Indian music is very different from music in the west, and it is difficult for westerners to appreciate it without much study and listening. The main difference is that harmony does not exist in Indian music, while in western music it occupies a central position.
Indian music has two basic elements, the tala, and the raga. Tala is the rhythm, and works on a system of beats. Raga is the melody, and just as there are a number of set talas, so there are also quite a few basic ragas.
The classical Indian music group consists of three musicians who provide the drone, the melody and the rhythm. The three musicians are basically soloists - because there is no harmony, there is no reason for the players to harmonize, so each musician chooses their own raga and tala, and follows it, sometimes coming together with the other musicians for a short time before diverging again.
The violinist Yehudi Menuhin has spent a long time studying Indian music. He suggests that the music provides an analogy for Indian society: a group of individuals not working together, but sometimes meeting at a common point. Western music is more like western democratic society, with a group of individuals (an orchestra) who each give up a little of their individuality for the harmony of the whole.
The best known Indian musical instruments are the sitar and the tabla. Ravi Shankar plays the sitar, and is probably the most famous Indian musician outside India. The sitar is a long, stringed instrument, on which the soloist plays the raga. The tabla is a pair of small kettle-drums which are played with the fingers. They provide the tala.
