I have chosen the song “Khamak and Huruk”, which is by Jnan Prakash Ghosh. I believe this song is a raga, because it has no vocals, and it is all instrumental, however the song itself is not very long, which is not the case for most ragas. This song originates from North India, and is an example of Indian folk music. Three different instruments are heard when listening to this song. First, you hear some sort of shaker instrument, almost like maracas. This instrument acts as the drone in this piece, playing the same rhythm the entire duration of the song. Next, the Khamak begins to play. The Khamak is a string instrument; it is a one-headed drum that has a string attached to it which is plucked by the musician. The last instrument is the Huruk, which is a drum. Throughout this piece, the Khamak and Huruk play “call-and-response”, where one instrument will play a melody, and the other will follow when it’s finished. The piece ends with all three instruments playing together. There’s a point about halfway through the song where the shaker instrument picks up the tempo, which increases the tempo of the Khamak and Huruk for the rest of the song as well. I picked this piece because I thought it was interesting how the shaker instrument acted as the drone; typically I would have thought a lower-sounding instrument would usually be the drone, and that something like a shaker instrument would be playing more of a melody. I also think it’s really interesting how the Khamak is played – it’s just a single string that is plucked and pulled for different notes.
Khamak and Huruk
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