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Dhrupad as in Dagar Tradition

Ashish Sankrityayan

(copyright Ashish Sankrityayan. All rights reserved)

"The Origin and Grammar of Dhrupad"

Dhrupad singing evolved from the singing of prabandhas in the medieval period, and like the writings of the bhakti saints of the time, it is suffused with a mystical devotion to God. It later receives the patronage of the Mughal court, and its survival to the present times owes much to the support of its various royal patrons. Despite a decline in its popularity over the last two centuries, Dhrupad is still considered to be the purest of all classical forms, and its treatment of ragas is still taken to be the ideal one.

A Dhrupad performance starts with the alap, which in its initial stage, is a slow and elaborate delineation of the raga using free flowing melodic patterns. Usually starting with the sa of the middle octave, the alap pattern gradually descend to the lower octave, and then returning to the middle octave they rise to the highest register in a gradual succession of melodic patterns. A final return to the middle octave sa concludes the first part of the alap. In uttaranga pradhan ragas like Bahar or Adana, the alap is done mainly in the higher register. The singing of a Sankrit shloka, which is set to the same kind of free flowing melodic patterns, sometimes precedes the alap. This shloka serves as a prelude to the alap.

In this methodical note-by-note elaboration, the melodic patterns at any stage seem to be focused on some individual note or resting point of the raga. The patterns take up the different facets of the raga one by one, and their gradual succession creates an impression of the raga slowly unfolding itself. In some ragas with a vakra roop like Shankara or Hem Kalyan, this kind of a note-by-note elaboration cannot be done. The alap employs variations of traditional melodic patterns that the musician has to assimilate through years of training and practise. It is essentially exploratory and improvisational, and through it the musician explored the relationship between the notes, their mutual consonances, and all the melodic variations that are possible within the framework of the raga.

Dhrupd alap is syllabic, because it employs the syllables aa, ra, na, naa, noom, na, te, ta, ra, na, na … which are abstractions of the mantric phrase Om antaran tvam, taran taaran tvam, anant Hari Narayan Om, the words having been broken down to their syllables to facilitate melodic improvisation. The syllabic nature of the music actually adds to the melodic possibilities, because shifting or changing the syllable can alter the character of any melodic phrase. As the use of the syllable Hari Narayan Om suggests, Dhrupad is in its essence a spiritual pursuit. It can be seen to be a form of meditation in which nada is used to attain liberation or the realisation of Brahma. Dhrupad alap, with its succession of free flowing patterns, produces a deeply meditative atmosphere, and although the rasas karuna, shringar, adbhut and, at a later stage, even veer rasa make an appearance, the overriding predominance is tat of bhakti. The great masters of the Dhrupad tradition Ustads Zakiruddin Khan, Allabande Khan and Nasiruddin Khan were especially renowned for their serene and meditative alap singing.

Once the elaboration of the raga through free flowing patterns is completed, the alap enters a phase in which the patterns are set to a rhythmic pulse, with a moderate tempo in the beginning, which is increased in stages later. In this portion, the presence of a rhythmic pulse combines with the syllabic character of the music, and alters the nature of the melodic patterns. This enables a melodic elaboration different form the one achieved with free flowing patterns. The patterns in the later part of this stage are embellished with ghamaks.

The alap is followed by a composition sung to pakhwaj accompaniment. The talas that commonly occur here are the choutaal, jhaptaal, sultaal and dhamar taal. Although the word Dhrupad refers to the composition (Dhrupad means a composition that is immutable) there is a commonality between the alap and the composition since they both employ the same kind of melodic patterns. The techniques, meend, ghamak, lahak, kampit, andolit etc that occur in the alap patterns, and Dhrupad musicians of the Dagar tradition actually use the composition patterns as models for alp patterns. The composition with its four parts sthayi, antara, abhog and sanchari summarises everything that preceded it and brings the exposition of the raga to an end.

The Concepts of Swara and Raga in Dhrupad

Dhrupad singing requires the practise of nada yoga, which is a form of laya yoga. The sadhana of nada yoga produces a resonant voice that comes from deep within, and seems to permeate the very being of the singer. The voice is different from the throaty voice that is ideal for khayal and thumri singing. It is a voice that is very rich in overtones. The author of this article can say from his personal experience of training under various Ustads of the Dagar tradition, that this sadhana involves shifting the source of sound gradually to the base of the throat (kanth mool), and further down to the heart (hriday), and the navel (nabhi) till a stage is reached when the entire region from navel to head (murdhanya) vibrates as one. There is a shloka in the Sangit-ratnakar of Sarangdev, which describes the method of producing nada. In the voice of a Dhrupad singer who has achieved siddhi in nada yoga, the intonation of a sa produces very prominent overtones of pa and ga. A similar prominence of overtones is seen in the rudra veena and the sursingar, which are regarded as the ideal instruments for Dhrupad alap, and alos in the instrument of percussion accompaniment the pakhwaj. This prominence of overtones enforces a consonance or samvad between the notes and the pace of dhrupad alap must necessarily be slow, because consonance cannot be experiences without lingering on the notes. The prominence of overtones that is achieved through the nada sadhna of Dhrupad also creates a consonance between the voice and the tanpura, and it is this consonance that produces a dense and meditative atmosphere that is so characteristic of the singing of the Dagars. Ustad Nasiruddin Khan was especially renowned for his accomplishment in nada yoga, and it is said that the prominence of overtones in his voice sounded like the tanpura and appeared to blend with it. This quality can also be seen in the voice of his younger brother Ustad Rahimuddin Khan Dagar, in some of his old recordings.

Consonance or samvad is especially important in Dhrupad because a raga in Dhrupad is identified by its swarup or characteristic ambience, and is not seen to be merely a certain sequence of notes. The concept of the swarup of a raga comes from the fact that the sa is itself a variable and undergoes microtonal shifts from one raga to another. The two centre strings of the tampura establish the sa, and the sa of the raga varies in relation to this. Each raga employs a distinct shade of sa, which uniquely characterises its swarup, and all other notes employed are merely overtones of this sa. The re of the Megh has a lower pitch than the re of Miya Malhar, and that is a consequence of the sa of the two ragas being different.

The swarup concept in the Dagar tradition enables the tanpura or the veena to be tuned differently for different ragas, so that the instrument itself, by its very tuning, can establish the swarup of the raga to be performed. The raga in khayal is essentially a certain sequence of notes, and the ambience of the raga in khayal is maintained by frequently repeating its characteristic phrases. In the Dagar tradition of Dhrupad, the swarup concept enables a treatment of ragas in which a characteristic note sequence need not br constantly repeated. The correct shade of a sa (or of re or of any other note of the raga) is sufficient to establish the swarup of the raga. It is therefore possible to linger on the notes, and explore the relationships between just a few notes at a time without losing the characteristic ambience of the raga. This can be experienced in the recording of Megh released by the Mewar Foundation, in which with the very first low and subtly modulated re, Ustad Nasir Moinuddin Dagar establishes the swarup of Megh. The fact that the tuning of the tanpura and the very first sa can establish the swarup of the raga, can be experienced in the recordings of Darbari kanada and Asavari of the Elder dagar Brothers that were released in the 1960s.

It is often heard that Dhrupad employs just plain notes, and all ornamentation is avoided to produce a very austere and rigid kind of music. There is actually a whole world of ornamentation in Dhrupad, but the ornamentation is essentially microtonal, employing the notes in their subtle microtonal shades. To give an example, an accomplished Dhrupad singer can sing raga Jaijaiwanti without employing komal ga but can create an illusion or aabhas of komal ga by making a minute microtonal inflection on re. The author has heard several demonsrations of this treatment of komal ga in Jaijaiwanti from Usatd Rahim Fahimuddin Dagar, Ustad Zia Mohiuddin Dagar and Ustad Zia Fariduddin Dagar. This subtle and microtonal ornamentation of Dhrupad seems to be lost on listeners who are used to ornamentation on at grosser level that occurs is other forms. In the recording of Mia ki malhar by the Elder Dagar brothers released by the Mewar Foundation, this concept of microtonal ornamentation can be seen in the interplay of the two nishads and dhaivata, with the patterns showing the subtle microtonal gradation of the notes. The meends seem to actually progress through the various microtonal shades, and the transitions from ni to sa seem to occur in stages through subtle gradations. The stays on the nishads seem to touch several shades o these notes.

The Dagar Dhrupad tradition sees the notes as fluid entities with endless shades that seem to flow and merge into each other. They somehow seem to elude a definite grasp. Birendrakishore Roychoudhary has mentioned this in his book on the musical heritage of Tansen. He has written about the atmosphere of mystery and strangemness that is created when the notes are not touched or grasped as definite points, (Hindustani sangeet mein Tansen ka sthan by Birendrakishore Roychoudhary translated by Madanlal Vyas, published by Vani Prakashan, New Delhi). Indian classical music has today reached a stage, where the very mention of a variable sa or pa should be greeted with derision. Yet there still survives a musical tradition wghich recognises that a whole world of musical possibilities opens up when the notes cease to be mere points. But this a world that cannot be accessed easily.