Sitar maestro Ravi Shankar is no more

Washington/New Delhi, Dec 12 (IANS) Sitar maestro and composer Pandit Ravi
Shankar, one of India’s most loved and best known musicians, died in the US
Tuesday. He was 92.

He had been admitted to the Scripps Memorial Hospital in La Jolla, San Diego
last Thursday after he complained of breathing difficulties.He breathed his
last at 4.30 p.m. Pacific Time Tuesday.

He is survived by his wife Sukanya Rajan and daughters Anoushka and Norah
Jones. He also had a son, Shubhendra Shankar, from his first wife Annapurna
Devi, who died in 1992.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh described his death as the passing away of an
era. He said in New Delhi Wednesday that Pandit Ravi Shankar was a
“national treasure and global ambassador of India’s cultural heritage”.

“An era has passed away with Pt. Ravishankar. The nation joins me to pay
tributes to his unsurpassable genius, his art and his humility,” the Prime
Minister’s Office (PMO) said in a message on micro-blogging site Twitter.

Dubbed the “godfather of world music” by George Harrison of the
Beatles, Ravi Shankar was born in Varanasi. He spent his youth touring Europe
and India with the dance group of his brother Uday Shankar. He gave up dancing
in 1938 to study sitar playing under court musician Allauddin Khan.

A performer, composer, teacher and writer, Ravi Shankar is well known for his
pioneering work in bringing Indian music to the West.

After finishing his studies in 1944, Shankar worked as a composer, creating the
music for the “Apu Trilogy” by Satyajit Ray and Richard
Attenborough’s “Gandhi”. For the latter film, he shared with George
Fenton an Oscar for best original score in 1983.

After working as music director of All India Radio, New Delhi, from 1949 to
1956, he made Indian classical music popular in the west in the 1960s through
teaching, performance, and his association with violinist Yehudi Menuhin and
George Harrison.

George Harrison produced and participated in two record albums, “Shankar
Family & Friends” and “Festival of India” both composed by
Ravi Shankar.

Shankar engaged Western music by writing concerti for sitar and orchestra and
toured the world in the 1970s and 1980s.

From 1986 to 1992 he served as a nominated member of the Rajya Sabha.

Shankar was awarded India’s highest civilian honour, the Bharat Ratna, in 1999,
and received three Grammy Awards. He was nominated for a Grammy award for 2013
too.

Shankar continued to perform in the 2000s, often with his daughter Anoushka.

His main companion for decades was dancer Kamala Shastri. He also had a
relationship with New York concert producer Sue Jones, with whom he fathered
singer Norah Jones.

Son “Shubho” Shankar was also a musician who often toured with him.
He passed on the baton as it were to his daughter Anoushka, also an accomplished
sitarist.

On learning of Shankar’s death, India’s ambassador to US Nirupama Rao tweeted,
“Pandit Ravi Shankar. Mourn passing of a musical genius and gentle soul.
Attended his last concert Nov in Calif. He played with such passion.”

“His last concert was particularly poignant. Anoushka and he played
together in perfect unison. A torch was passed,” she said.

“The music that I have learned and want to give is like worshipping God.
It is absolutely like a prayer,” she quoted him as saying.

2012-12-12 12:21:36

Source: http://nesaranews.blogspot.com/2012/12/sitar-maestro-ravi-shankar-is-no-more.html