Gamakas are central to the distinctive sound of Indian classical music — especially in Carnatic music. They include expressive oscillations, glides between notes, grace notes, and microtonal inflections.
The notes of a scale may begin to describe a raga, but this alone is not sufficient: a raga is brought to life through the appropriate gamakas for each note, along with phrases characteristic of that raga.
Some gamakas are essential to a raga’s identity, while others are chosen by the musician based on expressive intent, musical style, or tempo.
Though often translated as “ornamentation,” gamakas are far more integral to Carnatic music than that term implies.

The extensive use of gamakas in Carnatic music prompted questions of feasibility as well as expressiveness, in composing a highly contrapuntal piece.
Gamakas incorporate neighboring pitches into the playing of a note — and in a fugue, where multiple melodies unfold simultaneously, the presence of gamakas in each melody can result in several notes being heard beyond those explicitly written.

Might this blur the harmonic progressions shaped by counterpoint? Could it disrupt the balance of dissonance and consonance?
Or would the combination of multiple gamakas add richness and intricacy to the contrapuntal texture, enhancing rather than obscuring it?

Navigating these trade-offs was part of working at the intersection of the two traditions — especially when composing the individual Carnatic melodic lines that combine in counterpoint.

In Carnatic music, variety of musical ideas is prized — both as a way to showcase creativity and to explore the possibilities of a raga. This is especially apparent in improvisational sections. 

But even in a precomposed form like a kriti, there is room for expressive variety, both in the composition itself and in how musicians elaborate on it.

By contrast, in Western classical music, focused development of a small number of motifs is valued as a way to provide coherence –– particularly in a structured form like the fugue. 

A short motif is often spun out in many ways, including transposition, inversion, or augmentation, to create and unify a larger piece of music.

This contrast posed a compositional choice: how to balance the use of melodic variety with the focus on a few motifs — a less obvious aspect of blending these traditions. This choice point occurs despite the fact that both fugue and kriti forms are based on elaborations of an initial phrase.

The fugue-kriti leans more toward the traditional fugue model, employing motivic restraint. A few core motifs are developed and transformed to form the basis of later melodic material. Nevertheless, the variations and free counterpoint provide latitude to adapt to the phrasing and expressiveness of the raga.

The concerto-kriti, by contrast, incorporates a broader range of melodic ideas.
One way this breadth of ideas is conveyed is through a series of interludes set between the kriti’s sangathis (statements of the theme and its variations).

The harmonic progressions in this music were created entirely from each raga’s notes. These ragas use scales that differ significantly from the Western major and minor scales, which form the harmonic foundation of Baroque counterpoint and fugues, and tonal classical music more broadly.

I nevertheless chose to draw on the well-developed principles of tonal harmony, but adapted them to the modal nature of the ragas. For instance, I had to navigate the absence of a leading tone — a fundamental element of tonal harmony — in all the ragas I used.
The resulting chord progressions, built from each raga’s scale, follow their own internal harmonic logic, yielding an adapted functional harmony specific to each raga.
The outcome is a blend of tonal and modal harmonic ideas, occasionally supplemented by coloristic, non-functional harmony.

The particular notes of a raga can also open up distinctive harmonic possibilities. For example, the main theme of the concerto-kriti’s first movement prominently features augmented sixth chords — a consequence of that raga’s scale.

Another consideration is the pull of alternate tonal centers, rather than the primary tonic. At times, this is used deliberately to create harmonic ambiguity.

At other times, I had to find ways to counteract the unintended pull of a secondary center that could overshadow the tonic — especially in the absence of the tambura, which in Carnatic music provides a continuous reference to the tonic. For example, some of the ragas I used include a raised fourth scale degree, which creates a strong pull toward the dominant.

Western classical music is unusual in that it does not use a percussion instrument to mark the meter. Instead, percussion instruments are generally used to punctuate the music and for specific impact. Composers create a sense of meter through methods such as harmonic choice and rhythm, note accents and specific orchestration on strong beats, melodic phrase structure, and repeated figures like ostinatos.

I’ve chosen this approach for the fugue-kriti, where the fugue subject’s repeated entries also reinforce the meter. In the second half of the concerto-kriti, I introduce the mridangam, the principal rhythmic accompaniment in a Carnatic concert. Unlike its normal concert role, the mridangam here serves more as rhythmic counterpoint than a constant pulse, and contributes to the interplay between instruments. Its sonorous tone also provides emphasis at key points.

The Indian instruments featured are core to Carnatic music: the Carnatic violin (a standard violin, tuned and held differently and played in the Carnatic style), the Saraswati veena (an ancient instrument central to Indian culture), Carnatic flute (a bamboo transverse flute), and mridangam (a percussion instrument with two differently sized drumheads).

I chose the principal Western instruments for the concerto — trumpet and harp — for the way their timbre complements the Indian instruments and supports the musical narrative.

While the traditional orchestral families (strings, woodwinds, brass) are included in the concerto, their role is relatively restrained, allowing the soloists and their interaction to remain central. 

The string sections — including in the fugue — often provide a harmonic bed of long, sustained chords, evoking the continuous resonance of the tambura in Carnatic music.