Here are a few clips of my recent practice of Hindustani-style vocal alap. They are works in progress. First is the pre-dawn Rag Lalit:
[audio mp3=“https://rudiseitz1.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/rslalit1-ste-125.mp3"][/audio]
To Western ears Lalit may be one of the more “exotic” sounding ragas and you might think it is therefore one of the most difficult to sing. There are definite technical challenges here (in particular getting an accurate intonation of komal dha in the middle octave when it is approached from tivra ma) but overall I find the mood of the rag so enveloping that I don’t need to work too hard to maintain its distinctive character – the experience of singing it is trance-like and not particularly cerebral.
Second is the early-morning Rag Ahir Bhairav:
[audio mp3=“https://rudiseitz1.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/rsahirbhairav5-ste-097.mp3"][/audio]
My teacher considers Ahir Bhairav to be an “open” raga without many formal restrictions (therefore lending itself to experimentation) but I have found it quite challenging to express, because its character seems to depend on a proper balancing of the darkness from komal re with the brightness from the Ga-ma-Pa-Dha region. Without continuous attention to integrating those bright and dark elements, the alap can come out sounding like something of a hodgepodge. For me at least, there’s more active “work” required to hold things together here.
Third is the evening Rag Desh:
[audio mp3=“https://rudiseitz1.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/rsdesh-aug23.mp3"][/audio]
In contrast to Lalit and Ahir Bhairav where the alap may proceed by “visiting” and bringing focus to individual notes of the raga in succession, Desh calls for a phrase-based approach where the alap consists of the repetition and elaboration of a melodic signature. ■