PANDIT RAVI SHANKAR and ANOUSHKA SHANKAR

Ravi Shankar sitar), the legendary virtuoso sitarist, composer, teacher, and writer, is renowned throughout the world for his pioneering work in bringing Indian music to the West.

 He has been a cultural influence in the West for more than three decades as India’s most recognized and esteemed musical ambassador.

The youngest son in a Bengali family, he was born in 1920 in Varanasi Benares), the holiest of Indian cities. At the age of 10, he accompanied his elder brother with his company of dancers and musicians to Paris, where he attended school. He spent several years in the West absorbing different kinds of music, but returned to India in 1938 to begin his career. Shankar combined his concert performances with his work for All India Radio 1949-56), where he established the National Chamber Orchestra. As word of his virtuosity spread throughout India and then Europe, Asia, and the United States. Shankar embarked on one of the most extraordinary careers in the history of contemporary music.

Shankar is a prolific composer and in addition to his numerous ragas and talas, he has written for musicians from the East and West, including Yehudi Menuhin and Jean-Pierre Rampal. Among his works are two concertos for sitar and orchestra, the first commissioned by the London Symphony Orchestra and premiered under Andre Previn. In 1980, he was commissioned by the New York Philharmonic, under the direction of Zubin Mehta, to compose Raga-Mala A Garland of Ragas), his second sitar concerto. He has composed extensively for ballets and films, including Satyajit Ray’s Apu trilogy, which raised film music to a new standard of excellence, and Gandhi, the Academy Award-winning classic by Sir Richard Attenborough, which won him both Oscar and Grammy nominations. Shankar also composed and choreographed the ballet Ghanashyam, a work that made history on the British and Indian cultural scenes.