish-words and raga-samay

Similar queries arise in the context of bandish-words and raga-samay theory. Composers are not always conscious of the themes suitable to particular times of the day.

Theme based programmes of bandishes

Theme based programmes of bandishes in classical and light classical music are becoming popular. Under the circumstances, the length of the bandish will have to be increased to add literary content of quality and bring in contemporary themes. Since the focus of such programmes is on bandish and not raga or genre, a certain length of the bandish becomes a necessity.

Genre and bandish

For any genre to have a separate identity, the selection of material, its treatment and arrangement have to be in a particular way. Dhrupad-dhamar, khayal, tarana, tappa, thumri, dadra, geet, ghazal and bhajan are some of the contemporary classical, light classical and light forms in Hindustani music presented on a concert platform. All these forms have their own stylistic features. Today, their dividing lines are getting thinner. Even the gharanas (schools) ?? khayal and thumri are slowly disappearing. Every artist picks up what appeals to him from all the styles and makes use of it according to his ability. Especially, those artists who present only one type of music-form in their concert are seen consciously incorporating the features of other forms to make their music more entertaining. The classical khayal now displays a close affinity to light classical thumri (thum-khayal like tap-khayal). The murkis and khatkas in thumri are now used with abandon in khayal. The sargam and the tan can now be heard in thumri. The light form such as ghazal has now come closer to khayal and thumri by incorporating spacious alaps, tans and sargams.

This exchange of styles amongst different forms is a continuous process and their bandishes in turn are trying to adopt these changes.

Chaturang and trivat

According to present performance practice, chaturang, trivat belong to the family of the khayal genre. They differ only in the text of the bandishes. Chaturang has four sections - meaningful words, meaningless words, sargam and bols used in percussion. Is it not necessary to elaborate the form through the specific material of each section? For example, the meaningful words' section through meaningful words like bol-alaps in khayal and bol-tans in tappa, the sargam section through sargam phrases, the percussion section through percussion bols incorporating tihais etc., the meaningless words section through syllables like in tarana - increasing the tempo using syllables?7nv£rf also differs only in the text of the bandish using only percussion boh. Can trivat be elaborated through rhythm patterns used in the solo presentation of tala?

Dhrupad-dhamar

Dhrupad has its characteristic form. But dhamar is not a separate genre. It is similar to dhrupad. It differs only in the tempo and theme of the bandish, which is based on the Holi festival.

Thumri-dadra

In the light classical category the two main genres are thumri and dadra, which differ only in tempo. Thumri is in slow pace and dadra is fast (like with vilambit and drut khayal). Again it must be understood that chaiti, kajri, savni, jhula, hori, etc., are not separate genres. They are only theme variations, and depending on the tempo they identify with the thumri or dadra genre.

The merit of the bandish

A bandish reflects the composer's knowledge of the raga and genre, love for and understanding of words, respect for tradition, search for novelty and variety, ability for rhythmic play, aesthetic sense, etc., and overall talent. Presenting bandishes is another expression of its emotional content, and so on. They add to the attributes already mentioned. In the process of being composed, the bandish also takes on a "style" and tempo. It is very important, therefore, that one follows that style and tempo while presenting the bandish; otherwise the original beauty of the bandish is likely to be lost or affected. A bandish should not be branded as "good" simply because it is traditional. Neither should "recent origin" be regarded a disqualification for a well composed bandish. All traditionally established bandishes were "new" at some point of time. Whether old or new, a well composed bandish adds a lot of colours while developing a genre and raga. Queries are often raised regarding the need for new bandishes, especially when a large treasure of traditional bandishes is already available for all. If music has to change with time, then is it not necessary to have bandishes to represent music of the time? Talented artists of every period have added new bandishes to the repertoire of music and connoisseurs as well as laymen have accepted and welcomed them. The number of artists composing new bandishes has increased today for various reasons. The artist is liberating himself from the constraints of the gharana. He is being constantly exposed to music of every type, from all directions. He strives for something novel and he also desires to offer something that is his very own.

New bandishes that would stand the test of time would certainly be honoured as "traditional" bandishes in future years. Nothing "new" is new in totality. The old always creates space for the new.