L. Shankar Indian Music Workshop

Adult Group Class

Internationally renowned violinist, vocalist and composer, L. Shankar will lead a hands-on music workshop focusing on the foundations and roots of Indian classical ragas and talas (rhythmic time signatures). For the participatory 90 minute program, Shankar will help demystify Indian classical music with his wealth of knowledge and will be accessible to all musicians, instrumentalists, vocalists and composers, even if you have no prior Indian classical music experience. 
    
You will learn more about ragas which are built on a set of notes with unique ascending and descending patterns, a characteristic phrase, and key notes that guide musicians in composition and improvisation. Bring your instruments, your voices, and maybe a notebook. 

Since playing his first solo concert at the age of seven, L. Shankar has gone on to accompany many of South India’s leading vocalists and became a major soloist of Indian classical music at a young age. In 1970’s, after arriving in the USA, Shankar started to play and record with jazz musicians such as Archie Shepp and Clifford Thornton and in 1973 Shankar and jazz guitarist John McLaughlin co-founded Shakti and wrote all of the music together. The legendary supergroup was rounded out with Shankar’s uncle and percussionist, Ramnad Raghavan and a young Zakir Hussain. Ghatam player Vikku Vinayakram replaced Raghavan for the first world tour and following albums. Their pioneering collaboration is now considered to be the early foundations of "World Music", “Indo-jazz” or “Global Jazz”.

In the 1980s, Shankar specially created a 10-string, double neck, electric violin capable of covering the whole range of the orchestra’s string section from violin to double bass and his unique playing style has led to many legendary recordings and touring collaborations with pop and rock artists such as Peter Gabriel, Frank Zappa, Lou Reed, and Stewart Copeland to name a few. His violin work is featured on hit songs such as “In The Air Tonight” by Phil Collins, “Rise” by Public Image Limited, “Making Flippy Flappy” by Talking Heads and many songs by Peter Gabriel, a longtime collaborator. Shankar also co-wrote the Grammy nominated soundtrack ‘Passion’ for the Martin Scorsese film ‘The Last Temptation of Christ’ with Gabriel and has gone onto work on many other award winning film and TV soundtracks and scores such as Heroes, Passion of The Christ and Queen of The Damned. Outside his work on film, pop, rock and jazz music, Shankar has continued to expand international audiences for Indian classical music, often combining North Indian (Hindustani) and South Indian (Carnatic) styles. He has released over 25 albums to date including 7 full length albums on the famed ECM record label which have become benchmark recordings of Indian classical music. In 2024 he released two new albums including, ‘Over The Stars’ in August with fellow Shakti alumni Vikku Vinyakram, along with V. Selvaganesh and Swaminathan Selvaganesh and also ‘Full Moon’ in September with tabla player Abhijit Banerjee and reaching number #3 on the World Music Charts Europe.
https://lshankar.com/epk

Grouped with: Global Traditions