Ravi Shankar

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Varanasi (Uttar Pradesh), India

Ravi Shankar (born April 7, 1920 in Varanasi (Uttar Pradesh), India) is an Indian musician best known for his virtuosity on the sitar.

A disciple of Allauddin Khan (founder of the of ), Pandit Ravi Shankar is arguably the best-known Indian , and is well known for his pioneering work in bringing the power and appeal of the tradition, as well as music and its performers in general, to the West. This was done through his association with The Beatles as well as with his own personal charisma. His musical career spans over six decades and Shankar currently holds the Guinness Record for the longest international career.

He is the father of both Grammy award winning singer Norah Jones, and Anoushka Shankar, also a noted sitarist.

Born on April 7, 1920, in Varanasi into an orthodox, well-off Brahmin family, Rabindra Shankar Chowdery’s father, ShyÆm Shankar, was employed as a diwan (minister) by the Maharajah of Jhalawar. By the age of 13, Ravi Shankar was going along on every tour of his brother Uday Shankar’s Compaigne de Danse et Musique Hindou (Company of Hindu Dance and Music). At the All-Bengali Music Conference in December 1934, he met the multi-instrumentalist Allauddin Khan. Precisely when Allauddin Khan was born is uncertain. People hazard dates in the 1860s around 1862, but in later years he himself gave his age haphazardly. He would transform many musicians’ lives, but he had an incalculable effect on Ali Akbar (his son), Annapurna Devi (his daughter), and Shankar himself.
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  • genitivodeautor wrote:
    Tuesday evening
    Uno de los grandes músicos del siglo XX

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  • lastnofm wrote:
    last month
    how can i download these songs..plz write on ma profile.thnks

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  • Planeta_Lassu wrote:
    December 2011
    OM ♪♪♪ OM ♪♪♪

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  • Leptossomico wrote:
    December 2011
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  • MoogleZilla wrote:
    December 2011
    @ut0 - You don't have to "seek approval," but if you ever want to actually understand the music and its implications, you'd quit being such a knob.

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  • Who_Scared_You wrote:
    December 2011
    ravi shanker all day long

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  • ViniciusStilt wrote:
    December 2011
    I love the indian melodies...

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  • ut0 wrote:
    December 2011
    "You know Ravi himself is very much against drug use relating to this music." good thing I don't seek the approval of musicians I respect with regard to my personal habits, or else I might care.

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  • MoogleZilla wrote:
    December 2011
    Well, not necessarily for the first point. I mean that "high culture" would be the apex of said culture, while "national culture" would probably be along the lines of traditionalism and (more often than not) historical beliefs and messages. In other words, "high culture" would be the pinnacle of their respective cultural message (such as in the example of Schubert), while sea shanties would be a more rudimentary understanding and more personal expression of some cultural ideal or concept. Maybe not a "social message" as much as one of cultural pertinence an "traditionalism" or a historical event or something. Like you said, it relates back to historical outreaches. And I would agree on the Hindustani Classical point, but I'm more than positive that there was some precursor to it that would have been rudimentary and less structured than their "high art", so to speak.

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  • fat_fleshy_fingers wrote:
    December 2011
    there is no "high culture music" that is not related to its "national culture". all cultural expressions grow out of systems of meaning. schubert is just as "cultural" as sea shanties. i don't think that communicating a "social message" is what defines folk either. i think you're closer to a truth that i would accept with the "traditional" tag because it emphasises the conscious historical outreach that characterises traditional music. on the other hand, hindustani classical reaches back a couple centuries, doesn't it?

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  • MoogleZilla wrote:
    December 2011
    Well, yes, Ravi Shankar is (as I already stated) a Classical artist because he follows in line with the High Classical of Indian tradition. But groups that play "world music" do indeed play "folk/world music" because of its social message that is related to national culture. Perhaps "traditional music" is a better term though...Regardless, my point stands that music is best divided into these groupings. Art Music (classical) for its intents of formality and a transmission of an artistic message, Popular Music for its intents to transmit a message that is both accessible and relatable to all people, and "Traditional" Music a message of cultural significance or traditional/historical events and/or lifestyles. I know the original term "world music" was a sack of shit because it literally contained all non-American/European musics, but I think my term stands up fairly well. I'm not attempting to define anything else but what is before me.

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  • fat_fleshy_fingers wrote:
    December 2011
    you're trying to find a definition for something else entirely. i'm not suggesting a name for "anything that conveys some sort of social message" or wherein "something cultural rests". literally all music should be included then, otherwise it would not be music. i think "world music" originally stood for music, that was "from the rest of the world" without paying attention to its respective musical attributes or cultural entanglements. to assume that every culture has its "folk music" which is supposed to have the same status in its respective culture that folk has in europe (for example) would be a gross underestimation of the complexity and alterity of societies in the world. ravi shankar might be "high culture" in the context of south asian music, to the european listener it is, phenomenologically, simply unusual.

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  • MoogleZilla wrote:
    December 2011
    And it's not "racist", but rather sort of naive.

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  • MoogleZilla wrote:
    December 2011
    Err, yeah. That's why I fucking suggest "Folk/World" which would not only encompass "non-western" and "alien" music, but also American Folk, to some extent Blues, early Country (not that Nashville bullshit), and Native American musics as well. Anything that conveys some sort of social message inherent in the music itself. Something cultural rests in it.

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  • fat_fleshy_fingers wrote:
    December 2011
    the term world music does have a certain racist undertone to it; on the other hand, what's a good word for music that seems foreign/alien to western audiences because it's embedded in cultures which aren't their own? non-western music? seems pretty vague also. best case scenario is still everyone just learning their shit and distinguishing hindustani from arab music or whatever.

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  • MoogleZilla wrote:
    November 2011
    For real

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  • Akayz7 wrote:
    October 2011
    World Music is viable, because it doesn't only include a countries culture it includes many. French Rock is not World Music. But Traditional Greek Folk is.

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  • Akayz7 wrote:
    October 2011
    spinnyoza you are retarded. Music doesn't break down into just 4 genres. You said "Art", "Pop", "World" and "Progressive" some of the most vague terms ever to be used in music.

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  • ass_ wrote:
    October 2011
    Ustad Vilayat Khan is a better sitar Maestro. The Beatles suck. Ravi is a beastly innovator and musician, but anyone who diggs Ravi Shankar and Hindustani classical music in general should check out Nikhil Banerjee aka his peer and fellow student.

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  • MoogleZilla wrote:
    October 2011
    Pick something good for Popular

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