1. The scene opens on a fusion piece at its crescendo. Four children are playing in Iqbal’s room, whose walls carry posters of the flute players Pandit Hariprasad Chaurasia and Shashank Subramanyam.
2. They wind up the rehearsal and begin packing their instruments. Shruti wears a look of distress.
3. Iqbal reads out a newspaper line from the Parbatpuri Daily Clarion praising Shruti’s recent performance with her father.
4. The boys tease her and ask her to throw a party, but she stays lost in her thoughts. They finally have to shout her name to startle her.
5. Avinash realises she still hasn’t told her father about the concert.
6. Shruti explains her fear: her father would treat playing the violin to Western tunes as a desecration, and firmly believes only Hindustani classical music, with its ragas and aalaaps, is worth an artist’s time.
7. She insists she does respect his opinions — she simply wants to try something new and doesn’t know how to say it.
8. The three friends encourage her: he is her father, he will understand; the worst that can happen is a little scolding; he will eventually come round.
9. Shruti decides it is time to bite the bullet and promises to bring it up at dinner that night.

1. After dinner, Shruti is still staring at her last bite, lost in thought. Her parents gently tease her.
2. She gathers courage and asks her father not to get angry. Nabin refuses to promise anything but tells her to speak.
3. She mentions a concert next week. Nabin immediately says no — his rule is one performance every six months, because familiarity breeds contempt.
4. He objects to a group performance as well: drowning one’s individual style in the hubbub of an orchestra is not a wise choice.
5. Shruti admits, timidly, that it is an Indo-Western fusion concert. There is silence.
6. Nabin is deeply hurt. He says he never expected any student — let alone his own child — to lose their sense of musicality like this, and that his views on fusion music have been iterated in the house many times.
7. Shruti pleads with him to attend just one practice before deciding. He answers with a mocking remark about ‘phoo’ music and walks out.
8. Leela scolds Shruti for getting into all this without her father’s knowledge. Shruti admits she should have asked him, and fears all their practice will go down the drain.
9. Shruti apologises and promises never to hide anything again. Her mother sends her off to bed.

1. At Iqbal’s house again. The friends want to begin practice before hearing Shruti’s news.
2. In an aside, Shruti tells the audience she loves playing this piece and plans to practise one last time before telling the group she cannot join the performance.
3. Midway through the piece, her parents enter quietly and stand in a corner. Slowly they become engrossed; her father even taps his feet.
4. The moment it ends they walk forward clapping. Nabin claps furiously, wearing an expression of pride.
5. He praises the group and tells Shruti she never once lost sight of the notes of the raga. Leela jokes that their “practice classes” have clearly been successful.
6. Nabin offers the children the music room, where they will have more equipment and can practise regularly.
7. Shruti steps aside with her parents. She thanks them and promises to always take her art seriously.
8. Nabin admits it was Leela who opened his eyes — he had forgotten his own past — and tells Shruti to thank her mother instead.
9. Leela reveals the family secret: Nabin came from a family of vocalists and had to go against their wishes to play the violin, an instrument not yet part of classical Indian music then. His father saw it as a betrayal of tradition, but Nabin worked his fingers to the bone.
10. Nabin admits he underestimated the strength of their own music and feared losing Shruti. He now trusts her and will root for the group at the concert. Shruti hugs both her parents. Curtain down.

• Iqbal reads the newspaper line. The praise that should have delighted Shruti only deepens her guilt — it shows how heavy her father’s name sits on her.
• “It’s an Indo-Western fusion concert.” Followed by silence on stage. The one word fusion changes the whole mood of Act II.
• The tapping foot. Before Nabin says a single word of approval, his body has already surrendered to the music. Music convinces him where argument failed.
• Leela’s revelation. The father who forbids rebellion was once a rebel himself. This single fact dissolves the entire conflict.
• The proverb Nabin quotes at the end.

Every bay has its own wind blowing over it — meaning every artist has their own path and style. One rule cannot fit every person. With this line Nabin gives Shruti the freedom he once had to fight for.

Shruti Sharma

• Talented — praised in the newspaper; performs the raga notes flawlessly even in a fusion piece.
• Torn between duty and passion — she loves fusion music but does not want to hurt her father.
• Respectful, not rebellious — she is even ready to give up the concert rather than defy him.
• Honest in the end — she admits her mistake and promises never to hide things again.

Guru Nabin Sharma

• Strict and principled — one performance every six months; art before applause.
• Rigid at first — dismisses fusion as noise and even mocks it.
• Capable of change — hears the music, remembers his own past and admits his fears were baseless.
• Generous once convinced — offers his music room and promises to cheer for the group.

Leela Devi

• Warm and witty — lightens the tense dinner with humour.
• Fair — scolds Shruti for hiding the truth, yet defends her right to choose.
• The real bridge — she is the one who reminds Nabin of his own struggle. Without her, there is no happy ending.

The three friends

• Two kinds of music — Hindustani classical and Western, which come together in the fusion piece.
• Two generations — the father’s melody and the daughter’s melody, finally playing together instead of against each other.
• Two identical journeys — Nabin once broke away from a family of vocalists to play the violin; Shruti now breaks away from pure classical to play fusion. The same tune, one generation apart.
• ‘Twin’, not ‘rival’ — the title tells us in advance that the two melodies belong together.

• Tradition vs modernity — and finally, tradition with modernity.
• The generation gap — parent and child value the same art but express it differently.
• Duty to family vs personal passion — Shruti’s internal conflict runs through all three acts.
• Honest communication — almost every problem in the play is caused by not talking, and solved by talking.
• The role of a mother — quiet mediation can do what confrontation cannot.
• Cultural diversity — the four young musicians come from different backgrounds and make one piece of music.
• Art keeps evolving — the violin itself was once ‘foreign’ to Indian classical music. Today’s innovation is tomorrow’s tradition.

Idioms & phrases

Aside

A theatrical device where a character speaks directly to the audience. The other characters on stage are understood to be unaware of it. It lets us hear what a character truly thinks or feels. Shruti uses one in Act III to tell us she plans to withdraw from the concert.

How a play script is written

• No inverted commas — the speaker’s name already tells us who is talking.
• A colon (:) after the speaker’s name introduces the words of the speaker.
• Brackets (parentheses) carry stage directions — how the words are to be delivered, e.g. (a little loudly), (calmly but firmly), (getting up). They are never spoken aloud; they do the job a reporting verb does in prose.
• Ellipsis (…) shows a short pause or hesitation for dramatic effect.
• Italics are used for scene descriptions and actions.

Non-lexical fillers

Words or sounds such as uh, um, err, hmmm, ahem-ahem, whew, arrgh that fill pauses while a speaker gathers their thoughts or moves between ideas. In the play we hear Ahem ahem and I … er … — they make the dialogue sound natural and real.

A. Exclamatory sentences in reported speech

Sentences like Oh, how much I enjoy this! or Wah, how soulful! are exclamatory — they express sudden strong feeling.

1. Replace said with exclaimed, or exclaimed with (joy / wonder / sorrow). Other useful verbs: applauded, praised, pitied, urged.
2. Remove the interjection (Oh, Wow, Wah, Bravo, Alas).
3. Remove the exclamation mark and the quotation marks.
4. Add the linking word that, then change pronouns and tense as usual.

B. Phrasal verbs

A phrasal verb has two parts — a verb plus a preposition or adverb. Together they carry a completely new meaning. For example, pull means to move something and through means from one side to the other, but pull through means to succeed in doing something very difficult.

C. Stress and intonation

Where you place the stress changes the meaning a line carries. Stressing don’t and do in the same sentence highlights a contrast; a gentle tone that rises at the end signals sincerity or curiosity; a steady, thoughtful pitch suits a philosophical line.

Summary

The poet describes what music means to her. She compares it to an ocean that draws her in like a tide pulling towards the shore, and to a rhythm that stirs her deeply — right to her core.

When she is unhappy, music becomes her therapy: it eases the ache, lifts her spirits and gives her the strength to pull through. And when she looks back at her happiest moments, she finds music was always present in them. In the end she calls music the friend she needs — the one that stays when no one else seems to care.

Poetic devices

Emotion words from the unit

A poem by Walter de la Mare, given at the end of the unit for reading and enjoyment.

• Each stanza begins the same way — when music sounds — so the poem is built on repetition.
• Stanza 1: the familiar earth seems to vanish, and everything lovely on it grows lovelier still; flowers seem to blaze and trees lift their heavy branches in a kind of ecstasy.
• Stanza 2: naiads — water nymphs said to live in rivers, springs and waterfalls — appear to rise from the water, so beautiful that they dim the poet’s waking sight.
• Stanza 3: music restores the poet to all that he once was, before he came to this dusty, brooding world; the swift hours seem to break into distant song.
• Idea: music has the power to transform reality — it makes the ordinary world magical and returns us to our truest self.

• The Recycled Orchestra of Cateura, Paraguay, formed in 2012, makes musical instruments out of junk and discarded waste. Children are part of it, playing instruments built from scrap collected from landfills.
• The yazh is an ancient Indian stringed instrument — an earlier form of the veena. Its stem tip is shaped like the head of a mythological animal, and it comes in varieties named after the peacock and other forms.
• Indigenous instruments are crafted from natural materials such as bamboo, gourds, animal hides and shells, reflecting a deep connection with the environment and cultural heritage.
• Raga Chikitsa, an ancient text, describes the healing properties of music. A seventeenth-century work, Sangita Sudha, records the effects of music on emotions.
• Everything in nature has a rhythm or sound vibration — even the human heartbeat. Indian classical music is built on seven swaras (notes).
• 21 June is celebrated as World Music Day.
• Two celebrated Indian flute players are named in the play — Pandit Hariprasad Chaurasia and Shashank Subramanyam.

• Play: Twin Melodies by Mitra Phukan — three acts, ends with Curtain Down
• Shruti = violinist · Nabin = father, violinist, Principal of Sangeetika Music School · Leela = mother
• Band: Iqbal (flute) · Avinash (tabla) · Peter (keyboard) · Shruti (violin)
• Act I — rehearsal at Iqbal’s room; friends push Shruti to speak; she decides to bite the bullet
• Act II — dinner table; Nabin refuses, mocks fusion, walks out; Leela scolds Shruti for hiding it
• Act III — parents watch the rehearsal, are won over; Nabin offers the music room and promises to root for them
• The secret: Nabin himself defied a family of vocalists to take up the violin
• Key proverb: “Each bay, its own wind” — every artist has their own path
• Poem: A Friend Found in Music by Bryanna T. Perkins — 3 stanzas, rhyme scheme ABCB, metaphors: ocean, rhythm, therapy, friend
• Extra poem: Music by Walter de la Mare — music transforms the world