Who needs the blues guitar when you have the Duitara? The stories of the duitara go the same way as those of so many other folk music instruments. They generally run on the lines of, “Only when one has felt the depths of sadness, can one play the duitara.”
The Duitara is so poorly documented that I could find only four videos containing the instrument on YouTube and one on Vimeo. Even the Wikipedia page on the music of Meghalaya mentions a couple of rock bands but there is no mention of the duitara.
The Duitara is an important musical instrument of the Khasis and Jaintias of Meghalaya. It is a plucked string instrument, similar to a guitar. It is made of hard wood and is played with a wooden pick. It has four holes at its end, fixed with wooden pegs to hold the string in tune. The body of the Duitara is covered with animal skin.
Here is a video of Bah Kerios Wahlang, a duitara master, singing about the music he loves. Here is an excerpt of the song translated from the original Khasi. It perfectly sums up what this music and the duitara means to the person playing it.
It’s as old as time
And it will last beyond the 4 seasons
It springs from the depths of the Earth
It flows from the heart of the Duitara
You can hear it’s echo in nature
Feel it soar from within the Duitara
It seeps into the veins
It moves into the soul
Here’s another one by Kong Bathimai, a vegetable vendor by profession and an amazing duitara player and singer by passion.
Place of Origin: North Karnataka Instruments used: Chowdike
The devadasis of the Yellamma cult of North Karnataka bless the world with a storytelling music form called Chowdike Padagalu (ಚೌಡಿಕೆ ಪದಗಳು), which literally means ‘Chowdike Verses’. The name of the music form comes from the instrument that is integral to it- the ‘Chowdike’- a symbol of the goddess ‘Yellamma’. It is a single stringed instrument that accompanies every song.
Chowdike
The practitioners of this art form are either devadasis or descendents of devadasis. Although the practice of devadasis is banned in Karnataka, it still persists in some rural areas. Many of the Chowdike pada singers are “married” to the goddess Yellamma. The songs are mostly in praise of Yellamma. These days, with the help of the government and NGOs Chowdike padagalu has become a vehicle to communicate social messages, especially to rural women, on issues related to childbirth, prevention of HIV, female infanticide, etc.
Because of its origins in the now illegal devadasi tradition, the Chowdike pada songs are rapidly disappearing along with the devadasis. Added to this are rules of the devadasi community that prevent people from outside the community to learn the songs. Even within the community, only the members supposedly chosen by Yellamma can represent the goddess and sing her praise through Chowdike padagalu. There are some artists, however, who have dared to defy these rules. Radhabai Maruti Madar is one such artist who is determined to spread the word of Chowdike padagalu.
In the following video, Radhabai Maruti Madar explains Chowdike padagalu. According to her Chowdike padagalu is a wonderful art form akin to Sugama Sangeetha (otherwise known as Bhavageethe) and devotional music. She goes on to explain the story of the Chowdike instrument. Here is a rough translation of what she says.
“It is said that after goddess Yellamma chopped off Kartavirya’s head, she made Chowdike with his head, the handle with his hand and the rest with his body. Then when Kartivirya’s wife said how can I live without my husband, Yellamma made this music and asked her to play it and consider the sound as her husband’s voice. This is the story of this wonderful instrument called Chowdike.”
The Santals are one of India’s largest tribal communities. They are based around the eastern states of Odisha, Jharkhand and Bihar and share a distant relationship with Mundari and other Austro-Asiatic languages speaking tribes of eastern India through Bengal, Assam and all the way till Meghalaya and Tripura. The Santals have a rich ancient culture which is very different from Indo-Aryan or Dravidian Indian culture.
Music and dance form an integral part of their society. Santali music is unique among other folk music forms in its instrumentation and the scales it uses. I am going to only touch two or three aspects of Santali music because:
i) Santali music and culture is a vast subject that requires volumes to cover.
ii) Santali music is so poorly documented that it is near impossible to find any resources on the lyrics of their songs or their mythology or the technical details of their music.
Santali culture owes a lot to one man in particular- Pandit Raghunath Murmu. He single handedly invented the Ol-Chiki script for the Santali language. Today, all Santali literature is written in this script. The songs and plays he wrote are very popular among the Santalis and he is popularly known as Guru Gomke (an honorary title). One of the lines of his songs is appropriate when attempting to uncover the folk culture of India. He says, “If we lose our script, if we lose our language, if we lose our religion, then we lose our existence too.”
Most Santali songs revolve around nature and spirits associated with the animistic religion they follow.
Banam
The banam is a fretless bowed instrument, single or double stringed, carved out of a single log of wood of a tree. According to Santal legend, the banam originated out of the wood of a tree that grew out of the flesh of a human being. There are two types of banam- the dhodro banam and the phet banam.
The dhodro banam consits of a belly(lac) covered with an animal skin on which rests the bridge (sadam, lit, horse), an open chest (korom), a short neck (hotok)and a head (bohok). The head is often beautifully carved in the shape human or animal figures. If there is a head, the tuning peg is inserted in the ear (lutur), and the gut string comes out the mouth.
The phet banam has a sound box covered by animal skin. It usually has 3 to 4 strings.
‘Banam’ literally means excuse. It is said that after a tiring day in the fields or hunting, the banam is an excuse to sit and relax and play some soothing music.
Tamak:
The structure of the drum (like hollow half globe but tapering downwards) is made of iron plates. The upper side is covered with raw hide of buffalo. Ropes made of raw hide is used for applying tension for stretching the raw hide. Tamaks are made in different sizes as per requirement. Some can only be lifted with two persons and some are carried in bullock cart. The bigger ones are used during Sendra or mass hunting. Small and medium sizes are drummed by a person with two drum sticks for dances like lagne, dong, baha, dahar and all other forms of dances.
Place of origin: Kanyakumari, parts of neighbouring districts of Tamil Nadu and Kerala Instruments: Villu (bow), Kudam, Udukkai Themes: Village gods, regional mythology, social messages
In a journey across India to discover the many folk music forms of the country, there isn’t a better place to start than the southern tip, Kanyakumari. This is the land of the ancient art form of Villu Pattu (வில்லுப்பாட்டு). Villu Pattu literally means ‘Bow Song’. Its main instrument is, believe it or not, an actual bow.
The villu is usually played by two people, one of whom plays the bow string with a veesukol, and another who handles the kudam percussion that is tied to the villu. One of the villu players sings, while the rest of the group accompanies him or her on udukkais (a small drum), chimes and sometimes harmonium and tabla.
I will let the expert explain the details. Here is an excerpt from ‘History of Indian Theatre’ by Manohar Laxman Varadpande.
There are seven to eight persons in a bow-song party who form a kind of chorus that supports the main singer-narrator. When the chief narrator sings, the chorus takes up the refrain of the song and repeats it in unison or merely say O yes O yes—aama aama. The whole party sits on the ground and performs with a lot of gesticulation and facial expression to suit the narrative they have taken up for the performance. The ballad style songs are composed in rural dialect which makes direct appeal to the audience who sometimes join the chorus by emitting suitable sounds or words. In the week-long sessions the stories from Ramayana, Mahabharata and the Puranas are told.
The most popular story that the bow-song party narrates is Pazhanoor Nili. Nili is a beautiful woman who is murdered by her husband, who is provoked to do so by his mistress. She becomes a ghost and encounters her husband in his next birth. The unfulfilled love surges in the heart of Nili, now a ghost, with such ferocity that when she embraces her husband of previous birth, he dies instantly of suffocation. Stories with supernatural contents—gods, demi-gods, evil spirits as characters and human sacrifices, murders as situations are also narrated…
…Another interesting feature of the performance is the ‘debate’ between two parties made by dividing the whole bow-song group. One group will ask questions and the other Will reply. This debate can go on for hours.
What is Indian music? Here is a seemingly simple question that way too often gets overly simplistic answers. Is Indian music just Hindustani and Carnatic music on one end, Bollywood on the other and ‘folk music’ in between?
The categorization of everything in between classical and pop as folk music is troublesome. Indian folk music is as diverse as India itself. If every state has its language, every district has its own folk music and culture. There are 676 districts in India as of today. That’s a start to comprehending how vast the cultural heritage we are blessed with is.
Here’s me, an uncultured city dwelling fool trying, in my own way, to comprehend the vastness of this heritage I have inherited. I will try to write about every new form of music that I encounter, as I discover them. There is a serious lack of exposure that these music forms face, to the point that there is occasionally even a hint of disdain about these ‘non-classical’, ‘non-modern’, ‘non-urban’ forms of music from the interiors of our country.
So, open your ears and get ready to listen to some of the most original music you’ve ever heard; music styles and instruments that are soul-stirring at times, divine at times, and at times maybe even bizarre. Along with this music, be prepared for rich tales and ancient folklore of the kind that only the passage of time can perfect.
Lok Folk Music 