just wondering if anyone here has ever played a sitar. i'm thinking of maybee renting one ( there's a place an hour from my city that will rent me one ). the sitar looks quite hard too play, does anyone have some information too give me? the guy at the store also talked about different kinds of sitars other then to normal kind from india that i'm thinking about, like a 40 string one from turkey... but by then i was to confused to understand anything he was saying, i'll have to pay him a visit. any help would be appriciated.
I play sitar, and its a most challenging instrument to play properly. Renting one would be a good way to get some time on one before the investment of getting your own. Mine is a standard sitar with two toomba, or gourds. Each sitar is a little different, I can only describe it as very high action on the fretboard. Even sitting with it properly is an exercise at first! But once you get past the basic sitting and pickings, oh what a sound it makes!
i tried once, it sounded like a mouse caught in the piano strings, i would get lessons, or a book at least
Yeah I play sitar, i havent played in a few months because i sold it. but in a few weeks im definitley getting back up on one. I took lessons with a student of ali Akbhar Khan. I think the hardest part of playing sitar is the Ragas, and Raga form... Classical northern indian music, is completely different than what we're all accustomed to hearing, there is subtle harmonies, and usage of micro tones, highly attuned structre, to best convay moods and feelings through sound, which india has been studing in depth for over 7000 years. rather than elements prominant in western music. A truly devout sitar player will give up everything else but sitar. Its a means in itself, but you have to be prepared to die not accomplishing it. Ali akhbar khans father, while practicing in 12 hour or more intervals would grow his hair enourmously long and tie it to the ceiling so that when he fell asleep it would pull and wake him up. That to me is the biggest hardship faced by westerners picking up the sitar, because of our highly scheduled lives there is not enough time for proper training. Although you can always fake it.. cause sitar sounds so good on its own. You can really have alot of fun with it, with just some basics... You might get bloddy fingers depending on how harsh your teacher is.... i used to play this exercise where we would play a chromatic scale... damn i cant remember the indian name for it, up the fret board two octaves and then back down, playing each note 8 times.. then we would play 7, and 6, and all the way to one. And we would play complex stroking patterns along with it, by hitting the chicari (^) strings like this. Sa ^^ Sa ^^ Sa ^, Re ^^ Re ^^ Re ^, Ga ^^ Ga ^^ Ga^ Etc. ( C, D, E ).... It was really hard... if you practice, man its awesome
well, the thing is, i'm not looking to devote myself to the sitar ( i already am to the saxophone ), i just wanna try something different. the probleme is, it's so different that i have to drive for an hour to find one, i probably won't find a teacher ( i would like to have a teacher to help me get started), i'm going to go over there and get a sitar next week, i'll try it out and come back to you guys, thanks.
All I can tell you is that I am crazy for Sitar classic music. I am capable of listenming to it for hours and hours. It relaxes me.
i bought one like a week ago and it's supposed to come today. i'm pretty sure it's a standard with 2 toomba...it comes with a book and i was wondering if that's enough to get the basics. i really don't think i have access to a teacher
that will get you started, at least give you a chance to get the picking and fingering practise! Hey, everyones gotta start somewhere. Good luck with it, and if you have any questions, post em up and we will do our best. I hear you about the teacher. My teacher now only plays harmonium and sings, so I dont get much in the way of in person watching. I played a local festival a couple years ago and got to jam with my first real tabla player, and had to make do till then.
