Search - Dr. Chandrakant Sardeshmukh :: Celebration 80th Birthday

Celebrated Event in the Life of World Music Maestro/Student Releases Celebration CD on Teacher Ravi Shankar's 80th Birthday (Canberra, Australia)----Ravi Shankar, the legendary Sitar Maestro will turn 80 on 7th April. To celebrate this day, his student Chandrakant Sardeshmukh will release a new Sitar CD album entitled Celebration-To my guru, Pt. Ravi Shankar on his 80th birthday. This unusual and remarkable event will be highlighted by Chandrakant's CD release concert on the evening of Saturday, April 8th at the John Fairfax Theatre in the National Gallery of Australia. The event meant only for invited foreign diplomats and dignitaries in Canberra is hosted by the Indian High Commission here. The Sitar Maestro, Ravi Shankar, who made Indian music popular all over the world and especially to the West, is considered to be a living legend in World Music. The student Chandrakant, in releasing this CD is following the footsteps of his guru by promoting the thousands of years old tradition of spiritual Samavedic Indian music abroad through his Sitar performances and lecture-demonstrations. The Celebration CD (74 minutes) has two compositions from one of Chandrakant's Sitar concerts recorded live in Australia. The first piece titled Happiness Forever in Raga Hemant represents the season winter and was composed by Ustad Allauddin Khan Baba. This joyous and deeply poignant interpretation of Happiness Forever is a delicate yet supremely dazzling performance counterbalanced with a rolling majesty. It evokes feelings of shelter from the elements as nature prepares for rebirth and warmth before the fireside that lends itself to contemplation of deepest longings. The second composition In Search of Happiness is Raga Shuddha Kaushi. Chandrakant's research on 'Gandhar Grama', the Samavedic basis of Indian Music, led him to composing the original 'Shuddha' (Pure) version of Raga Kaushi (which is otherwise always used in combination with different ragas such as Kaushi Kanada, Kaushi Bhairav and so on). In Search of Happiness expresses divine emotions and melodies in such a mysterious fashion as though the gods themselves were voicing sentiments of approval. Celebration CD is dedicated to the legendary Sitar Maestro Pandit Ravi Shankar, rejoicing the occasion of his 80th birthday. It is a gesture of heartfelt gratitude from Chandrakant, combined with an abiding love and affection as well as a wish for the long, healthy and happy life for the Maestro, written in the Sanskrit language as Jeevet Sharadaha Shatam inside the CD's booklet. There is also a poetic letter by Chandrakant who witnessed the 50th, 60th and 70th birthday celebrations of his guru in various places in India. He says: " . . . with all those melodies still ringing in my ears, this is my humble present to you, Guruji, on your 80th birthday, wherever you are in the world . . ." Chandrakant, born to play the Sitar, was declared as a child prodigy by Pandit Ravi Shankar at the age of eight in 1963. The Maestro immediately accepted young Chandrakant as his student. When he started travelling abroad, Mrs. Annapurnadevi, his then wife and daughter of his guru, Ustad Allauddin Khan Baba bagan teaching little Chandrakant. Years of practice, years of discovery and growth, years in the passing down of knowledge from teacher to student, followed at the feet of the renowned guru in the completely traditional Indian style. This training has enriched Chandrakant's Indian music melodies today, which are gaining increasing popularity on line at the MP3 web site. Listen and let your heart and soul soar. Chandrakant Sardeshmukh embarks on the new millennium with Celebration CD (74:00) featuring two traditional Indian ragas on Sitar with one underlying theme: happiness.