references?

[vidya]

> 6. Why have accompanists low social status in the music community, like
> tabla and sarangi in Hindustani music?

This used to be the case, I suppose, in the past. It's not true any longer. 
The simple reason for low status is the fact that sons of dancers and 
courtesans would take to musical accompaniment as a profession, and the 
social hierarchy placed such people on a low status. In other words, the
low social status of accompanists in the past, is an effect of parentage. 
Though this is closely correlated with their profession, the mere fact of
being a sArangiya or a tabaliya is not causative of low social status. 

The current situation is very different. Tabla players like Zakir Hussain
and Swapan Chowdhary are almost glamorous cult figures in India now. In
fact their status is rather high nowadays, within Indian society. The
sarangi on the other hand is not a very popular instrument, and very few
people take to it. It has also slowly yielded place to the harmonium as
an accompaniment of choice for vocal music. If the sarangi is used in
Hindustani music nowadays, it is increasingly as a solo instrument, and less
as an accompaniment. 

S. Vidyasankar