Another legend leaves us …..Ravi shankar

A great and everlasting name in the music Industry, master of his art Ravi Shankar leaves us at the age of 92 on 11 December 2012 at around 16:30. He was admitted Scripps Memorial Hospital in California on 6th December after complaining of breathing difficulties, leaving millions of his fans teary eyed. Ravi Shankar has contributed to the Music Industry combining totally two different worlds….Beatles George Harrison, John Lennon and Paul McCartney and Indian classical musicians Zakir Hussein, Shiv Kumar Sharma and Vishwamohan Bhatt. His love and expertise in the instrument “SITAR” has no match in the world and he was the first one to introduce it to the western world introduced Westerners to Indian classical music, and through his friendship with Harrison became a mainstay of the 1960s counterculture scene.
He was born into a Bengali family in city of Vranasai in ancient India and was a dancer originally with his brothers’ troupe but at the age of 18 he gave up dancing to study sitar. For the next seven years Shankar studied under BabaAlauddin Khan the founder of Maihar gharana a style of Hindustani classical music
He has received many awards and honours from his own country and from all over the world, including fourteen doctorates, the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan, Desikottam,Padma Bhushan of 1967, the Music Council UNESCO award 1975, the Magsaysay Award from Manila, two Grammy’s, the Fukuoka grand Prize from Japan, the Polar Music Prize of 1998, the Crystal award from Davos, with the title ‘Global Ambassador’ to name some. Shankar has been described by India’s prime minister as a “national treasure and global ambassador of India’s cultural heritage.”
He developed a crude facility and played the instrument, sitar with Western tuning, on Lennon’s “Norwegian Wood.” The Rolling Stones soon used a sitar on the hit single “Paint it Black” and the Byrds used raga-influenced guitar on “Eight Miles High.Gaining confidence with the sitar, Harrison recorded the Indian-inspired song “Love You To” on the Beatles’ landmark 1966 album “Revolver,” helping spark the raga-rock phase of ’60s music and making Shankar a favorite at Western concerts.
His daughter Anoushka Shankar is following her father in his footsteps…keeping his Music alive in the hearts of millions.
Beatle George Harrison calls him “The godfather of world music”