Indian Classical Music - Shashikala Srinivasan

Indian Classical Music and the near-absence of Harmony

By Shashikala Srinivasan | May 7, 2024October 25, 2024 by Shashikala Srinivasan

A young, musically talented nephew of mine, raised a question: Why is it that Indian classical music did not explore harmony like Western music did? Even when they encountered new European instruments like harmonium and violin, the Indians made it an accompaniment to individual, vocal renderings rather than use it for exploring harmony, he observed. As far as he was concerned, moving from monophony to harmony and polyphony was a natural progression in the evolution…

A Response to Pratap Bhanu Mehta’s article on decolonization

By Shashikala Srinivasan | September 13, 2023November 20, 2025 by Shashikala Srinivasan

Pratap Bhanu Mehta has written a thought-provoking piece on the problems with the current talk of decolonisation (September, 1, 2023, Indian Express). His contention is that the current call for decolonization, though correct in its assessment that colonialism misrepresented Indian knowledge forms thereby almost blocking our access to it, is superficial. For the call for decolonization has neither been accompanied by any attempt to either “diagnose indic knowledge” or understand why the knowledge forms that…