The Brown Indian Band was formed by bass player

Bass Player

Bass player can refer to:*Bass Player , an album by Rhombus*Bass Player , a magazine for bassists*Bassist, or bass player, a musician who plays the bass guitar...

 Colin D'Cruz and features accomplished Indian classical

Indian classical music

The origins of Indian classical music can be found in the Vedas, which are the oldest scriptures in the Hindu tradition. Indian classical music has also been significantly influenced by, or syncretised with, Indian folk music and Persian music. The Samaveda, one of the four Vedas, describes music...

 musicians, in concert with jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 musicians.

Overview

Indian classical is similar to jazz as they are both forms of improvised music. Whereas Indian classical is linear

Linear

In mathematics, a linear map or function f is a function which satisfies the following two properties:* Additivity : f = f + f...

 and uses just one scale (rāga

Raga

A raga is one of the melodic modes used in Indian classical music.It is a series of five or more musical notes upon which a melody is made...

) to improvise within a composition

Musical composition

Musical composition can refer to an original piece of music, the structure of a musical piece, or the process of creating a new piece of music. People who practice composition are called composers.- Musical compositions :...

, jazz has a much broader palette for musical improvisation, where multiple scales can be used to improvise through complex harmonies. Indian classical music, however, has some of the world's most complex rhythm

Rhythm

Rhythm may be generally defined as a "movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions." This general meaning of regular recurrence or pattern in time may be applied to a wide variety of cyclical natural phenomena having a periodicity or...

 structures and subtle quarter tone

Quarter tone

A quarter tone , is a pitch halfway between the usual notes of a chromatic scale, an interval about half as wide as a semitone, which is half a whole tone....

s that takes its sound far beyond the realms of the twelve tone

Twelve-tone technique

Twelve-tone technique is a method of musical composition devised by Arnold Schoenberg...

 scale.

The Brown Indian Band uses the best of both styles of musical improvisation to create a very funky sound of world music

World music

World music is a term with widely varying definitions, often encompassing music which is primarily identified as another genre. This is evidenced by world music definitions such as "all of the music in the world" or "somebody else's local music"...

. The band has floating personnel that very often features visiting international jazz artists.