Since the beginning of the second half of the twentieth century, the harmonium has been the instrument used most often to accompany singers. The following section explores the strategies that harmonium accompanists have developed to turn their much-criticised instrument into a suitable medium of melodic accompaniment. An examination of recordings of selected ornaments which are especially relevant to the vocal style provides answers. No attempt is made to judge how convincing the respective techniques are; the singer`s general acceptance is sufficient judgement.

Ornaments in Harmonium
An accompanying instrument is supposed to shadow the human voice. This formulation has nearly become a lexical expression; the accompanying instrument is supposed to follow the solo voice as closely as possible, without rivalling it. The intended overall sound ideal is an imitative heterophony between subordinate accompanist and instructive singing voice. The accompanying instrument is, moreover, supposed to "fill in" breathing and other pauses of the singer, thus bridging short periods of time by means of musical ideas that have been provided earlier in the piece by the soloist. When a harmonium is being used, the critical point in this dependency of accompanist on soloist is that technically, the soloist`s "master pattern" and the accompanist`s reproduction thereof have to be rendered in quick succession. This is crucial only when the musical detail in question is a key element of the respective raga that is being performed; otherwise, musical freedom provides ample space for the musician to revert to musical alternatives. In case the melodic idea that is to be imitated by the accompanist is particularly challenging for the harmonium and cannot be imitated faithfully, the temporal proximity of the ideal (vocal) original and the possibly imperfect (harmonium) copy might reinforce the notion that the harmonium is perhaps not the ideal solution. The popularity and intensive use of the harmonium, however, contradict this inference; on the contrary, the appreciation that it receives suggests that measured by its function, the harmonium`s capabilities are satisfactory, and the instrument contributes to the flow of a raga performance. This means that harmonium players must have found effective ways to overcome black-and-white contrasts such as suitable unsuitable by finding musical compromises.

There are several other musical instruments that are being used in contemporary India that pose comparable challenges. If they have mostly been imported rather than developed solely on Indian soil, they do not all derive from the European cultural area: the guitar, the saxophone and others come to mind, but particularly the santur, and in a sense also the sitar, which in recent centuries advanced to being one of the main instruments of Indian solo music. In the case of the sitar, the difficulties that had to be overcome were less obtrusive, but the situation with the santur is directly comparable to that of the harmonium. The tendency to musically exploit an imported musical instrument`s potential by taking it further than this had commonly been done in the originating culture, thus, is evident not only in connection with the harmonium.