teaching lineage · Rudra veena, Sitar, Sursringar
Rampur Senia lineage
The court lineage at Rampur that taught Allauddin Khan and others, and so stands behind much of modern instrumental music.
Rampur, Uttar Pradesh · 1 musicians documented
Gharanas & musical lineages
Hindustani music is taught person to person. Browse the traditions by voice, instrument or place, and open one to read who is documented within it.
About this guide
The names of these traditions — gharana, bani, teaching line, regional style — describe different things, and each entry says which it is. Where a teaching link is shown, a sentence in a named source supports it. Where it is not, we say so, and the claim stays unpublished.
This is growing research rather than a complete map. Not every instrument organises itself into gharanas, many musicians here do not yet have a page of their own, and dates, founders and teaching links are left out wherever a source has not yet settled them. Additions are read by an editor before they appear. Carnatic traditions are a later phase.
4 traditions
Showing 4 traditions
Dhrupad, been and pakhawaj traditions
The oldest surviving layer: dhrupad singing, the rudra veena that shadows it, and the pakhawaj that keeps its time. These pass down as banis and family lines rather than as city-named houses.
Instrumental gharanas and teaching lines
Sitar, sarod, bansuri, sarangi, shehnai, santoor, violin and harmonium. Some are full gharanas with their own baaj; others are teaching lines, where the transmission is documented but no house name is claimed.
gharana · Sitar, Sarod, Surbahar, Bansuri, Violin
Maihar (Senia-Maihar) gharana
The twentieth century's most far-reaching instrumental school: dhrupad-like alap, a strict practice regime, and students across several different instruments.
Maihar, Madhya Pradesh · 17 musicians documented
gharana · Sitar, Surbahar
Imdadkhani (Etawah) gharana
The sitar school that made the instrument sing: gayaki ang, drawn-out meend, and a family line of players over six generations.
Etawah, Uttar Pradesh · 12 musicians documented
teaching lineage · Sitar, Surbahar
Senia sitar lineage (Masitkhani baaj)
The older, dhrupad-leaning sitar line behind the Masitkhani gat: slow, weighty compositions and a plectrum style kept apart from the dominant twentieth-century schools.
Delhi, Jaipur · 6 musicians documented