About the Author
She has given workshops and lectures in a variety of countries in different parts of the world. She has contributed articles to various journals and as an academic she has presented papers at conferences and seminars. She has produced a CD entitled ‘Traditional Vedic Invocations’ consisting of eight well-known mantras and has made a DVD entitled, ‘Ancient Indian Song. An Introduction to the Hymns of the Vedas’. See Home Page for details. As a teacher she has taught both introductory lessons as well as specialist sessions in different aspects of language, chant and raga. As a writer she has published a book, ‘Hidden Faces of Ancient Indian Song’. See Home Page for details. |
Her
serious involvement with North Indian classical music started around
1980. Since that time she has made many prolonged visits to India, to
interview and record vocalists in song and mantra recitation as well
as to collect other research material. At first her attention was focussed
on aspects of embellishment and ornamentation (gamaka) However, the
study of such a wide and complex subject as gamaka stimulated enquiry
into other avenues of research so that when the study was completed
what had been discovered seemed unsatisfactory. It became clear that
language and music were inseparably linked. It seemed that some of the
answers to the questions which had arisen lay in much older forms of
Indian music, in the various systems of Vedic mantra recitation, in
the sounds of the Sanskrit language and, if a musical style was to be
part of the investigation, then it should be north India’s most
ancient tradition of classical vocal music, dhrupada. It also became
clear that how we hear is crucial to what we hear and that this is the
starting point for any enquiry. Moreover, an appreciation of underlying
philosophical and esoteric concepts is essential to an understanding
of the evolution of northern India’s musical tradition.