|
 Anoushka
Shankar has shown herself to be a unique
artist with tremendous talent and
understanding of the great musical tradition
of India. Anoushka is the only artist in the
world to be trained completely by her father
and legendary sitar virtuoso and composer,
Ravi Shankar. She has been playing and
studying the sitar with him since she was
nine, and at age thirteen she made her
performing debut in New Delhi, India.
For
Anoushka Shankar, there is legacy and then
there is destiny. She is equally respectful of
both, but bound to neither. Her ever-growing
audience cannot help but acknowledge the
familial roots of the young woman coaxing
spellbinding spiritual sounds from her sitar,
but neither can they deny that she is an
innovator in her own right. Her name may have
brought her to the stage for the first time as
a young girl, but it is her talent and vision
that have kept her there.
Schooled in the Indian classical music
tradition by the greatest teacher any student
could hope to have, maestro and father Ravi
Shankar, Anoushka had already dazzled
thousands with her accomplished musicianship
by the time she had reached her teens.
Anoushka made her recording debut at 13,
appearing on the album In Celebration,
a tribute to the works of Ravi Shankar. Two
years later she made her debut as a conductor
on her father's Chants Of India album
produced by close family friend, George
Harrison.
Anoushka, her 1998 solo debut, established the
younger Shankar as something of a prodigy.
That same year, the British Parliament awarded
Anoushka with a House of Commons Shield,
making her both the youngest and the first
female recipient of that high honor.
Anourag (2000), Anoushka's sophomore
release, expanded upon and refined what she
had offered on the debut, and 2001's Live
at Carnegie Hall truly brought Anoushka
into the international spotlight, garnering
her first Grammy nomination and making her the
youngest person ever nominated in the World
Music category.
2005 brought a return to the recording studio
and the release of her fourth and most
ambitious album, Rise (Angel Records).
Previously, Anoushka had recorded and
performed primarily as a soloist, interpreting
the music of her father. Rise marked a
breakthrough for Anoushka who composed,
produced and arranged the album. It received
glowing reviews throughout the world and gave
Anoushka another Grammy nomination in the Best
Contemporary World Music category. Anoushka
also became the first Indian to play at the
Grammy Awards when she performed a piece from
the CD at the pre-telecast ceremony in
February 2006.
Those who witnessed Anoushka's own rise
throughout the years could not have been too
surprised to see how far she had come in so
short a time. Born June 9, 1981 in London,
Anoushka recalls that it was actually her
mother, Sukanya Shankar, who encouraged her to
train on the complicated Indian stringed
instrument that Anoushka's father had made
world-famous. She first sat down with a sitar,
custom-made to accommodate a child's hands,
when she was only eight. |
