ABSTRACT
MTVP is therefore the earliest known example of a detailed written notation that permits people to know precisely how pieces of drum music for the pakhavaj and tabla were to be played in the past. The significance of Gurudev’s drumming legacy comes into focus more sharply when people compare it with some other documents that preceded and followed it: early Urdu works such as the Sarmayah-i ‘Israt of Sadiq Ali Khan and the contemporaneous Risala Tabla Navazi of Muhammad Ishaq Dehlavi do not give the technical details of strokes and are often difficult to decipher rhythmically. It has already been established that tabla thekas are accentual patterns made up of strokes superimposed on clapping patterns with varying degrees of compatibility: for example, jhaptal theka was seen to have a high degree of compatibility with its tal structure and ektal theka relatively little compatibility.
