In person
Private lessons
One teacher, one student, one instrument each
- Regular lessons, where geography and touring allow.
- Compositions dictated phrase by phrase and repeated until secure.
- Instrument set-up and maintenance addressed as needed.
Teaching
Teaching
Instruction in the sarod and in the music it carries, after the manner in which it was received
Philosophy
What is taught, and why in this order
Arnab Chakrabarty learnt over decades, in the traditional way, from Prof. Kalyan Mukherjea, Ustad Irfan Muhammad Khan and Pandit Buddhadev Dasgupta. He teaches as he was taught: slowly, by the composition, and with the expectation that the student will remember.
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The bandish as blueprint
A composition is not a tune to be recited before the improvisation begins. It is a live ideational blueprint: it holds the raga’s grammar, its characteristic turns and its rhythmic intent, and the elaboration that follows is answerable to it.
Lessons therefore begin with the bandish, learnt exactly, and proceed to what may legitimately be derived from it.
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Custodianship of repertoire
Having absorbed nearly the entire compositional and stylistic repertoire of the Lucknow and Bengal branches of the Shahjahanpur Gharana, he holds several hundred compositions from these lineages, including many rarely heard today.
A student is not merely taught these; he or she is made responsible for them, with their attributions, variants and proper tempi.
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Technique in its place
Facility is necessary and is drilled accordingly: right-hand stroke patterns, left-hand stopping with the nail, meend, clean taans at speed. But technique is subordinate to the music, never a spectacle in itself.
A fast passage that says nothing about the raga is, in this room, simply a wrong one.
Formats
How lessons are arranged
Three forms of study. Schedules, frequency and fees are agreed individually once an application has been read.
Online
Lessons by video call
The same method, across time zones
- Scheduled lessons for students wherever they live.
- Lessons may be recorded by the student, by arrangement.
- Practice recordings may be sent between lessons, by arrangement.
Intensive
Concentrated study
Several consecutive days on a defined subject
- One raga, one body of compositions, or one technical problem, studied in depth.
- Individual or for a small group, by arrangement.
- Suited to students who already have a regular teacher.
Who it is for
Students, and what is expected of them
For
- Serious students of the sarod, at any stage, who intend to keep at it.
- Players of other instruments, sitar, violin, guitar, winds, who want the repertoire and the grammar of raga from an instrumentalist.
- Vocalists interested in compositions of the instrumental tradition and in how raga is built.
- Advanced learners and performers seeking rare ragas or particular compositions of the Lucknow and Bengal lineages.
Expected
- Daily practice. The amount will be discussed; its regularity will not.
- Patience with slow beginnings. A composition is learnt correctly before it is learnt quickly.
- Memory. Notation may assist; it does not substitute.
- Candour about what one does and does not know. Applications are read with that in mind.
Application
Apply to study
Tell us plainly where you are in your study. Every application is read, and a reply follows by email.
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