Western Musicologist on Hindustani Music

Dr. Lovely Sharma has taken enormous pain in collecting information on western musicologists. She has traveled far and wide, interviewed musicologists, studied their books and websites. It was a challenging task. In spite of many difficulties, she has managed to collect abundant information about the musicologists and their work through interviews and extensive meetings. The information given in this book is authentic. The richness of Hindustani Classical music has attracted many western musicologists. They studied Hindustani music minutely and their exposition was clear and transparent. Their work on Indian Classical music is not only popular in western countries but considered very important in India too and therefore has been translated into different western languages. Alean Denelou was the first musicologist of 20th century who has done pioneering work on Hindustani Classical music. Another western musicologist Selina the leman (Selina Sharma) has written valuable books on Hindustani Classical music. Western musicologists have done extensive work on ethnomusicology, history of Indian music, different forms of Indian music, instrumental music, and Vedic music, They have also compiled and edited works of other musicologists and have translated many Sanskrit and Urdu books concerned with Indian Classical music. The present work on the contribution of western musicologists is first of its kind, which will become a reference book for music lovers, researchers and teachers..

Dr. Lovely Sharma is a Sitarist and Musicologist of International repute. She has been recipient of Barsari and National Scholarship. After receiving Gold medal in M.A. music she has never looked back. She did her Ph.D. degree from M.S. University, Baroda. Dr. Sharma joined music department of D.E.I University as a lecturer in 1987. Due to her global recognition, she has been invited at various International fora as a music therapist (Australia in 2005, Sweden in 2006). She has been honored as a Sitarist by Iran Art Academey, Iran. She was also invited for an international conference held in Malaysia as Music Educationist as well a sitarist. Dr. Sharma has presented nearly 35 research papers and has published around 30 research papers in various national and International music journals and books her unique project work entitled "Effect of Music on prisoners" throws light on her character to accept challenges and to contribute to social welfare. She was also awarded best teacher's award in 1999 in Delhi and Kalabhusan award in 2004 by Dr. B.R. Ambedkar University, Agra. Her book on `Rajasthani lok geeton ki shastriyata' was published in 2005. She is an external expert of around 30 Indian universities apart from UGC and RPSC, Rajasthan.

I have started work on this volume while doing a research study for my D.Lit degree. In this book, I have presented a detailed study on the contribution of western musicologists in Indian music during 20th century. This book particularly is concerned with the valuable work done by western musicologists on Indian Classical music. When I commenced forming ideas and collecting data for the study, I realized that a very small percentage of Indian musicians, musicologists, scholars and students were aware of the real contribution of western authors in Indian Classical music. In Uttar Pradesh for instance, I interviewed around 100 musicologists and musicians and only about one percent were aware of the contribution of any western musicologist in Indian music. The main content of the present study is the authored works of the western musicologists. Most of these works were not easily available in India. I had to toil to collect and compile data from various institutions, universities and libraries in India and abroad. During this research study, although we one can find references of western authors like William Jones (1799) and Capt. N.A. Willard (1834) for their authored works, yet it is only after 1947 that western musicologists took greater interest to research and study various aspects of ethnomusicology with reference to India. Their analytical approach towards Indian music helped us to have more inside in the field of Indian music. After a critical analysis of their work, I divided the musicologists into two categories namely prominent and moderately prominent. This book discusses 21 prominent western musicologists and 16 moderately prominent musicologists and their contributions towards Indian music alphabetically. The author believes that the book will be an useful and authentic reference tool and will inspire and motivate re-searchers in musicology to make further investigations and probe into Indian Classical Musicology deeply.

The book covering prominent Western musicologists is another vital part of Dr. Lovely Sharma's project. After independence great interest was taken by Western musicians and musicologists. It gave a new dimension to their understanding of world culture in music and they found a great classical tradition existing in India. Our musicians has started going to Western countries especially U.K. and U.S.A. and creating great interest in the Western audience. Western music is based on harmony and counter part. They found that Indian Music is mainly based on melodic con-tours and realized that the progression m Indian Music was completely based on melodic movement and the rhythmic movement which went along with the melodic progression. The rhythmic accompaniment given by either Mrindhang or Tabla were highly complex, the parallel of which did not exist in Western music. The first ambassador of our Indian music was Hazrat Inayatkhan and later it was to the credit of Pandit Ravi Shanker, a great Sitarist who popularized the Indian Music in the western countries. Then, several music scholars tried to understand Indian Music in good depth. Dr. Alien Daneilou was one of the firsts, who tried to understand Indian Music, in the context of Indian Culture and Sanskrit texts. Then followed several musicologist of the West, to name a few; Bonny Wade, Bruno Nattle, Daneilou Newman, Allyn Miner, Joep Bor, Jose Luiz Martinez, Dr. Kippen, Lewis Rowell, Martin Clayton, Stephen Sllawek, Dr. Wim van der Meer. Actually such deep interest, is credible to the Western scholars, which in a way gave our own scholars an added insight. I am sure that more and more Western musicologists will be added to the list with time and their interest will continue in the coming decades. In this context, this work attains a significant importance. The entire task was challenging both on account of the collection of data from the published works in India and abroad and also on the basis of personal as well as on line interviews of the musicologists. Much of the material was gathered over many years. Despite the obvious limitations of a single individual attempting to throw lights on this unexplored subject, Dr. Sharma has done marvelous work which will earn her much appreciation from music lovers. I appreciate the efforts of the author for her contribution in bringing out such an important publication.

**Contents and Sample Pages**