Lesson 7: Accompaniment (II): Starting Before the Sam

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Lesson 7: Accompaniment (II): Starting Before the Sam

This lesson describes the process of playing the kartal for songs that start before the sam. There are a good number of songs that start before the sam. Here is a diagram of a song that begins before the sam.

X			0
1	2	3	4	5	6
					S
					sar
X			0
1	2	3	4	5	6
P	P	m	g	g	R	S
va	sva	to	ma	ar	cara
X			0
1	2	3	4	5	6
m	m	g	R	S	‘d
e	sam	pi	ya	a	po
X			0
1	2	3	4	5	6
‘P	‘P	‘n	S	g	R
de	chi	to	ma	ar	gho
X			0
1	2	3	4	5	6
S	-	-	-	-	S
re	e	e	e	e	tu

It is clearly shown that this song’s first word begins at matra 6, which is before the sam. If the main singer were to follow your kartal accompaniment, you should strike the first kartal attack at the word ‘va’ which is the sam. As far as which particular cycles are concerned, it would wise to use one of the cycles in Lesson 5 (three-beat cycles).

Like in Lesson 6, the only way to understand this is by practice. Listen to the following clips and try to playing to the songs. Again, do not worry so much about mukhras yet. Focus on getting the rhythmic cycle in the song properly. Once that is done effortlessly, then mukhras can be added using good judgement.

ACCOMPANIMENT 1 IN DADRA TALA:

Sarvasva Tomar Carane (6 beat cycle)