Gaayan Samay of the Raag

Dear Indian Classical Music Lovers,

We are back with our new post- Gaayan Samay of the Raag.

This is very important and many people are not aware of this logic. We have read about Vadi and Samvadi in our previous post (Most dominant Swara of Raag is Vadi and sub dominant swara of the raag is Samvadi). 

Now in Indian Classical Music, each raag is rendered at a specific time of the day. The time of the raag depends on the Vaadi swar of the raag. Whole saptak(octave) Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Dha Ni Sa (where yellow color Sa is from Taar Saptak) is divided into 2 parts- 1) Sa Re Ga Ma and 2) Pa Dha Ni Sa

Here the earlier part 'Sa Re Ga Ma' is called 'Poorvaang' and the later part 'Pa Dha Ni Sa' is called 'Uttarang'. 
If Vaadi of the raag fell in the 'Poorvaang' then those raags are called Poorvang Vaadi Raag and these raags are rendered between 12AM and 12PM. For e.g Raag Yemen(Vadi 'Ga' and Samvadi 'Ni').

Similarly, If Vaadi of the raag fell in the 'Uttarang' then those raags are called Uttarangi Vaadi Raag and these raags are rendered between 12 PM and 12 AM For e.g Raag Bhairav (Vadi- 'Dha' and Samvadi 'Re').
So if we know the vaadi swar of the raag then we can estimate the gayan samay of the raag. The raags in Indian Classical Music are divided into 3 categories taking their swars and time in account. Read our next blog Categorization of raags.

Also one very important thing to know- the Samwad between Vadi and Samvadi is always either Sa and Ma or Sa and Pa ie if we take vadi as our Sa then Samvadi would be either Ma or Pa.

What is Raag?

Raag in Indian Classical Music:

A Raag can be defined as a combination of 2 things:
1. Which notes can be used in Aroh ie while going up and which can be used in Avroh ie while coming down to the level of microtones. 
2. And the norms as to how the notes in the raag are combined and how they are related to each other.

Each raag has a 'Dominant' and 'Subdominant' swara called 'Vaadi' and 'Samvaadi'. A note which is strongly emphasized is called 'Vaadi' and the one which is strong but slightly less is called 'Samvaadi'. Also there are note/s which are excluded from that Raag are called 'Vivadi'

There are other characteristics of Raag:

• Samay (Time)
• Aroh/ Avroh
• Pakad
• Thaat 

Read about Swar, Saptak and Thaat system here-  http://indianvocalclassesonline.blogspot.in/p/basic-concepts.html