Copyright by Jeffrey Michael Grimes 2008 - The University of Texas ...

music, and that the only factor external to the tradition which has any real impact on the
tradition is economics, not in any theoretical sense, but to the extent that, for example,
financial needs may force a musician compromise the amount they can practice or teach
or even compromise their artistic integrity by deliberately playing to the less discerning
members of the mass audience. By this view, the only story to be told about the
migration of musicians from North India to Maharashtra and Bengal is that in the past,
patronage was available in the courts of North India, and now it is available in the ‘major
metros,’ the most important of which are Bombay and Calcutta, and due to this, these
musicians subsequently propagated their style in their new region and built up a base of
listeners and followers there. Based on this view, then, in chapters 3 through 6, I
examine the tradition in this light, discussing the history and current musical scene in
Bengal and Maharashtra in terms of whom my interlocutors saw as the most important
and influential musicians and lineages of musicians in each region. Thus, in chapter 3, I
discuss Khyal in Maharashtra; in chapter 4, I look at Khyal in Bengal; chapter 5 concerns
traditions of tabla playing in both regions; and chapter 6 discusses in instrumental music
in Bengal and, to a lesser extent, the dearth of instrumental music in Maharashtra.
Chapter 2 serves as introduction to this larger section, where I discuss the gharana
concept, as so many of interlocutors explained the scenes in each region in terms of
gharana-based styles. In each chapter, I attempt to make some generalizations about the
most common musical styles in the case of each genre in each region.
In the second broad section, which consists of two chapters, one quite lengthy, I
examine the tradition in terms that only a handful, if any, of my interlocutors suggested.
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