Alain Daniélou

ETHNOMUSICOLOGY
In this essay, first published in The Journal of the Madras Music Academy (Vol. XXVII, 1957), Alain Daniélou deals with different aspects of ethnomusicological research (focused on Indian music) and the complexity of contact between cultures. At the time of its publication, ethnomusicology was a discipline in statu nascendi with intrinsic problems not only of methodology, but also of conception. Daniélou’s text shows not only a critical attitude toward ethnomusicology’s ethnocentric bent at that time, but also toward an unprofessional fascination with the foreign which obliterates one’s own cultural values. His essay focuses on the need to differentiate and preserve the values of each culture in order to foster mutual enrichment.

Alain Daniélou playing the vīṇā at the Labyrinth, Zagarolo, in 1981. Photo by Jacques Cloarec.

Intercultural Contact

Some time ago Mr. Nicolas Nabokov, in a short talk given under the auspices of the Music Academy, reminded us that contact between different cultures can only be an enrichment if it means, for each one, a better understanding of the points where it differs from other cultures. New contacts can then lead towards the development of individual characteristics, rather than towards a cultural compromise. Thus, contact with another culture is useful mainly when it leads to a better appreciation of our own and to an exaltation in each case of the particular pattern of life which is a civilisation and which expresses itself in all human activities in religion, social behaviour and customs, literature, art, music, all that which in a country has been developed through lengthy centuries of relative seclusion, and which has thus grown as the natural expression of the particular genius of a particular people or nation.

Learning another Civilisation

We cannot easily leave aside the pattern of the civilisation in which we are born. It has become an essential part of ourselves. We can learn a new culture as we learn a new language, provided we are well-grounded in our own. This is why people who have lived from childhood midway between two cultures face a very serious problem of development and tend to live in a sort of cultural vacuum which we can observe in their homes, their manners, their interests. We are all born with individual and group characteristics and however attracted we may be by a culture other than our own, however efficiently we may adapt ourselves to the civilisation and manners of another country or race, we can almost always observe that in the highest creations of the mind, the higher levels of genius can only be reached within the drama of what is natural to us, within the limitations of our mother tongue, within the frame of a particular and definite civilisation or culture.

Knowledge is not Imitation

Most musicians in the West play Spanish or Italian or Russian music and often play it very well; but, even in what is a mere interpretation, we feel there is a more subtle and perfect understanding when Toscanini directs a Verdi opera or Karajan a Schubert symphony or when a real Spaniard plays Falla or Albeniz. And we have no trace of doubt that if a Norwegian tries to compose a Spanish dance, it will remain an outward and inadequate imitation of what any street composer can do in Spain effortlessly. The same applies in India to Karnatic and Hindustani or even Bengali music. I am not at all convinced that a South Indian musician who learns North Indian ragas and styles of singing, however well he does it, is doing any service to Karnatic or Hindustani music and, maybe, not to music altogether. At the same time, mutual ignorance and lack of appreciation is certainly damaging and is a handicap to any healthy development and even harmful to the preservation of ancient forms of music. This is because there are things that we must know and not do. If we refuse to know we paralyse our development and what we have is bound to degenerate, but if we try to experiment with everything we learn, if we try to imitate what others do, we are sure to lose our personality and to degrade whatever is our own.
We are usually not sufficiently aware of the characteristics of our own genius because it seems to us the most natural thing, while we are full of admiration for those characteristics in others that are strange to us, so that many of us spend our lives trying to do that for which we are least gifted.
I remember once meeting a stranger in Paris and, after talking for half an hour, he told me: “Since you come from Brittany…”. I said: “How do you know I come from Brittany?” He answered: “Oh! That is not difficult. We have been talking together for half an hour and you managed not to say yes or no to any of my questions. Only people from Brittany can do that”. Well, I was not aware of this characteristic, but I do sometimes feel that if, instead of trying to acquire the sceptical and flippant outlook of the French or the analytical mode of thought of the Hindu, I had tried to develop the poetic ambiguousness of my own people I might have been an outstanding Celtic poet, instead of a very average Frenchman and an amateur Hindu.
All this, however, is intended only as an excuse for the subject I am supposed to talk to you about, which is ethnomusicology, that is, the study of music envisaged as part of the culture of a particular human group, race, or nation.

Ethnomusicology

Ethnomusicology has only been recognised as an important subject in a few Western Universities and it is still, in many ways, a science in its infancy, although modern technology and equipment have given it considerable means to develop rapidly.
A characteristic of the technical development of the last fifty years has been to alter in many ways our methods of study and this has led to a sort of general reconsideration of almost all the postulates which were considered established facts in the last century.
The famous pianist Franz Listz, when he was already one of the famous performers of Europe, decided that he really knew too little of the technique of his instrument. He therefore discarded all he knew and started again to study from the beginning.

The Modern Outlook

The same outlook is noticeable in almost all branches of learning in our time. Everything that was considered as established fact is questioned again and all studies are restarted from their fundamentals. In fact this is the very criterion of modern sciences, the very characteristic of the modern outlook in all spheres of human thought. We question the validity of our thinking machine, of the language through which we express our thought, of the religions which try to justify our modern way of life. We question the most elementary laws of physics and mathematics, so that guiding minds of our age express themselves in terms of non-Euclidian physics, non-Aristotelian semantics and other sublime abstractions.
But you may ask what this has to do with music. Ethnomusicology is the study of primitive music, and the classical musical art of a developed culture is not a playground for ethnologists and anthropologists. It deals with higher values of culture which need be approached from a different point of view.
This, I am afraid is not quite justified in the case of music. If we do not want all the systems of music of the world to vanish in a complete musical mix-up, we have to reconsider carefully and consolidate the real foundations of the various systems and entirely revise the approximate and inaccurate theories that may have been sufficient a century ago, but do not meet the challenge of our age.
It is wrong to believe that Ethnomusicology means the study of tribal or primitive music and that the established systems of art-music are too lofty to be probed into with the help of modern measuring instruments. In fact, the technical study of the particularities of musical systems as they are – and not as musicians believe they are – is an enormous asset for disentangling the pure, the essential aspects of a particular system of music from accretions due to outside imports and influences. The music of Europe would be much healthier if its theorists were more aware of its origin, its possibilities in the musical systems of other parts of the world. In India, at least four entirely distinct learned systems of music have existed from very ancient times, these were known to the Sanskrit writers as the four matas, yet there seems to be growing confusion as to what are the essential elements of each of these musical systems and the means of preserving their individual characters, the purity of their style, the quality of their expression.
While taking into account the written theory of music, whether Eastern or Western, Ethno-musicology remains very shy of the statements of musicians or of old-fashioned musicologists; it refuses to acknowledge many of their classifications, much of their often over-simplified or over-complicated theories. In India if we really want to understand the fundamental differences between existing systems and to find out which of the ancient texts really referred to what sort of music, we have to start our observations on the basis of the actual performance of the remnants of the ancient music as they are found today. And, when we have established the characteristics of each system of each school of music, as they may still exist today, we may be able to understand what was meant by the classifications of the ancient writers instead of interpreting them to suit our own views on musical history or the styles of music we are pleased to call classical.

History of Musicology

Ethnomusicology is, in Europe, considered a relatively new science, hardly yet established.
Its acknowledged originator was Alexander John Ellis who was born in 1814 and whose essay On the Musical Scales of Various Nations contained a first attempt to study Arabian and Indian scales. He was assisted in his measuring by Alfred James Hipkins (1826-1903).
The German von Hornbostel gave to Ethno-musicology many of its methods, and his co-worker Kurt Sachs brought the science to America. Jaap Kunst in Holland and Schaeffner in France have done considerable work on this subject in recent years.
It would however be wrong to believe that the idea of studying music as a human phenomenon is altogether new. It appears that many of the earliest Sanksrit writers on music approached the art in a true musicological spirit and the very title of a work like the Brihaddest expresses the intention of its author Matanga to study the various songs of men just as they are found among the various peoples of the land.

Methods and Instruments
Measuring instruments

For an objective study of music we need several things, the first one is convenient measuring-instruments and methods for the analysis of intervals, whether simultaneous or successive, and also easy instruments to reproduce and play-back conveniently the intervals measured so as to ascertain, with the help of the musicians themselves, whether the intervals measured were really those intended and not accidental.

Notation

Then we need an adequate system of notation to record our observations accurately and in detail not merely in the form of arithmetic figures, but also in a musical score that can be studied and played musically and in which ornamental subtleties can be conveniently expressed.

Recordings

We need recordings as permanent evidence of our observations, and also to make sure that we are not tendentious in our measures and do not interpret music to bring it back to a pattern known to us.
Recordings are also the safest basis for the notation and measure of intervals, since the musician need not be disturbed in his play at the time of recording; and we can also later repeat exactly the same passage any number of times, which is essential for any accurate analysis and notation.

Words and Translation

In the case of songs, we need also an exact transliteration of the text as it is sung – this is often quite distinct from the original written text – with its accents and long syllables and, if the language is not familiar, an accurate translation of the meaning of each word.
From the historical and technical point of view, a study of the instruments is also important. A good photograph of the instrument being played and details of its tuning, strings, manufacture, and ways of playing are usually most useful.

The Musicological Document

The preparation of a perfect musicological document is an elaborate process. Different musicologists follow distinct methods. I shall give you some idea of the way I proceed myself.
The performers and instruments must be carefully selected and brought to a convenient recording place. I personally prefer as far as possible to work in a sound-proof studio since this allows a better study of sound quality and a better balance of voices and instruments.
The music must then be rehearsed sufficiently so that the musicians are in the proper mood and sing or play with proper feeling. This is very important since most musicians take a little time to get into a raga, and the intervals they use at the beginning are very approximate. It is only when they are caught by the mood of the raga that the intervals become precise and can be measured. Most musicians believe that they can demonstrate without preparation this or that interval, sing the 22 śrutis in succession, etc. This, according to my experience, is never more than a vague approximation. Accuracy in music is always linked with emotion and so long as the feeling is not there the accuracy remains doubtful. For ordinary recording, it is important to record a full piece with its prelude, beginning and end, but for musicological studies a few slices of a longer performance usually give the best results.
The recording equipment should preferably be a professional tape machine allowing proper editing. Amateur tape recorders can however be used for fieldwork and are sufficient for making notations, if not for making discs. Many amateur machines use only half of the tape and record something else on the other half. This is most inconvenient and necessitates duplication on a full-size tape to make editing work possible.

Notation

Once the record is made, the notation is a complex task. The intervals and their variations have to be carefully measured and a series of playbacks and attempts made at reproducing the exact intervals on a suitable musical instrument in collaboration with the musicians to determine whether the intervals used are really those the musicians were aiming at or whether they have occasionally gone slightly – or noticeably – out of tune. This procedure is essential since all musicians go occasionally out of tune and we must be careful not to mistake such accidents as parts of the system. We have to know what the musician wants to sing or play and this is not always what he actually does. If we attempted to find out the scale of Western music by measuring the intervals sung by some Italian singers during an average opera performance we would be sure to get the most astounding results. This mistake is very commonly made in the study of so-called primitive music and leads to absurd conclusions. Another difficult problem is the exact notation of grace notes or ornaments, as well as of the indirect attack of notes. This requires patience and care but the results are most rewarding, since it is in the subtle elaboration of ornaments and the approach to notes that the original character of a musical system and its connections with other systems can be most safely established. It is in that particular field of notation that diagrams can be made regarding intonation and vocal and instrumental technique, showing the particular characteristics of a musical system and its possible connections with other systems. I have not yet had the time to do systematic work on Karnatic music although I have already done a good deal of recording and notation of it, but I know it is one of the richest fields in the world as regards the originality and variety of musical ornamentation. Grace notes have to be studied as a completely separate subject. The intervals used in vibrato, in appoggiatura, in gliding to a note from above or below, in turning around it, or linking it to a sometimes quite distant note, are different in their nature from those of scales. And this is why they constitute an independent contribution to musical expression. If they are played artificially with the ordinary notes of the scale they lose all character and meaning. This is why the modern interpretation of early Western music makes it appear often so absurdly ornate.
The study of music with the help of modern facilities will allow us to bring much fresh air and new material to musical theories that have become stale and are mostly built up of unverified statements repeated indefinitely and made to suit conventional ideas as to what the history of a particular system should be.

South Indian Music

We are faced in South India with a most ancient and original system, which very probably has links with some of the oldest branches of European music and definite affinities with some musical elements still found in North Africa, particularly Tunisia, where it may well be that something has remained of an ancient, – should we say Carthaginian, – culture, which once flourished there.
I believe that only when we make a technical study of Karnatic music, quite independently of the claims of some of its exponents, shall we be able gradually to find its proper place in the general history of Indian music as well as of world music and its dependence on or independence from the various systems expounded in the numerous and often contradictory layers of Sanskrit musical theory.

Folk and Classical Music

In this study it is most important to make a parallel analysis of the art music of the cities – or classical music as it is now somewhat wrongly called, – and the music of different ethnic groups broadly classified as folk music, though much of it represents remnants of other branches of ancient art music.

Music shop in Benares, India. Photo by Alexander Reshnya. Source: Shutterstock

Musical Geography

The geography of music in India is as interesting as it is bewildering. We often meet side by side in the same locality musical systems which seem altogether different in origin and form and it is only when we study them and classify them adequately that we are able to have a true picture of the origin and place of the different music forms found in India today. Until then most of what we say for or against a particular musical system remains without much proof. There is in the town of Banaras a caste of milkmen said to be the descendants of an ancient tribe, all of whose songs are built on a scale of 12 semitones which is otherwise completely unknown to the music of North India. I am sure we could find such instances almost anywhere in this country.

Representation of Intervals

There are several ways of measuring and classifying musical intervals.
Representation by ratios is the only logical one, allowing us to understand the harmonic relationship of intervals, but it does not permit a rapid appreciation of relative size, or measurements. This is why other systems have been evolved. The oldest one was invented by the Chinese and is based on the decreasing powers of 3. It is not very convenient. Among the others the savarts – so called from the French physicist who advocated the system – are equal intervals based on the difference in the logarithms of the numbers forming the ratio and dividing the octave into 301 equal intervals (O. 301 being the logarithm of 2). This system is now sometimes replaced by the milli-octave or more commonly by cents which divide the octave into 1200 equal intervals. I personally always use savarts not because the inventor was French but merely because it allows direct use of logarithm tables which is most convenient if one is to do much work on subtle differences of intervals.

Group of musicians in Benares around 1950. Photo by Alain Daniélou.

We hear many strong statements regarding scales and intervals. We are told that there are natural intervals and others considered artificial. This is probably true and comes from our ability to grasp some intervals as more meaningful than others, to perceive some types of ratios more clearly than others. We should not however believe that these are established and permanent facts. Such theories are at the most a guess. Indian music is theoretically based on the same type of division of the octave as is Western music. Yet both often utilise in practice noticeably distinct intervals. The fact that the tempered scale which is based on roots tends in some countries to replace proportional or harmonic scales does not necessarily imply that we are abandoning a good type of scale for a bad one, but raises the question as to if we can grasp that a series of proportional ratios corresponds to expressive values, why we cannot grasp roots in the same way. True musicology must stay very shy of any theory and avoid carefully any form of number mysticism. We shall soon enough find that most people in practice follow a division of the octave quite distinct from the one they claim to be using.

The Classification of Instruments

The development and characteristics of musical instruments, just like vocal technique, are very important elements for the study of ethnomusicology.
Many theories have been put forward to explain the origin and development of the different forms of musical instrument. We should be rather suspicious of such theories since we have no means whatever of knowing how primitive man may have behaved many thousand years ago. Kurt Sachs believes that instrumental music came from magic rituals and vocal music from the need to call to one another. Here in India we believed that it came ready-made from certain deities. Such matters, being impossible to verify, do not come within the purview of science.
Instruments are difficult to classify because of their variety. The Chinese used to divide instruments according to the material they are made of, into kin (metal), che (stone), t’u (earthenware), ko (skin), hièn (strings), p’o (gourd), chu (bambu) and mh (wood). This was not accepted by Western musicologists because their instruments are usually made of several materials. The Indian classification has been for many centuries the most logical and convenient one. It was established probably long before the Nātya Śāstra was compiled and recognizes ghana (gongs, cymbals, etc.), avanaddha (drums), tata (strings) and suṣira (wind instruments).
The first reasonable classification of instruments adopted in Europe in the 19th century seems to have been the Indian one and modern classifications are not noticeably different.
The classification proposed by the Belgian Victor Mahillon (who died in 1924) is autophones, membranophones, chordophones and aerophones: that is instruments whose material itself produces the sound without being stretched in any way, the autophones being now usually called idiophones; the instruments in which the sound is produced by a stretched skin or membrane are membranophones; those in which the sound-producing element is a string are chordophones; and aerophones are those in which the air vibrates.
We see easily that, in spite of these complicated names, this latest discovery of Western musicology nearly follows the ancient Indian division.

The Technique of Voice Vibration

The technique of voice production is an important element for the differentiation of musical families.
Sir Stuart Wilson gave us a most interesting and amusing account of some aspects of voice production in the West. His most qualified and beautiful demonstration was particularly interesting for us because it may help us to understand a fundamental difference of purpose between the European and the Indian singer.
Western singing is a form of chanting. It is basically an exalted way of reciting a poem, of carrying words and their meaning above the waves of the orchestra. The melodic line is the chanted flow of the sentence. The accents become the long, powerful and moving sustained notes. It is true that there is such a thing as Italian vocalisation or bel-canto, but this remains an occasional ornamentation of the spoken song.
In the purely modal form of music the voice is an instrument. It develops a raga exactly as a vina or a flute would do. In the higher forms of modal music, a musician can make almost exactly the same musical development on one poem as on another. The form of the raga, the ornamentation of the song, the position of the voice are quite independent of the words. In fact I have often noted that some of the most beautiful khyāls of Northern India are built on meaningless syllables or on one or two old short verses whose meaning is not clear to the singer. This is why the gestures and expressions of the Indian singer follow the melodic form of the raga in the North, the rhythmic pattern in the South, but in no case the meaning of the words.
This naturally leads to a very different approach to singing and much of vocal technique is evolved according to the relative proportion of the three elements – the words, theme and rhythm, the ancient Dhatu, Matu and Tala – which are the guiding factors grouping the other elements that come into action in shaping of the voice. The extreme sensitiveness to rhythm of the Tamilian leads him to sustain a note by a repetitive rhythmical resounding of an allegedly single note, bringing into action the lowest part of the larynx which works a little as does the palm of the left hand in the sustained sound of the mṛdaṅga. This leads to a form of gamaka, very surprising at first to ears trained to purely melodic patterns of ornamentation. You can therefore observe what could be a division of vocal technique into the flute-voice where the ornament is purely melodic, the drum-voice where the nature of the ornament is essentially rhythmical, the vina-voice which is halfway between. But we also have in those parts of India, influenced by Sino-Tibetan music, the single cry where each note is dealt with as a separate entity, and we also know the chanting or speaking voice similar to that of Western countries.
This rough division may give you an idea of how an ethnomusicological survey and study of such basic things as voice production, instrumental technique, besides form, style and ornamentation of the music, may give us useful information for the building of a reasonable and sound theory of the history of Indian music and help us discover the original contribution of the different parts of India as well as its links with the music of other countries.
Ethnomusicology should play in music the part that archaeology plays in history. It gives us the positive documents through which we can verify and implement the data received from written or oral tradition.

The Problem of Notation

In this connection it may be necessary to stress the importance of an adequate system of notation.
Nowhere is there an entirely satisfactory notation system, and the purpose of notation is not always clearly understood. To learn a song from notation is not the best way to learn it, and some musicians, therefore, feel that any system is good enough provided it is simple and easy to print.
The work of the musicologist is however impossible if an adequate system of notation is not available. And the more elaborate and detailed the notation, the better his work.
Much of the work done on folk music in Europe in the last century and much of the work done even at present is practically useless as an instrument for Ethnomusicology, that is the classification of musical families. We cannot draw any valid conclusions from a notation in 12 semitones which entirely obliterates the microtones (the śrutis) not only in the main theme but, and this is even more deplorable, in the ornaments.
In India where the use of microtonal intervals is so varied, so subtle, so beautiful, no one will be able to talk sense about them until an adequate system for the analysis and notation of śrutis and for the division of mātrās is not only made available but brought into common use.
India has probably the oldest system of notation in the world. Greek notation, Arabic notation and later the Western Solfa system were most probably derived from Indian notation.
In the past four centuries Europe has developed a much better and more convenient system of notation than any previously used. All the recent attempts at increasing the range and possibilities of Indian notation are imitated from the Western system. The two best-known attempts at introducing some feature of Western notation in the Indian system are those of Vishnu Digambar and V. N. Bhatkande.

Ethnomusicology should play in music the part that archaeology plays in history. It gives us the positive documents through which we can verify and implement the data received from written or oral tradition.

These however remain rather inadequate as compared to the Western staff. The best system I have come across so far is that used by Mrs. Vidya of Madras in her collection of classical Kritis. This brings modern Indian notation to a stage closely resembling the systems used in Europe at the end of the Middle Ages. Such notation systems fall however very short of the requirements of Ethnomusicology. I do not see why Indian musicians should not take the lead and, accepting all the additions made to notation in Europe in the past four centuries, now carry this further by meeting all the requirements of Indian music and thus give a welcome lead to the notation systems used in other countries. This obviously cannot be done until the Indian system is first brought up to date and standardized.

Need for Development of Ethnomusicology

In every country, musical theory is based on the implied assertion that the prevalent musical system is natural, superior, more ancient, etc. It is very difficult therefore to explain one form of music to people used to another form in terms of accepted musical theory. If I dared to repeat to you one tenth of what I have to listen to from Western or even North Indian musicians about Karnatic music you would turn me out of this place as a miscreant, a savage, an imperialist, or whatever. But I must say for the sake of fairness, that I have often had to listen in Madras to long discourses as to all the alleged inferiorities of Western or North Indian music based usually on some misunderstanding of musical terms. Such an outlook is harmful to everybody. Either people imitate and that is wrong, or they deprecate and that is worse. We have to find some common ground for cultural development and understanding.
This is where Ethnomusicology can be our best platform, because it deals with facts only and can allow us to build up the basic material for musical studies irrespective of age-worn theories, while dealing with age-old music and, with its help, we can come to some positive conculsions regarding the history of the musical system in this vast land and in the ancient literature that reflects this history. We can also analyse impartially the nature of the different features used to build each particular system, and thus find out what are its essential elements and possibly the direction in which a particular system of music can develop while keeping in line with its original genius.

Practical Steps

Cover of the Unesco Collection volume Suryanarayana playing the South Indian Vina, edited by Alain Daniélou in collaboration with Jacques Cloarec, published in 1974.

But how can one proceed practically? How can one develop in India a good Ethnomusicology laboratory which requires recording facilities, trained personnel, collection of documents, sound-measuring equipment, etc.? It is not for me to make suggestions on such matters. I can only hope that the Music Academy may be able to play a role in this, as in other branches of musical study, a pioneering role and that the new Academies established by the government will become aware of the important work to be done. One thing seems to me certain: unless we are able to put into modern scientific terms all the prodigious experience and invention of India in the field of music, it will not be easy to carry that knowledge beyond India’s borders, nor even to keep it alive within India itself. It is my belief that the methods of Ethnomusicology may be the instrument that will bring the world to realise the greatness of the contribution of India, past and present, in the field of music, and, at the same time, may provide the means of consolidating the purest classical values and give a new impulse to the highest forms of this most precious creation of Indian genius.