DRONES—not the ones that fly, take pictures and drop bombs, but sustained musical reference tones—have been used for thousands of years. Simple, effective, and popular, drones originated in ancient southwest Asia, and spread to Europe, India, and Africa.
For many contemporary listeners, their first encounter with a drone was in Indian classical music. It's normally produced by a dedicated instrument called the tamboura (or tanpura), which creates a sustained buzzing sound with the reference pitch and a harmonic fifth above it. Some Indian instruments like the sitar, sarod, and saranghi have drone strings built-in. Not to be outdone, western bagpipes produce multiple drones, as does the medieval hurdy-gurdy. And today, drones are common in electronic and avant-garde music.
Microtones are another basic feature of Indian music. Where western music uses just 12 equally spaced tones to the octave, Indian scales typically have 22, allowing more elaborate melodies and ornamentation. On this transmission of Hearts of Space, we return to the entrancing sounds of Indian contemplative music, on a program called DRONES & MICROTONES.
Music is by SAMIR BODHI, HANS CHRISTIAN, AL GROMER KHAN, J.J. GREGG, RAMAN & SRIKANTH, MANOSE, and AMELIA CUNI & WERNER DURAND.
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