By mixing Carnatic and Hindustani, Mysore’s kings helped create a unique body of music

They inhabited altogether different musical worlds: the great Gauhar Jaan, with the high drama of her life as a singer-courtesan in the north, and Veena Sheshanna, the mighty veena stalwart and elite musician of the early 20th century Mysore court.

What could possibly connect them? Nearly a half century of cultural confluence between Carnatic and Hindustani styles at the erstwhile Mysore court, says Geetha Ramanand, veena exponent and a keen music researcher.

For over three decades Ramanand worked as a broadcaster, producing features for the All India Radio. One of her explorations throws light on the unexpected interconnections that sprang up between Hindustani and Carnatic music in the early decades of the 20th century at the Mysore durbar.

Of these connections, one of the most fascinating is how short instrumental compositions from the north – naghmas and dhuns – found their way into Carnatic music, thanks to experimentation by the fabled vainika vaggeyakaras (veena players and composers) attached to the court. That is how Gauhar Jaan’s Mere dard-e-jigar in raga Jhinjhoti, pressed into shellac in 1905, found its way into Sheshanna’s compilation of short veena compositions. As did Zohrabai Agrewali’s superb Naina tore rasile, also set in Jhinjhoti.

“He brought in a variety of laya patterns unlike the original, where the emphasis...

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