Hindustani musicone of the two principal types of South Asian classical music, found mainly in the northern three-fourths of the subcontinent, where Indo-Aryan languages are spoken. (The other principal type, Carnatic music of northern India and Pakistan that developed as a distinct type from the late 12th or early , is found in the Dravidian-speaking region of southern India.) The two systems diverged gradually, beginning in the 13th century, when the Islāmic Islamic conquest of the northern parts of the subcontinent brought special emphasis to introduced highly influential Arabic and Iranian Persian musical practices , which that then merged with ancient Hindu traditions. (The latter traditions, less affected by foreign influences, remain in the Carnatic music of the south, the division being roughly demarcated by the city of Hyderābād in Andhra Pradesh state.influences from Muslim cultures played virtually no role in the development of Carnatic music.)

Northern India shares with the south the basic melodic principles use of raga ragas (melodic framework frameworks for improvisation and composition) and , the rhythmic principles of tala (cyclical rhythmic pattern), although there are pronounced differences in style and classification. Instrumental music is more dominant in the northern music, in which a greater number of different instruments are in use; and there exist cyclic metric patterns sometimes of great complexity), and the practice of nonmetric, rhythmically “free” improvisation. Although vocal music plays an important role, instrumental music is more important in Hindustani music than it is in Carnatic; there are some purely instrumental forms, such as the theme with variations known as gat.

The most prominent instruments of Hindustani music are the sitar (a long-necked fretted lute with about 30 melodic, a sort of theme with variations.

Hindustani music is often regarded as more emotional and romantic than its southern counterpart. The prolongation of tones, for instance, in introductory (ālāpa) sections of pieces can create a languorous effect. Change by stages to faster and faster tempos—sometimes with concomitant changes in tala patterns—is also characteristic of performances in northern India and Pakistan.

drone, and sympathetic strings), sarod (a short-necked unfretted lute with sympathetic and drone strings), sarangi (a bowed fiddle), shehnai (an oboelike wind instrument), tabla (a set of two drums played by one musician, the right-hand drum carefully tuned), and tamboura (a large, long-necked lute with four strings, used only to play the supporting drone, a single repeated chord).



Daniel Neuman, The Life of Music in North India (1980, reprinted 1990); Nazir Ali Jairazbhoy, The Rāgs of North Indian Music (1971); Ravi Shankar, edited and introduced by George Harrison, Raga Mala: The Autobiography of Ravi Shankar (1999); Suvarnalata Rao, Wim van der Meer, and Jane Harvey and Joep Bor (ed.), The Raga Guide (1999); George Ruckert, Music in North India (2004).