Part of Hindustani Classical
Hindustani classical vocal music is the singing tradition of North Indian art music. Singers develop a raga through composition and improvisation in khayal and dhrupad.
Historical Timeline
Most accounts name Amir Khusrau as the creator of tarana. The Dilli gharana traces its tarana repertoire to him through the qawwal bachche, the hereditary qawwal community of Delhi, beginning with his disciple Samat bin Ibrahim. Supporters of the attribution cite later Indo-Persian writers. Pandey and Bhardwaj (2024) report that Abul Fazl's Ain-i-Akbari, from the late 16th century, names Khusrau as the creator of tarana, and that Faqirullah's Rag Darpan (1663) credits him with tarana singing.
The writer Abhik Majumdar sets out the grounds for doubt. In his Ejaz-e-Khusravi, Khusrau names ragas that he says already existed and claims none of them as his own. Majumdar's account of the origin legend cites Willard's treatise of 1834. In that story Khusrau hears Gopal Nayak sing raga Kadambak and reproduces it on meaningless syllables, and modern writers treat it as legend. Majumdar still credits Khusrau with a significant role in the form's emergence.
Among later schools, the Rampur-Sahaswan gharana is known for tarana. The Sangeet Natak Akademi, in its award to Nisar Hussain Khan, recognised his expert rendering of the form.
Attributed to Amir Khusrau
Amir Khusrau (1253 to 1325), poet and musician at the Delhi Sultanate court, is the traditional creator of tarana. Writers on both sides of that attribution see tarana as building on nirgit, wordless singing that existed in India before him.
Rampur court taranas
At the Rampur court, Seniya dhrupad musicians such as Bahadur Hussain and Wazir Khan were prolific tarana composers. Maihar gharana teachers later collected dozens of fast sarod compositions (drut gats) said to be built on Rampur taranas.
Recording Era
Tarana reached 78 rpm discs, including fast taranas by Nisar Hussain Khan of the Rampur-Sahaswan gharana. Amir Khan (1912 to 1974), founder of the Indore gharana, researched tarana from 1958 and published on its style in 1966.
Contemporary Practice
Rashid Khan (1968 to 2024), a disciple of Nisar Hussain Khan, sang taranas in the Rampur-Sahaswan tradition. Taranas also feature in ensembles joining Hindustani and Carnatic musicians, such as Ravi Shankar's tarana in raga Kirvani.
Playing Techniques
Rhythmic Syllables
A tarana draws on a stock of syllables: ta, na, dir (also dere or dare), tom, dani, odani, tadeem and tana, with yali and ali-alla in some compositions. Many draw on bols, the spoken syllables that name an instrument's strokes: pakhawaj and tabla bols such as dha, tirkit and dhum, stroke sounds such as dir dir and, by some accounts, sitar bols.
What the syllables mean is disputed. One view holds that they have no lexical meaning and are chosen for sound and alliteration. Amir Khan argued that they are Persian and Arabic words whose sense was lost through repetition, reading dani as 'he knows' and yala as 'Ya Allah'. Prabha Atre is reported as holding that tarana began with meaningful words that later singers mispronounced. Other musicians hold that a Persian base existed and has since been lost.
The word tarana also names a technique. Musicians sometimes call the nom-tom passages of khayal and dhrupad, sung on syllables such as nom, tom and ta-ra-na, tarana. Those passages elaborate other forms; the composed tarana stands as a piece in its own right.
Structure and Types
Like khayal, a tarana has two sections: the sthayi, the first section, and the antara, the second. A tarana with a Persian couplet or quatrain (ruba'i), usually placed in the antara, is a ruba'idar tarana. Such stanzas sometimes include Urdu, Hindi or Sanskrit lines among the Persian.
One typology, reported from the Dilli gharana, names three kinds: a tarana on syllables alone, one whose antara adds verse, and the trivat, whose sthayi uses tarana syllables while the antara switches to percussion bols. The classification belongs to that gharana's tradition, and other schools may group taranas differently.
Tempo and Tala
Tarana is most often sung at drut laya (fast tempo), though taranas are set in various talas and tempi. Documented examples sit in teentaal (16 beats) and ektaal (12 beats). Some open at madhya laya (medium tempo) and accelerate to drut. Rashid Khan's tarana in raga Gaud Sarang, in ektaal, follows that arc.
A slow variant, the khayalnuma, is rarely heard now. Jal Balaporia sings one in raga Yaman in Rajat Kapoor's 1995 Films Division film Tarana.
Journey to Mastery
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Khayal Grounding
Syllable Vocabulary
Tala and Tempo
Repertoire
Performance Practice
Past Performances
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