First appeared in www.scroll.in on February 14, 2015. Basant Bahar, a compound melodic structure that incorporates phrases from the raags Basant and Bahar, is a vital presence in the spring soundscape of northern India. As is the case with many compound raags, Basant Bahar has compositions that bring in different colours of the constituent raags by displaying segments of each in separate lines of the song-text or by bringing in a quick succession of phrases of both raags in