Veena was once a broad term for all stringed instruments. Medieval changes led to instruments such as the sarod, sitar, rabab, esraj and dilruba. It is natural to ask how far earlier veena types shaped later instruments, and how independent ...
Veena was once a broad term for all stringed instruments. Medieval changes led to instruments such as the sarod, sitar, rabab, esraj and dilruba. It is natural to ask how far earlier veena types shaped later instruments, and how independent each one's playing technique became. In this book, the author focuses solely on the sitar and examines how other instruments influenced its playing technique, understood here as method, distinctiveness and craft. The author used surveys and interviews, and organised the study into six chapters. The author concludes that ancient veena types partly influenced the sitar's size, number of strings and playing style. Among present-day instruments, it is very hard to say which influenced which; each has its own tradition. The author also holds that instrumental music depends on vocal music, yet the sitar's own repertoire of bols and techniques is far richer.