[Vision2020] Ravi Shankar, Father to Musicians Norah Jones & Anoushka Shankar, Dies at 92

[Steven Basoa]

I was very fortunate to receive music lessons from Ravi Shankar back  
in 1971 when I was a student at CCNY.  I was taking an Eastern Music  
class and our professor was a close, personal friend of his.  While  
on a visit to NY, he came in and taught both class sessions that week  
(a small class of about 15 very lucky students).  I may even still  
have the class notes somewhere.  When he performed in concert that  
weekend, our class got to sit in the front row.  What a great week  
that was.  He was an incomparable musician and left a huge imprint on  
the world of music.


On Dec 12, 2012, at 3:00 PM, Ted Moffett wrote:

I was watching "Democracy Now" this morning and was amazed and  
delighted to suddenly see concert footage of Ravi Shankar and his  
daughter Anoushka, both playing sitar on stage.

Wow!

I did not know Ravi had died, then Amy Goodman announced this.

I am not very familiar with Ravi Shankar's music, having heard only  
one or two albums of his, though I absolutely love the sitar, which I  
think is one of the most amazing instruments humans have ever created.

Sometimes when I pick up my guitar, it seems like a silly child's toy  
compared to the sitar, which I have attempted to play.  However, Jimi  
Hendrix proves this quite wrong!

Singer/musician Norah Jones is very famous, and I am certain many on  
Vision2020 have heard her music.  What many may not know, is that  
Ravi Shankar is her father!

I like Norah Jones music, but I am a much bigger fan of Ravi's  
daughter Anoushka's music, which ranges from more traditional Indian  
sitar playing, to more westernized styles of music.

Not that I am an expert judge, but Anoushka is claimed to be a sitar  
virtuoso in her own right, and I have albums of her playing sitar  
with Ravi and others that indicate this is indeed the case.

Anoushka plays on Stings album "Sacred Love:" ( http://www.sting.com/ 
discography/index/ablum/albumId/28/tagName/Albums ) and Sting sings  
on one of Anoushka's more westernized albums, "Breathing Under  
Water," on which sister Norah Jones also guests:

http://www.anoushkashankar.com/albums/breathing-under-water/

"Breathing Under Water" is very different than some of Anoushka's  
earlier albums, which are very traditional Indian music.  They're all  
amazing!

Watch/listen to Ravi and Anoushka in concert both playing sitar on  
YouTube.  Amazing music!  Numerous other music options are shown for  
Anoushka's music on YouTube at this website:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eG2moqxqIaE

------------------------------------------------------

Sitar legend Ravi Shankar dies at 92

By Ben Brumfield, CNN
updated 3:59 PM EST, Wed December 12, 2012
http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/12/showbiz/california-ravi-shankar-obit/ 
index.html

(CNN) -- His music transcended trends and cultural barriers. Pandit  
Ravi Shankar's life, which traversed nearly a century, ended Tuesday.

The legendary sitar player, who taught Beatle George Harrison how to  
play the stringed instrument and brought Indian music to the West,  
passed away at age 92 in the early evening in San Diego, near his  
home, according to his wife, Sukanya, and daughter Anoushka Shankar,  
who were by his side.

Shankar was the father of jazz singer Norah Jones as well. He is also  
survived by three grandchildren and four great-grandchildren,  
according to his record label, East Meets West Music.

His health had suffered over the past year, according to a statement  
from his record label, and he underwent heart valve replacement  
surgery last Thursday.

Unfortunately, despite the best efforts of the surgeons and doctors  
taking care of him, his body was not able to withstand the strain of  
the surgery," his wife and daughter said.

In the 1960s, he took Eastern music mainstream in the West. He lent  
ethereal, spiritual sounds to the Fab Four through his friendship  
with Harrison, who recorded them on the "Sgt. Pepper's" album in the  
song "Within You Without You."

Virtuoso performances at Monterey in 1967 and Woodstock in 1969  
helped cement Shankar's place in Western musical history as an  
ambassador of Eastern wisdom to a generation looking for new values.

"Ravi was a great loss musically, spiritually and physically. God  
bless to Ravi's family. Peace & Love," Beatle Ringo Starr said in a  
statement released through a representative.

Singer Peter Gabriel hailed Shankar as an inspiration who "opened the  
door to non-western music for millions of people around the world."

"He was very serious about his music, and I remember at one WOMAD  
performance, he stopped the music to ask his audience not to point  
their feet at him as that was seen as offensive in India," Gabriel  
said in a statement. "He was also warm, witty and mischievous as a  
man. He will be badly missed."

Even actress Pamela Anderson weighed in tweeting one of Shankar's  
music videos.

In Bangladesh's bloody war of separation from Pakistan in 1971,  
Shankar and Harrison launched what UNICEF calls the first massive  
fund-raising pop event, The Concert for Bangladesh, to generate  
donations for the flood of refugees pouring into India.

Later, from 1986 to 1992, Shankar put his politics into practice as a  
member of India's upper house of parliament, the Rajya Sabha, or  
state assembly, serving with India's current Prime Minister Manmohan  
Singh.

"It was difficult, often, to judge what was more remarkable -- the  
man or his music," Singh said of Shankar on Wednesday. He praised him  
as one of India's "most effective cultural ambassadors."

Both houses of parliament observed a moment of silence in his honor.

Shankar's musical career had a long life before and after the '60s.  
He was born on April 7, 1920, and when he and Harrison met, he was  
already 46 and famous in India as a classical musician, according to  
his record label biography.

His classical career outlived his counterculture fame, but he  
continued to meld East with West and composed concertos, which  
harmonized his sitar with orchestras. He played duos with American  
classical violin maestro Yehudi Menuhin and composed with American  
minimalist Philip Glass. He also wrote film music for the Hollywood  
movie "Gandhi."

Shankar kept homes in the United States and India.

Despite ill health, he shared a stage with his daughter Anoushka,  
also a sitar virtuoso, in early November.

It was his last public performance.

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Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett

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