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
Scholars place thumri before the mid-nineteenth century but disagree on when it began. Vidya Rao, a singer and writer, dates its entry into the courts to the late eighteenth or early nineteenth century. Lalita du Perron places its height at Lucknow in the mid-nineteenth century, under Wajid Ali Shah, Nawab of Awadh from 1847 to 1856, who composed under the pen name Akhtarpiya. Popular belief names him its inventor; du Perron calls that mistaken, and Prem Lata Sharma treats his patronage as one episode in a longer history.
This early bandish thumri served dance. A courtesan (tawaif) might sing seated with abhinaya, expressive acting through face and hands, then rise to dance, or dance while another sang. In the second half of the century courtly patronage declined and the courtesan tradition lost social standing. Courtesans kept performing at small private gatherings, where thumri shed its link with dance and became a song form. Its centre moved to Banaras (Varanasi), and the slower bol banao thumri took shape there, fed by eastern Uttar Pradesh folk songs such as chaiti, kajari and biraha.
Lucknow court and Kathak
Thumri enters the courts of North India and reaches its height at Lucknow under Wajid Ali Shah. Courtesans sing bandish thumri for Kathak, and dancers of the Lucknow kathak family, among them Kalka and Bindadin, compose for it.
Banaras and Bol Banao
As court patronage fades, thumri leaves dance behind for small private gatherings. In Banaras it takes on a grave, slow manner, and local musicians shape the bol banao style that leads modern thumri.
Records and Radio
Gauhar Jaan records thumri and dadra for the Gramophone Company from 1902. Begum Akhtar later broadcasts often on All India Radio. To Lalita du Perron, the early records suggest that thumri's subject matter was already narrowing.
Contemporary Practice
Girija Devi taught at the ITC Sangeet Research Academy, Calcutta, and the Sangeet Natak Akademi honoured Chhannu Lal Mishra's Banaras thumri. Vidya Rao observes that thumri has slowed in living memory and drawn closer to khayal.
Playing Techniques
Bol Banao Technique
Bol banao, also written bol banav, is the central craft of modern thumri. The singer takes a short line of the text and repeats it many times, giving each repetition a new melodic shape and a new emotional colour, such as love, anger or sadness, then returns to the opening line. Writers often call it word-painting. Vidya Rao adds two tools: kaku, a change of vocal inflection that alters what the same words mean, and pauses that carry meaning of their own.
A composition has two sections, the sthayi and the antara, set in contrasting registers and each usually of two lines. Most bol banao thumris end with the laggi, a short, faster passage, often in kaharva (8 beats) or tintal, in which the tabla player improvises before the song returns to its own tala. The older bandish thumri, also called bol baant, is a fixed composition led by rhythm and pace and made for dance.
The voice sits over a tanpura or swarmandal drone, with tabla and either sarangi or harmonium following the melody.
Ragas and Talas
Thumri draws on a restricted set of ragas, the melodic frameworks of Indian music. Ragas named for thumri include Khamaj, Kafi, Bhairavi, Pilu, Tilang, Tilak Kamod, Jhinjhoti, Jogiya, Desh and Pahadi. A Varanasi account from the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts adds others, such as Sindhu Bhairavi, Gara, Zila, Mand and Sohni.
A thumri singer handles these ragas freely, bringing in notes outside the usual scale for colour and touching other ragas in passing. The scholar Prem Lata Sharma, writing in 1960, explained this as the raga's pattern giving way when the singer's attention turns to the words. The music scholar Gordon Thompson observes that the same notes might elsewhere be heard as disturbing a raga's mood.
Thumri also has its own talas (rhythmic cycles). Deepchandi, of 14 beats, and dadra, of 6, are typical, with addha, rupak, Punjabi theka and kaharva also in use. The singer Vidya Rao reports that the older dance-linked thumris of Lucknow were set in tintal, jhaptal and sawari as well.
Regional Styles
In 1960 Prem Lata Sharma found no thumri gharanas (schools) in the strict sense, only regional styles, though later Sangeet Natak Akademi citations name a Banaras gharana. The eastern style is purab ang, also written poorab or Poorbi. Sharma centres it on Banaras (Varanasi) and credits it with grace and tenderness. In the IGNCA's Varanasi account, Banaras singers dwell on notes at slow tempo and draw out the meaning of words. Akademi citations tie Rasoolan Bai, Siddheshwari Devi, Girija Devi and Chhannulal Mishra to Banaras.
Lucknow is disputed. Sharma treats it as a separate western style, the pachahin ang, less tender and less elastic. The IGNCA account instead places Lucknow, Banaras and Gaya together within purab ang, and describes Lucknow thumri as lively and quick, full of murki (quick turns).
The Punjabi ang, a more recent style shaped by tappa, weaves profuse murkis into fast taans (rapid melodic runs). Its leading exponent was Bade Ghulam Ali Khan of the Patiala gharana. The Akademi cited Begum Akhtar for thumri that combined purab and Punjabi ang.
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Vocal Technique
Thumri ragas and talas
Bol Banao
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Interpretation and Performance
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