HISTORY OF HINDUSTANI MUSIC
Hindustani classical music is the Hindustani or erstwhile North Indian style of Indian classical music. It is a tradition that originated in Vedic ritual chants and has been evolving from the 12th century CE, in what are now northern India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan, and also Nepal and Afghanistan, and is today one of the two parts of Indian classical music, with the other one being Carnatic music, which represents the music of South India.
Hindustani, presently represented by the official languages
of India and Pakistan, Standard Hindi and Urdu, originated during the Mughal Empire, when the Persian court language exerted a strong influence on the Indic dialects of central India, creating Rekhta or "mixed" speech. It is this which came to be known as Hindustani, was elevated to a literary language, and is the basis for modern standard Hindi and Urdu. Although these official languages are distinct registers in their formal aspects, such as modern technical vocabulary, they continue to be all but indistinguishable in their vernacular forms.
