Perception of Similarity and Dissimilarity in Hindustani Classical Music

Musicians trained in the Hindustani classical music tradition are usually able to identify the group to which a specific raga belongs. While such classifications make sense in the context of formal musical constructs, it is also essential to examine if there is a perceptual root to such classification. Two studies were conducted under this head. In the first study, musically untrained listeners were asked to group twelve music clips rendered in alaap and madhya laya belonging to two thaats/ragangs and provide descriptions of similarities between the clips in each group. In the second study, an interview was conducted with trained musicians in the Hindustani Classical music tradition to examine the classification parameters used by them. The findings of the first study revealed that untrained listeners were not able to classify the ragas correctly. Similarity judgments between clips were motivated by surface features, whereas trained musicians based their classification on features do not directly fit into the categories of deep features as theorized in Western music. Results suggest that Indian lay listeners use many similar surface features like Western lay listeners, and Indian classification traditions seem to embed deep musical and cultural components unavailable to lay listeners.