From Finding the Raga, which was published last month by New York Review Books.

1.

What is a raga? To answer this question we must first acquire a sense of what it isn’t. It isn’t a composition, though compositions are set to ragas. It isn’t a melody, in that a melody can be sung without preoccupations to do with form and shape; with a raga, the emergence during its exposition of its rupa—the features and shape that make it recognizable—is of primary importance. A raga is not a scale. It is not the sum total of its notes.…