''Dhol Sagar'' ( Garhwali; literally "ocean of drumming") is an ancient Indian treatise on the art of playing the dhol damau, the folk instruments of the

Garhwal region Garhwal (IPA: /ɡəɽʋːɔɭ/) is one of the two administrative divisions of the Indian state of Uttarakhand. Lying in the Himalayas, it is bounded on the north by Tibet, on the east by Kumaon, on the south by Uttar Pradesh state, and on the ...

Uttarakhand Uttarakhand ( , or ; , ), also known as Uttaranchal ( ; List of renamed places in India, the official name until 2007), is a States and union territories of India, state in the North India, northern part of India. It is often referred to as t ...

. It does not exist in a complete printed form, as it was transmitted orally (through

percussive A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Excl ...

verses and

vocable In the broadest sense of the word, a vocable is any meaningful sound uttered by people, such as a word or term, that is fixed by their language and culture. Use of the words in the broad sense is archaic and the term is instead used for utterances ...

syllables) or empirically within the traditional drumming families. It is believed to have mythical origins and its existence has only been confirmed by local scholars and practitioners. The treatise contains

shlokas Shloka or śloka ( sa, श्लोक , from the root , Macdonell, Arthur A., ''A Sanskrit Grammar for Students'', Appendix II, p. 232 (Oxford University Press, 3rd edition, 1927). in a broader sense, according to Monier-Williams's dictionary, is ...

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominalization, nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cul ...

or Garhwali, and specific rhythm patterns for occasions like christening, wedding ceremonies, religious festivals,

shamanic rituals Shamanism is a religious practice that involves a practitioner (shaman) interacting with what they believe to be a spirit world through altered states of consciousness, such as trance. The goal of this is usually to direct spirits or spirit ...

, ritual dramas like '' Pandav Lila'', death rites etc. The players of ''Dhol Sagar'' traditionally belonged to particular musical caste groups such as ''auji'', ''bajgi'', ''das'' or ''dholi''. Either due to urban migration among the youth in the drumming families, the growing popularity of brass bands and

DJs A disc jockey, more commonly abbreviated as DJ, is a person who plays recorded music for an audience. Types of DJs include radio DJs (who host programs on music radio stations), club DJs (who work at a nightclub or music festival), mobile D ...

in villages, or the drummers' desire to disassociate themselves from a practice that was historically tied to their specific "low-

caste Caste is a form of social stratification characterised by endogamy, hereditary transmission of a style of life which often includes an occupation, ritual status in a hierarchy, and customary social interaction and exclusion based on cultural ...

", the unwritten ancient knowledge of ''Dhol Sagar'' faces the threat of being lost. Many traditional drummers have either given up the practice or have been driven out of work.

References

Bibliography

*{{cite book , last=Alter , first=Andrew , date=2014 , title=Mountainous Sound Spaces: Listening to History and Music in the Uttarakhand Himalayas , publisher=

Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press is the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by Henry VIII of England, King Henry VIII in 1534, it is the oldest university press in the world. It is also the King's Printer. Cambr ...

, isbn= 9789384463069 Drums Music theory Indian folk music Sanskrit texts Culture of Uttarakhand Garhwal division Indian folk culture