Man With Sign, March 26, 02026
It's threatening to rain this morning, and I grab my white plastic poncho just in case on the wy out the door. As it turns out, it's not needed. The weather, while moist, refrains from dropping anything on me. I reach Roosevelt Circle at 7:32 and set up my equipment, then lean on the railing while holding up THINK IN EONS — ACT NOW! No Craige again today.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S79ruOVzEZU
#ClimateChaos #GlobalWarming #HindustaniMusic #CitizenActivism
Aside from the get-a-job guy twirling his finger at his temple, and two men in a sedan who yell "VOTE TRUMP!", the other responses are very friendly. Lots of waves and smiles; the plea for temporal literacy I'm offering somehow seems to strike a chord with the morning commute today. Maybe I'm imagining it? I slept better last night and although I'm still fatigued I feel much better.
2/
In keeping with the week's theme of "scattered technical exercises with no clear goal," I decide to build the morning's practice around an augmented triad. Starting by singing the arpeggio itself: C, E, Ab, C, flexing over two octaves and a sixth (the high C isn't cooperating today). The symmetrical structure established, I begin adding ornamental tones.
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First, a whole step above each chord tone, creating a pattern (in sargam): SRS, GM#G, dnd, etc. Then a whole step below: SnS, GRG, dM#d, etc. I continue building variations on these structures over the course of the hour, some of the time singing semitones above & below, sometimes mixing both whole- and half-steps to create more intricate chromatic forms.
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These exercises are interesting beyond their rather abstract musical content. The Hindustani melismatic approach is meant to serve the needs of scalar music in which most activity involves adjacent tones — but steady streams of chromatic sequences are very uncommon. It requires very carefully focused attention to keep the intervallic positions in mind while singing these lines on an open vowel.
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The sargam syllables offer a different sort of challenge, because it is also quite rare for natural and altered intervals to be sung in direct sequence (this can be heard in Kedar- and Lalit-ang ragas on the fourth scale degree, in Malhar- and Bahar-ang raags on the seventh, and on the third in some treatments of Jog...so it's definitely a thing, but still uncommon).
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Anyway, the augmented exercises are technical in nature and not particularly evocative of a mood or "rasa," as would be the case in most Hindustani practice. This is an aesthetic distinction, and one worth noting. I like abstraction for its own sake and wouldn't mind spending time with some Slonimskian chromatics even if they're not emotionally evocative.
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At 8:26 I make a video, then sing through the hour, break down, pack up, head out, for a day with fewer external demands than yesterday, which was uncomfortably full of teaching and responsibilities. I've got the usual resistance chores, a few students, and some video editing to do today, but there's some welcome down time as well.
8/
We are planning to be part of Saturday's big "No Kings III" demonstration, most likely heading into Boston for the gathering on the Common. I know people who've never protested before who are planning on participating, and that's a hopeful sign. To change everything, we need everybody — and the current state of affairs is spiraling out of control. This can't go on.
See you tomorrow.
Man With Sign
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Warren Senders