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In the early days of good bandwidth, and subsequently in the Covid years, individual gurus used platforms such as Zoom to connect with their students.
Hit brings you a list of some of the bigger institutional efforts to take Indian music—film, classical, and semi-classical—to students worldwide.
With gurus and students getting used to online pedagogy, systematic music education is now more accessible than ever before. The options are greater, and you don't always have to sign up for a long-term course.
Here are some options you can check out.
Artium Academy — artiumacademy.com
Sonu Nigam, K S Chithra, Shubha Mudgal and Aruna Sairam are on the board of Artium. The site offers courses in Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam film songs, as also in Karnatik and Western vocals. The instruments taught include the piano, guitar, tabla, and drums. The site is easy to navigate, and invites learners to try out its services with a free class. Artium offers offline classes in Chennai.
Fee: Ranges from Rs 800 to Rs 945 a class, and you pay for 12 classes at a time.
Shankar Mahadevan Academy — shankarmahadevanacademy.com
Founded by the popular Bollywood singer and composer Shankar Mahadevan, this academy has been around since 2010. It offers 600+ courses--a course could mean just one composition or raga. Besides Hindustani and Karnatik music, film music in Hindi and Tamil are among the courses you can take up.
Fee: Averages about Rs 1,000 a class.
Acharyanet — acharyanet.com
Developed by Chitravina N Ravikiran, it offers a systematic platform for Karnatik music with access to top gurus. Besides Karnatik and Hindustani classical music, it also offers lessons in mridangam, khanjira, violin, chitraveena, and other instruments.
Courses are taught by such well-known names as Madurai T N Seshagopalan, R K Srikantan, Trichy Sankaran, Tanjavur Shankara Iyer, P S Narayanaswamy, Chitravina N Ravikiran, Neyveli Santhanagopalan, Sriram Parasuram, Malladi Brothers, Rama Ravi, Prince Rama Varma and Sikkil Gurucharan.
Fee: Annual subscription that gives you access to recorded lessons is priced at Rs 10,000 for basic, 13,000 for intermediate, and Rs 14,000 for all-inclusive. If you have specific requests, or want one-on-one lessons, get in touch with them. Once you place a request, they get back to you within 24 hours to discuss schedules and learning options.
Darbar Academy — academy.darbar.org
Indian classical music is the focus, and the academy is based in the UK.
Fee: Encourages students to take up a monthly membership for live sessions. Students also get access to Darbar Player (a streaming archive of concerts and films) at a discounted 40 pounds for the first year.
Sharda.org — sharda.org
Based in Melbourne, Australia, it offers an archive of vocal, sitar, harmonium, and tabla tutorials, with some free content. The focus is on covering a set syllabus, and taking up exams. Certificates are issued by Akhil Bhartiya Gandharva Mahavidyalaya Mandal (ABGMVM).
Fee: Annual subscription is priced at 395 dollars, and a monthly subscription comes for 45.95 dollars.
IndianRaga — indianraga.com
This site is run by a group based in Boston, USA. IndianRaga offers online classical music and dance classes. Its focus is Karnatik. Hindustani music and its declared objective is to 'make classical cool'. The Raga Jam section encourages students to collaborate and produce music videos.
Fee: Their Raga Labs Academy (teaching arm) works on a subscription model. Best to check the site directly for current rates.
