Visit to Indian Music Experience, Bangalore

Visit to Indian Music Experience, Bangalore

For a student of music of "Indian" music (and not just "Indian classical" or "Carnatic"), few years of training teaches that Indian music is diverse, and it represents the living diversity of the country that India is. So, when I read about an attempt of "experience all Indian music", I have to admit that I was sceptical. So, when I got a chance to be in Bangalore, the first thing in the morning I did was to head to Indian Music Experience on Brigade Road. And I am very happy that I did so because to say that this place pleasantly surprised me would be an understatement.

Indian Music Experience (IME) is a museum of Indian music, started recently (June 2019 as per the news report I found on Google). It is spread across 3 huge floors full of multimedia including audio-visual samples, interactive exhibits, wall paintings etc. Pioneering Indian ethnomusicologist Dr Ashok Da Ranade theorised that Indian music flows in 6 categories: 1. Primitive, 2. Folk, 3. Art, 4. Devotional, 5. Popular and 6. Confluence. IME has been, more of less, successful to represent all these categories. I am sure several people must have worked hard to envision, design and bring this into reality. My sincere thanks to all of them.

Visit starts from the 3^rd floor and then we walk down as we see each exhibit. 3rd floor starts with confluence music, also referred as fusion. Must visit: Hybrid Sounds interactive. This allows you to mix instruments of several culture and create new sound of your own!

Then is the section of religious / bhakti sangeet. Just listening to the wide range (while knowing that few things could are missing - e.g. Marathi kirtan) makes you wonder at the expanse of just one category of music. I spent quite a lot of time here. 

Since I learn Hindustani music, I didn't really spend a lot of time in that section. Instead I checked the Carnatic section, which has a very good audio-visual explanation of the different compositional and creative forms. As a student of a different tradition, I found this section wonderful and educative. There is a full-length concert video recording by Ranjan - Gayatri along with annotations explaining the form, and a separate explanation about the nature and aesthetic beauty of the form by N Ravikiran. (On a side note, I have always found that Carnatic music is more complex than Hindustani - I may have this feeling because I don't understand Carnatic music that much - but I had this feeling again going through the exhibit about the various forms, their own structure and relative structure in a concert).

Then comes the section of folk music. There is a very good attempt to categorize the songs: songs of work, songs of functions (birth, death, marriage etc). There are several examples from several languages, regions.

2 things that I found missing (or maybe they were there, and I skipped them by mistake? not sure): 1) primitive music seems to be missing or there is no explicit mention of this. 2) Although in the folk music, there are examples form different states, I feel that another categorization based purely on the states / regions could also have been exhibited. 

There is also a large gallery for instruments. By this time, after standing for about 2 hours, I was tired and hence I am not sure if the names of the instruments are missing, or I missed them.

Popular music section is represented by the indie (I did not know that indie in ‘indie music’ means independent) music in the confluence section and the film music. We all know about different eras and personalities in Hindi film music and everyone will agree that to represent them is going to be a challenging task. But IME has been successful is making the exhibit comprehensive.

Again, one of the highlights is the interactive exhibit about background music. We all take the background music for granted, so much so, that we don't even realize it's there. But what is Sholey's iconic scene of gabbar asking "kitne admi the" is re-done with different background music? You can find that out yourself.

And that is why, I think IME has been successful. The name seems to have been chosen wisely. It is Indian Music "experience" and not Indian Music "museum". You get to experience the music in a way, that it makes you realize the diversity, richness and the though behind the music making.

Make sure to visit IME when you are in Bangalore. I am sure you will love it.