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RĀGĀKIT
Midnight · Meditative · Hindustani, midnight
Malkauns
Meditation, introspection
MIDI files
Files are in Sa = C and loop on whole bars. Drag them onto a track in your DAW. The WAV uses the instrument you picked above. Free to use in your releases, royalty-free.
Plays the raga's ascent (aroha) and descent (avaroha), which often skip or zigzag through notes. Tap any key to hear it.
Good to know
One of the oldest ragas, known as Malav-Kaushik in older texts.
Five notes, with no Re and no Pa. Its Carnatic twin is Hindolam.
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One of the six principal ragas in the old raga-ragini family system.
A 5-note raga, called audav in classical terms.
Grouped under the Bhairavi thaat, one of the ten parent scales of Hindustani music (some traditions place it under Asavari).
Spotted a mistake? Corrections from musicians are very welcome in the feedback box below.
Movement
Aroha (up)
SgMdnSC E♭ F A♭ B♭ C
Avaroha (down)
SndMgSC B♭ A♭ F E♭ C
Notes of Malkauns
Sargam
S
g
M
d
n
S
Western
C
E♭
F
A♭
B♭
C
Solfège
do
me
fa
le
te
do
Pakad
gMdMgMgS
E♭ F A♭ F E♭ F E♭ C
The pakad is the raga's catch-phrase: hear it and you know the raga. Use it as a hook or riff. The MIDI gives you the notes and shape; musicians add slides (meend) and ornaments between the notes, so add your own bends and feel.
Practice singing
RāgāKit sings each note in sargam (Sa, Re, Ga, Ma…), then listens while you sing it back. Turn on the Drone for a steady Sa, and use headphones if you can. Your voice is analysed on this device only: nothing is recorded or sent.
–
flat
sharp
Sing any note…
Chords that fit
Every chord uses only this raga's notes. Ragas are traditionally played over a drone, so these are for fusion, film and accompaniment. Tap a chord to hear it.
Home chords: they contain Sa, so they sit best under the melody
Other chords for movement
Why these chords fit
Every chord is built only from the raga's own notes (for example Fm = Ma – komal Dha – Sa), so it won't clash with the melody.
Malkauns leaves out Re and Pa, so chords that need those notes aren't offered. Without Pa, no chord sits squarely on Sa: the drone holds Sa, and the home chords are the ones that contain it. Where a major or minor chord doesn’t fit, a sus chord stands in.
Its altered notes are komal Ga, komal Dha and komal Ni. Chords that contain them (E♭sus4 and B♭sus4) carry the raga's colour: use them for mood, then return to a home chord.
Home chords contain Sa, so they agree with the tanpura drone and feel settled. The others move away from Sa and pull back toward home, which is what makes a loop feel like it's going somewhere.
A simple loop to start:Fm → E♭sus4 → B♭sus4 → Fm
Fusion: genres that fit
Suggested from the raga's notes and mood. Start here, then break the rules.
AmbientFree or 60–80 BPM
Long pads on Sa and Pa, lots of reverb, a few notes at a time.
Melodic techno122–130 BPM
A hypnotic 1-bar loop from the pakad, filtered over a long build.
Trip-hop80–95 BPM
Slow broken beats, dark bass, a sampled-sounding sitar line.
Rhythms to try
Taals that suit this raga. Hear them and download the beat as MIDI.
Tell me what helped and what's missing. It goes straight to the person building this and stays private. It's anonymous: no name or email needed. Want news of new ragas and packs? Use the email sign-up at the bottom of the page.
Sa is set to C. Lowercase sargam (r g d n) means komal or flat; M' means tivra or sharp Ma. Solfège uses movable do, so do is always Sa. A dot below a note means the lower octave; a dot above means the upper octave.