| Kirtan |
| An important role for music in South Asian culture is in the worship
of deities, as seen in the Rg Veda (the "praise" veda). The most common form of religious musical praise in modern India is kīrtan [Sanskrit kīrti "to praise"] and those who perform kīrtan function as preacherswho incorporate music and
spoken exegesis into their storytelling. |
| These kīrtankārs
[Sanskrit kīrtan + kārnā vt "to do"] take a great number of performative forms and appear in a diverse array of musical and dramatic
configurations. All attempt to explain the fundamentals of Hinduism
in ways that will make the philosophic intricacies comprehensible
to the layperson. The relationship between the national cosmopolitan
culture and regional or even village culture has been described
by anthropologists Robert Redfield and Milton Singer as that of
"great" and "little" traditions. The kīrtankār is an interlocutor in this dialogue. |
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| Selected Performances |
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| Sources of Indian Music |
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31 January, 2013
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