Blog Post 5

This particular performance of Hindustani Classical music included the characteristic drone that seems to follow you throughout the entire song. The lead vocalist was a woman who used the equally characteristic quarter-tone voice fluctuations throughout the pieace. It also included one man playing a set of membranophones, two women playing chordophones, and one man playing an instrument that looked like a box which I could not decipher which family of music instruments it belonged to.

They performed at a music festival, and the atmosphere was reverent, yet relaxed. I suppose that could be expected from music that is thousands of years old. Interestingly, Hindustani music is traditionally passed down orally, and, since this performance occurred in 2009, that would make this piece the result of generations and generations of preservation. I find that very intriguing.

The crowd, or the small glimpse you get of them, looked entirely Indian. The performers were also Indian and were dressed in traditional Hindustani attire. All these elements contributed to the feel of the performance, making it seem very traditional. In some videos I found, the performers were dressed casually, or it was performed by college students in a music ethnography class, and while the performance seemed good to my ears, it gave a different feel to my eyes. So I do think what the performers wore contributed to the music they played.