User:Harmonium Guru

= Learn How To Play Harmonium = A harmonium, also called a "reed organ" or "pump organ", is a keyboard instrument that is a lot like an organ. It makes sound by blowing air through reeds, which are tuned to different pitches to make musical notes.

Nowadays, we can see different types harmonium, which are used to lean harmonium.


 * Standard Harmonium
 * Coupler Harmonium
 * Scale Changer Harmonium

Division of Saptak
In Indian Classical music three saptaks (Octaves) are usually utilized.

 Saptak : When the set of seven notes is played in the order it is called a Saptak (i.e. Sa, Re, Ga, Ma, Pa, Dha, Ni). In the keyboard or harmonium the Sa gets repeated after Ni. The frequency of 2nd Sa is twice the frequency of first Sa. Notes of this saptak are indicated by a sign of full stop on right side e.g. S.


 *  Mandar Saptak:  The one below the madh saptak is called mandr saptak (low). Notes of this octave are sung or played in a low deep tone. This comprises of the saptak that is below the lower Sa of the madh saptak. Notes of this saptak are indicated by a sign of  Full Stop on left side e.g. (.S)


 *  Madh Saptak:  The normal tone of human voice, which is neither high nor low. It is called madh saptak (middle octave). This has got no symbol in the notation system.Example - S, R, G, M


 * Taar Saptak: The one higher than madh saptak is taar saptak (high). The notes are high and sharp. The frequency of the second Sa is twice the frequency of the first Sa. The second Sa belongs to taar saptak and in this way the same saptak gets repeated.Notes of this saptak are indicated by a sign of full stop on the right side e.g. (S.)

Notes of Saptak
The notes of the Indian gamut (seven notes of music) are known as sargam. Just as the English word "alphabet" is derived from the Greek letters "alpha,  beta", in the same way the word "Sargam" is derived from "Sa-Re-Ga-Ma". Sa, Re, Ga, Ma, is simply the initial notes (swar) of the Indian musical gamut. These swars are Sa, Re, Ga, Ma, Pa, Dha, and Ni. The intervals of the Indian scale are essentially the same as those of the western scale. The notes in the Western scale are evenly spaced; the ones in the Eastern scale follow the natural divisions of vibrational frequencies.

Musical notes are chosen by certain names. However, the names do not refer to notes of fixed absolute pitch. Having decided on the schedule and key in which the performance is to take place, the singer or musician determines the pitch, which will be the fundamental pitch, and designates it as the first note of the octave, calling it by the label " Sa ". The succeeding notes of the octave are then given the following names: Sa, Re, Ga, Ma, Pa, Dha, Ni, Sa

The full names of the notes are given as under:


 * 1) Sa Khraj/Shadj (the tonic note)
 * 2) Re Rekhab
 * 3) Ga Gandhar
 * 4) Ma Madhyam
 * 5) Pa Pancham
 * 6) Dha Dhaivat
 * 7) Ni Nikhad

The intervals between these notes can be regarded as the same as those of the standard C major scale of just temperament, and we will denote these notes by S, R, G, M, P, D, N, S.

S, R, G, M, P, D, N, S           (Indian)

C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C          (western)

Traditionally, the seven swars are said to derive, as do many elements of Indian music, from sounds in nature: Shadj/Sa is said to imitate the cry of the peacock; Rekhab /Re, the chataka bird crying for its mate; Gandhar /Ga, the bleating of a goat or sheep; Madhyam /Ma, the middle sound, the crane or heron's call; Pancham /Pa, the fifth sound, the kokila (cuckoo) in spring; Dhaivat /Dha, the horse's neigh, or the frog in the rainy season; Nikhad /Ni, the trumpeting  of the elephant.


 * Shuddh or natural notes are notated as S, R, G, M, P, D, N,
 * All upper case letters except Sa and Pa refer to " Sudh Swars" Example,
 * All lower case letters refer to the "Komal Swars". Example, r g d
 * For (M) refers Shuddh Ma or the natural one and (M') refers to the 'Tiver or Kori Ma'.

Sa and Pa are never sharp or flat. Shuddh Ma, however, is written with a lower case M. It is the only note ever referred to as sharp. As tiver or "bright" Ma it is written with an upper case M'. In addition there are of course, certain notes that are komal (flat) or tiver (sharp) versions of some of these.

Twelve Notes of Saptak

 * Sa, which will be represented by S
 * 1) Komal Re, which will be represented by r
 * 2) Sudh Re, which will be represented by R
 * 3) Komal Ga, which will be represented by g
 * 4) Sudh Ga, which will be represented by G
 * 5) Sudh Ma, which will be represented by M
 * 6) Tiver Ma, which will be represented by M'
 * Pa, will be represented by P
 * 1) Komal Dha, which will be represented by d
 * 2) Sudh Dha, which will be represented by D
 * 3) Komal Ni, which will be represented by n
 * 4) Sudh Ni, which will be represented by N

Komal means notes with lower voice and Sudh means notes with higher voice. Shuddh Notes are also called natural notes

SARGAM
Natural notes (pure or major) are called Shudh notes which are shown as S, R, G, M, P, D, N. The notes, or swars, are Khraj/Shadj, Rekhab, Gandhar, Madhyam, Pancham, Dhaivat and Nikhad. When singing these become Sa, Re, Ga, Ma, Pa, Dha, Ni, and sargam stands for "Sa-Re-Ga-Ma". Only these syllables are sung, and further designations are never vocalized. When writing these become, S, R, G, M, P, D, N. A sign of fullstop on the right side of a letter (S.) indicates the octave higher, a sign of fullstop on the left side of a letter (.S) indicates the octave lower. Re, Ga, Dha, and Ni may be either shudh or komal; Ma may be either shudh or tivar and is then called tiver Ma. Sa and Pa are immovable (once Sa is selected),

Don't think there is anything that you can practice that will have as much an impact on your playing as sargam. Take the sargam challenge. Play the sargam every night for one month and then re-assess your playing skills afterward.

In other words Sargam is the collection of music notes or the swar of the scale. It has been mentioned earlier how notes of the sargam relate to the western scale. Practicing to play sargam in music is bit like weight training. Basic rules of weight training are to start with simple exercises with

lightweights. As you get comfortable with lightweights, you increase repetitions or increase the weight you are lifting. You also focus on muscle group you work on. You go to heavier and more complex exercises after you feel comfortable with the basic exercises. When we say sargam, we don't just mean a scale of notes but it means the act of playing the sargam. Playing the sargam is the single most important thing you can do when you are learning harmonium or keyboard. When beginning to learn harmonium, the teachers should not stress the playing of the sargam too much or enforce it. After all, there is nothing joyous about playing one note after the other in succession, over and over again. Students tend to hate sargam for this very reason. Getting students into sargam is a challenge.

Sargam fixes everything. If your right hand is not strong enough, sargam fixes that. If you are not confident in class, sargam fixes that. If you don't know where the notes are at the beginning, or how to sit properly for long periods of time or need discipline or you are trying to increase your speed or clarity or timing or rhythm or etc; sargam fixes all. Sargam needs great practice, but it doesn't have to be boring. Nothing is more boring than playing the same notes over and over again, so spice up your sargam with some of the variations. This will sound like you are actually playing something.

THAAT
The set of seven notes is called a thaat and thaat produce ragas. The system of classification for the raga in different groups is called a thaat. Thaat system is an "artificial" way to classifying ragas. Classification in Thaat system is purely for academic purpose. It is not necessary that Ragas from the same thaat might have same or similar personality. The idea behind thaat is pretty simple. There are 12 notes in an octave - 7 pure notes and 5 flat/augmented notes. If one makes various permutations of these notes, one can think of 72 different combinations. Hindustani system, however, adds further restrictions on the way these notes are used. It is usually not allowed to use both pure and corresponding flat note one after the other (and since this is an evolved art form and not science, there are always exceptions to such rules). When such restrictions are factored in, the numbers of thaat reduce to ten. It is important for beginners to practice Kalyan thaat well to begin with. As they get comfortable with it, they may switch to Behravi thaat. I also find from my own experience that Bhairav thaat too presents some interesting fingering challenges. If one gets command on these three, the other thaat usually follow pretty easily.

If you learn thaat then you can easily learn ragas and can play many songs in keyboard or harmonium. You can play few songs with thaat but unlimited songs can be produced with ragas and ragas produce beauty. It is easy to play songs in a thaat that contain fixed number of ascending and descending notes. In a  raga there may not be fix number of notes in ascending and descending order so, it is not easy to play songs in the first instance. There are certain rules for representation of thaat. These rules of classification of thaat are defined as under.


 * 1) A thaat must have seven notes out of the twelve notes placed in an ascending or descending order. Both the forms of the notes can be
 * 2) Thaat has only one arohi and one
 * 3) Thaat is not to be sung and is for only playing music songs but the ragas produced from the thaat are
 * 4) Thaat is named after the popular raga of that thaat. For example behravi is a popular raga and the thaat of the raga behravi is named after the
 * 5) Out of ten thaat about 80 ragas are developed and performed these days. But for a beginner 30 ragas are sufficient to bring perfection in

The set of seven notes or scale that can produce a raga is called a thaat. The system of classification for the ragas in different groups is called a thaat. There  are again several systems of classification of the raga. Presently in Indian classical music the 10-thaat classifications of ragas is commonly known.

ALANKARS
Alankars are different sets of the swars that will enable you to practice and familiarize yourself with the different sounds. You should practice these till you can play them correctly without looking at the keyboard. While you practice, please sing along with notes so that you can improve your voice.

The term Alankar literally means an ornament or decoration; it is the repetition of musical notes from a Raga in a particular pattern.

Alankars are of four types:

 * 1) Asthai Alankars, which returns to the initial note
 * 2) Arohi Alankars, which is a ascending sequence of notes
 * 3) Amrohi Alankars, which is a descending sequence of notes
 * 4) Sanchari Alankars, which combines elements of the above

Alankars are extremely useful for practice and are a great way of getting familiar with your keyboard or harmonium.

Here are some more Alankars for practice; try to play them continuously for an extended period of time; its extremely important that your fingers move smoothly on the keyboard because when you are playing a metered melody, an extra second's hesitation is enough to send you out of synchronization with the taal or rhythm.

Basic Alankars

 * 1) AROH – S R  G  M  P  D  N AVROH – S.  N  D  P  M  G  R  S
 * 2) AROH – SS RR  GG  MM  PP  DD  NN  S. AVROH – S.S.  NN  DD  PP  MM  GG  RR  SS
 * 3) AROH – SRG RGM  GMP  MPD  PDN DNS. AVROH – S.ND  NDP  DPM  PMG  MGR  GRS
 * 4) AROH – SRGM RGMP  GMPD  MPDN PDNS. AVROH – S.NDP  NDPM  DPMG  PMGR  MGRS
 * 5) AROH – SRGMP RGMPD  GMPDN MPDNS. AVROH – S.NDPM  NDMPG  DPMGR  PMGRS
 * 6) AROH – SRGMPD RGMPDN GMPDNS. AVROH – S.NDPMG  NDPMGR  DPMGRS
 * 7) AROH – SRGMPDN RGMPDNS. AVROH – S.NDPMGR  NDPMGRS
 * 8) AROH – SRGMPDNS. AVROH – S.NDPMGRS
 * 9) AROH – SR RG  GM  MP  PD  DN NS. AVROH - S.N  ND  DP  PM  MG  GR  RS
 * 10) AROH - SG RM  GP  MD  PN DS. AVROH – S.D  NP  DM  PG  MR  GS

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