Statistical Approach to Style Characterization of the Trinity of Carnatic Music

This book, designed for an international audience, offers a comprehensive glossary of music terms with a focus on Indian music, which traces its roots to the Vedas. Using a wealth of compositions, it explores the statistical approach to analysing the styles of the Trinity of Carnatic music. Key topics such as notes, ragas, talas, ornamentation, and the limitations in analysing gamakas are included. The study methods are clearly outlined, shedding light on sonant-consonance relationships and explaining why Shannon’s entropy is neither a style nor raga characteristic. The text discusses periodicity in variograms and the hole effect due to variations / sangathis. It demonstrates that Indian music, adhering to the Markov property, is neither entirely deterministic nor random. New methods are introduced to quantify determinism and define convolute scales’ ascent and descent, including substitutability analysis. This is a pioneering work with “originality”, a good reference book opening up new avenues for research in comparative music.