Tradition and Transition: The Performing Arts in Medieval North India

Abstract

The performing arts in medieval India kept pace with changing socio- cultural environment and patronage patterns. This led to the synthesi sation of Indian and Turko-Persian performance practices at the court as well as folk levels and the emergence of a common music culture from the thirteenth century. New musical forms emerged, even as tra ditional genres remained in vogue. The medieval centuries witnessed fluctuations in the fortunes of several performance forms and their practitioners. The qawwāls became repositories of synthesised Indo- Persian traditions, but theatre artistes suffered neglect through most of the period. The eighteenth century, however, became the century of the courtesans. Lucknow in the nineteenth century turned into a dynamic centre of experimentation. A new scenario began to take shape after the traumatic events of 1857.