The Sounds of Music : Science of Musical Scales III -- Indian Classical

TL;DR

This paper explores the structure of Indian classical music scales and explains how ragas are generated through scale shifting, building on previous work on Western musical scales.

Contribution

It provides an analysis of Indian classical scales and introduces the concept of raga generation via scale shifting, expanding the scientific understanding of musical scale structures.

Findings

Indian scales are based on specific scale structures.

Ragas are generated through systematic scale shifting.

The study bridges Western and Indian musical scale theories.

Abstract

In the previous articles of this series, we have discussed the development of musical scales particularly that of the heptatonic scale which forms the basis of Western classical music today. In this last article, we take a look at the basic structure of scales used in Indian classical music and how different `raga's are generated through the simple process of scale shifting.