London, England · indian classical · contemporary

Anoushka Shankar

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A sitar player who took the instrument out of its glass case — classical training bent toward flamenco, electronics and film scoring without diluting any of it.

Anoushka Shankar, born Anoushka Hemangini Shankar in London on 9 June 1981, is a British-American sitarist and composer trained from childhood by her father, Ravi Shankar. Her mother is Sukanya Rajan and her half-sister is the singer Norah Jones.

She began sitar lessons at eight with one of her father's disciples, Gaurav Mazumdar, and by ten was accompanying her father on tanpura at his concerts. She gave her first public performance in 1995, aged thirteen, at Siri Fort in New Delhi, accompanied by tabla player Zakir Hussain.

She signed to Angel/EMI at sixteen and released her debut album, Anoushka, in 1998, followed by Anourag in 2000. Her third album, Live at Carnegie Hall, brought her a Grammy nomination in 2003, making her the youngest nominee in the World Music category.

Her fourth album, RISE, released in 2005, was her first self-produced and self-composed non-classical record. It earned another Grammy nomination and was followed in 2006 by her becoming the first Indian musician to perform at the Grammy Awards. She has since recorded with electronic producer Karsh Kale, notably on the 2007 album Breathing Under Water.

Live, she generally works with a small group of percussionists and other instrumentalists, giving long-form pieces room to develop rather than compressing them into short songs. In total she has received fourteen Grammy Award nominations.

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