Sangitasiromani

TITLE: Sangītaśiromani
CAT# (YEAR COMPOSED): 66 (2002)
INSTRUMENTATION: 7 strings (vl, vla)
PAGES: 47
DURATION (APPROX): 9’05
NOTE: originally titled Overture as this piece was intended as the opening music to an experimental music theater environment titled CREATION OF THE WORLD (now dormant…). This was influenced by ancient north Indian treatises (SANGITASIROMANI, and the RG VEDA), while exploring the decoupling of sound production by strings.

Sangītaśiromani refers to a medieval handbook of Indian Music, the “Crest-Jewel of Music”, written in 1428 A.D. 

Ancient north Indian treatises, such as the SANGITASIROMANI, and the RG VEDA have influenced the musical language and form of this composition. These ancient texts were concerned with developing relationships between The Divine, humans and affect. In my composition, some ideas from the ancients are applied to multidimensional networks (parameter spaces) outside of fundamental frequency obsession.

The correspondence between the elements are regulated according to prominent tonal centers within music.  In this composition diatonic tonal centers are not utilized, but rather centers applied to multidimensional scaling, that are distributed over 22 śruti (the smallest tonal interval that can be perceived).