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Fundamentals of Ancient Indian Music and Dance
classical standards is all-important; in it accuracy and skill are treated as more important than the quality of the tone. The tune, melody and rhythm are all with which it is concerned. In western music, the quality of the voice and the charm are important factors.
Another feature which distinguishes Indian music from the western is that wbile the former develops a single emotion, the latter frequently changes the moods. There is a fundamental difference between the systems of rhythm in the music of India and Europe. “The highly developed tāla or rhythinic system, with its avoidance of strict metre and its development by the use of an accumulating combination of beat sub divisions, has no parallel in western music On the other hand, the Indian system has no exact counterpart to the tone of the tempered system, except for the keynote, of western music.” 1
There cannot be a more fitting finale to this topic than the following quotation from Rabindranaib Tagore who, in his inimitable language, brings out the distinction between the aims underlying the two systems of music :
“Our music draws the listener away beyond the limits of everyday human joys and sorrows. and takes us to that lonely region of renunciation which lies at the root of the universe, while European music leads us to a variegated dance through the endless rise and fall of human grief and joy.”
1. See D. P. Singhal : India and World Civilisation, I, p. 222.
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