Vocal

Singing sits at the origin of Indian classical music. Its roots reach back to the chanting of Vedic literature and to the Natya Shastra of Bharata Muni, and the 13th-century Sangita Ratnakara of Śārṅgadeva gave it a lasting framework by naming song as the first of the three arts of sangita. Around the 12th century the tradition divided. In the north, under Persian and Islamic influence, dhrupad gave way over time to khyal, and lighter forms such as thumri took shape. In the south the Carnatic tradition developed its own body of song, reaching a height in the 18th century with the Trinity of Tyagaraja, Muthuswami Dikshitar, and Syama Sastri, whose kritis remain central to the repertoire. The concert format that audiences know today was settled in the 1930s by Ariyakudi Ramanuja Iyengar. Through every change the voice stayed at the centre, the standard that instruments were built to imitate.