a. To start with, I would like to mention that all the surbahar recitals that I have heard hitherto, have been played with alap, jod and jhala. These surbahar players did not play gats at all. To name a few, Ustad Imdad Khan (Jaunpuri record), Ustad Enayet Khan (several Surbahar records), Ustad Mushtaq Ali Khan (Puriya full national program) – no gats. Even Ustad Vilayat Khan, Ustad Imrat Khan or Shri Pushparaj Koshti did not play any gats. Some of them played gats on the sitar as a follow-up.
b. Hence, to play gats on surbahar is a concept unknown to me. However, if we wish to play gats within the surbahar recital– as have been played with Been / veena, we could think about a little modification and follow the been pattern (with pakhawaj accompaniment).
c. Dhrupad bandishes (not gats) played with Been follow the dhrupad idiom – perhaps with the slightly faster tempo. I have composed a short bandish in Jhaptaal. This composition follows dhrupad rendition but with khayal ang. Hence, if it is desired to include a gat composition in a surbahar recital, I would recommend that it should be done in Jhaptaal or Sultaal. The actual composition could be based on a dhrupad composition sung in this tala, which might be termed as sadra.
d. Ustad Vilayat Khan had mentioned in his NCPA recordings of rudraveena (been) that, Ustad Sadiq Ali Khan, Ustad Asad Ali Khan etc. leaned a lot on khayal ang in the bandishes played with pakhawaj.
e. It is self-evident that, if bandishes / gats are to be played on surbahar, it will have to be accompanied by pakhawaj and not tabla – tabla would give a distinct khayal based tempo.
f. The development of bandish / gat in such a case will have to follow the sitar gat unfoldment upto the stage of gat-kam, just as taan patterns are not a part of dhrupad rendition.
g. Hence, jhala could be played just as we play in sitar recitals except (I assume) that, in the alap / jod stage, jhala portion consisted of ulta-jhala. In conclusion, we would add that sobriety and introspective element of surbahar should not be lost in an attempt to play aggressive rhythmic patterns.