A Taste of the Classical Music of India

Yesterday we had the opportunity to take some lessons and watch a performance of Indian classical music.  I took lessons in the sitar and voice.  In the sitar lesson, we learned the proper way to sit and hold the instrument.  We each received picks and learned how to play the classical Indian scale.  I found it really interesting that they have the note C fixed as "do," instead of being able to change "do" to create other keys like we do in Western music.  The sitar is a very beautiful instrument.  In my voice lesson, I learned to sing the classical Indian scale.  At first I had a little trouble pronouncing the syllables correctly, but after my teacher wrote them down it was a little easier.  I thought it was interesting that we sat down through the lesson.  In the West, it is traditional to stand while performing or practicing.  We did a few other exercising ascending and descending the scale.  I fee like a learned a lot.   

We came back in the evening for a concert and it was amazing.  I was struck by the complexity of the musical textures and melodies.  The parts of the pieces we heard blended together in an incredible way, but I felt that each instrument would have been impressive playing their own part alone.  The singer was wonderful.  He sang really complicated vocal runs and trills with ease.  It was breathtaking.  I was so glad that we were able to experience this wonderful music.