The Gharanas of Hindustani Music: Exploring the Unique Stylistic Traits

Abstract- The journey of Indian music spans a period of over 4500 years, starting from Indus Valley Civilization to the modern period. Hindustani art music began to evolve after pre-medieval Indian music passed through certain stages of transformation and development till the beginning of the 11th century. The Modern Period of Music in India, and especially the Indian classical music, went through a transformation for almost four centuries particularly from the sixteenth, to result in the today's Hindustani classical music. This modern period witnessed an increasing number of works in the field of musicology in Persian, Urdu, Hindi and other regional languages, instead of Sanskrit. All these tell us the story of how Indian classical or Hindustani Art Music, as we know it today, evolved and took shape as we see and enjoy it today. Indian scholars started publishing fresh material on Hindustani Music in English as well as many regional languages right from the beginning of the nineteenth century. The Hindi word ‘Ghar’ is derived from ‘Gruh’, literally means house. Gharana is an abstract noun of ‘Ghar’ meaning 'of the house'. Many crafts in India were carried on as family traditions, passed on from father to son for many generations. It was rare that an outsider was allowed entry unless he became a part of the family. A gharana also indicates a comprehensive musicological ideology.