Darbar are currently creating an ‘Index of Hindustani Raga’, due to go online later in 2020. I'm writing it - although really, my role is just to turn the expertise of the musicians and scholars into something clear, useful, and broadly communicable.
So I'd love some feedback on it - quick summary below.

● Basic idea: A free, in-depth, high-quality resource, of interest to students, artists, listeners, and anyone else in the world who wishes to focus in and learn more about the music. While no online index can ever substitute for the instruction of a
good guru, we figured that (since everyone uses them nowadays) we should put the very best resources out there for everyone.

● Pages: An in-depth web page each for 40 Hindustani ragas (listed below), collating multiple perspectives - e.g. summary, history, mythology, phraseology, compositions, imagery, scale geometry, raga differentiation, global equivalents, analysing great
recordings etc. And 10 ‘linking pages’ - e.g. lists, thaats, samay, raga families, geometry, murchana wheels, etc

● Principles: Writing is underway, and I'm following these guiding principles - would particularly love to know what you think of these. They derive from research and artist input during my written series for Darbar last year, and from current
discussions with Deepak Raja and other scholars, as well as my own experiences in the gurukul and in teaching global music.

—Artist leadership: direct, detailed input from top performers - e.g. Indrani Mukherjee, Rupak Kulkarni, and many of the artists I interviewed last year

—Centrality of composition: learn primarily through absorbing sounds rather than memorising ‘rules’ - and encourage much more focus on the infinite ‘spaces between the notes’, which are often given cursory treatment in 'summaries' of ragas

—‘Window to more’: the concept of a ‘comprehensive’ raga writeup is nonsensical - readers should be inspired to carry on searching, and so each page will be stacked with avenues for this

—Fresh sources: new archival materials kindly shared by Alam Khan, Sukanya Shankar, and others - and a very wide collation of existing sources

—Avoid telling people ‘how to feel’: e.g. choose less mood-specific descriptors (e.g. ‘unresolved‘ rather than ‘mournful’), contextualise rasas (avoid one-word translations), and include varied cultural associations (mythology, artist
recollections, paintings, etc)

—‘Living forms’: Ragas evolve over time, so why keep these pages static? I'll update them in the future with new input, suggestions, corrections, etc

—If you want to get a 'full stack' view of the different viewpoints we're trying to approach from, see my finished draft for Raag Parameshwari (https://docs.google.com/document/d/18eninI1I5uw3DjjJu-oEWTwExhXI7nJmsOI45BXWcj8) - an idiosyncratic modern
raga created by Ravi Shankar in the latter half of the 20th century, derived through daydreaming in the back of a car in Bengal. (n.b. Most of the ragas will have more detailed phraseological guidance...I haven't got any artist input on Parameshwari yet,
although I believe Pt Ronu Majumdar will be sending some in.

— really want this to be the very best resource it can be - ragas are complex cognitive intertwinings, and must be approached from many angles. And it's not like I'm pulling forth all the raga knowledge from my head - my role is in finding ways to
organise, contextualise, and explain the knowledge of the masters. So I'd love any feedback on what you'd find most useful in a raga index!

These are the initial 40 ragas - we'll be adding more in the future, and this list may be tweaked a bit too: Ahir Bhairav | Antardhwani | Bageshri | Basant Mukhari | Bhairav | Bhairavi | Bhimpalasi | Bhupali | Bihag | Bilaskhani Todi | Chandranandan |
Charukeshi | Darbari | Desh | Durga | Gorakh Kalyan | Jhinjhoti | Jog | Jogkauns | Kafi | Kalavati | Kaunsi Kanada | Komal Re Asavari | Lalit | Malkauns | Marwa | Megh Malhar | Miyan ki Malhar | Multani | Parameshwari | Patdeep | Pilu | Poorvi | Puriya |
Puriya Dhanashree | Shree | Tilak Kamod | Todi | Vachaspati | Yaman

George Howlett | www.ragajunglism.org

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

This sounds really good, and it's a very difficult project. From my experience learning Hindustani classical music (as an amateur) I feel it might be good to make such an index audio-based rather than text-based. When Pt Bhatkhande tried to formalise and
classify Hindustani classical music in the early 20th century, audio recording was not in everyone's hands. Today, we can attempt to create an index which has hundreds of recordings for the same raga - so that the different ways of interpreting it are
visible.

Definitely interested in this, although my limited knowledge is practical rather than theoretical

On Sunday, 5 April 2020 11:51:04 UTC-4, ghowl...@gmail.com wrote:

Darbar are currently creating an ‘Index of Hindustani Raga’, due to go online later in 2020. I'm writing it - although really, my role is just to turn the expertise of the musicians and scholars into something clear, useful, and broadly

communicable. So I'd love some feedback on it - quick summary below.

● Basic idea: A free, in-depth, high-quality resource, of interest to students, artists, listeners, and anyone else in the world who wishes to focus in and learn more about the music. While no online index can ever substitute for the instruction of a

good guru, we figured that (since everyone uses them nowadays) we should put the very best resources out there for everyone.

● Pages: An in-depth web page each for 40 Hindustani ragas (listed below), collating multiple perspectives - e.g. summary, history, mythology, phraseology, compositions, imagery, scale geometry, raga differentiation, global equivalents, analysing

great recordings etc. And 10 ‘linking pages’ - e.g. lists, thaats, samay, raga families, geometry, murchana wheels, etc

● Principles: Writing is underway, and I'm following these guiding principles - would particularly love to know what you think of these. They derive from research and artist input during my written series for Darbar last year, and from current

discussions with Deepak Raja and other scholars, as well as my own experiences in the gurukul and in teaching global music.

—Artist leadership: direct, detailed input from top performers - e.g. Indrani Mukherjee, Rupak Kulkarni, and many of the artists I interviewed last year

—Centrality of composition: learn primarily through absorbing sounds rather than memorising ‘rules’ - and encourage much more focus on the infinite ‘spaces between the notes’, which are often given cursory treatment in 'summaries' of ragas

—‘Window to more’: the concept of a ‘comprehensive’ raga writeup is nonsensical - readers should be inspired to carry on searching, and so each page will be stacked with avenues for this

—Fresh sources: new archival materials kindly shared by Alam Khan, Sukanya Shankar, and others - and a very wide collation of existing sources

—Avoid telling people ‘how to feel’: e.g. choose less mood-specific descriptors (e.g. ‘unresolved‘ rather than ‘mournful’), contextualise rasas (avoid one-word translations), and include varied cultural associations (mythology, artist

recollections, paintings, etc)

—‘Living forms’: Ragas evolve over time, so why keep these pages static? I'll update them in the future with new input, suggestions, corrections, etc

—If you want to get a 'full stack' view of the different viewpoints we're trying to approach from, see my finished draft for Raag Parameshwari (https://docs.google.com/document/d/18eninI1I5uw3DjjJu-oEWTwExhXI7nJmsOI45BXWcj8) - an idiosyncratic modern

raga created by Ravi Shankar in the latter half of the 20th century, derived through daydreaming in the back of a car in Bengal. (n.b. Most of the ragas will have more detailed phraseological guidance...I haven't got any artist input on Parameshwari yet,
although I believe Pt Ronu Majumdar will be sending some in.

— really want this to be the very best resource it can be - ragas are complex cognitive intertwinings, and must be approached from many angles. And it's not like I'm pulling forth all the raga knowledge from my head - my role is in finding ways to

organise, contextualise, and explain the knowledge of the masters. So I'd love any feedback on what you'd find most useful in a raga index!

These are the initial 40 ragas - we'll be adding more in the future, and this list may be tweaked a bit too: Ahir Bhairav | Antardhwani | Bageshri | Basant Mukhari | Bhairav | Bhairavi | Bhimpalasi | Bhupali | Bihag | Bilaskhani Todi | Chandranandan |

Charukeshi | Darbari | Desh | Durga | Gorakh Kalyan | Jhinjhoti | Jog | Jogkauns | Kafi | Kalavati | Kaunsi Kanada | Komal Re Asavari | Lalit | Malkauns | Marwa | Megh Malhar | Miyan ki Malhar | Multani | Parameshwari | Patdeep | Pilu | Poorvi | Puriya |
Puriya Dhanashree | Shree | Tilak Kamod | Todi | Vachaspati | Yaman

George Howlett | www.ragajunglism.org

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)