Shakti shares the brilliance of Indian music and its impact on the world
By INDRANIL BASU — arts@theaggie.org
Shakti won Best Global Music Album for “This Moment” at the 66th Annual Grammy Awards, which was telecast earlier this year on Feb. 4, 2024 on CBS, marking a historic moment for Indian music and musicians across the world. September marks not only one year of the completion of the 50th Anniversary Tour of Shakti but also their performance at UC Davis as part of the tour.
“Shakti,” which means fundamental cosmic energy, manifests its meaning in the way it brings together eastern classical music — North India’s Hindustani and South India’s Carnatic — and Western music. The band expertly combines these varied streams into a global music of universal emotion that emanates a transcendental spiritual expression.
Shakti was first formed in 1973 by virtuoso British guitarist John McLaughlin and Indian tabla maestro Ustad Zakir Hussain based on their experimental jam sessions. They were joined by Indian violinist Lakshminarayana Shankar and percussionist T. H. “Vikku” Vinayakram, forming an “unprecedented transcontinental collaboration.”
They released three albums and toured extensively until disbanding in 1978. In 1997, McLaughlin and Hussain reconstituted the band as “Remember Shakti,” with V. Selvaganesh — son of Vinayakram — mandolin player U. Shrinivas and vocalist Shankar Mahadevan. Again, they disbanded for another two decades.
The band finally reformed in 2020, this time with Mahadevan, Selvaganesh and violinist Ganesh Rajagopalan. After sold-out concerts in India, they released their first studio album as Shakti in more than 45 years in 2023: “This Moment.” Supporting their album, they set out on a world tour including India, the United States and Europe under the name Shakti50.
One of the stops on their world tour was none other than the Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts at UC Davis on Sep. 8, 2023, marking the Center’s opening event of that season that featured guest performer Bill Frisell.
The audience waited with great anticipation for Shakti to come on stage, with many Indian audience members coming from along the West Coast to witness the special appearance of the maestros of Indian music.
Many Indians across generations have grown up with the music of the various band members and know of them as some of the greatest and most popular Indian musicians. Hussain is regarded as India’s most famous tabla virtuoso in the post-independence era while Mahadevan is known as a leading composer and singer in Hindi films. Rajagopalan is one half of renowned violin maestros The Kumaresh Brothers, and Selvaganesh is a celebrated Carnatic percussionist. Most of these musicians come from rich and eminent generational legacies of Indian music, and getting a chance to see them perform live around one’s own Northern California hometown was a paramount opportunity for many in the audience.
The musicians sat cross-legged on the stage in the traditional Indian style of musical practice. The strings and percussion were concentrically placed in order to communicate and improvise throughout the performance. Percussionists Hussain and Selvaganesh utilized a variety of traditional percussion instruments: the Hindustani tabla, chanda and nadal; the Carnatic kanjira, mridangam and ghatam; as well as konnakol — vocally performed percussion syllables.
Mahadevan opened with their song “Giriraj Sudha,” a devotional piece for auspicious beginnings. The music’s playfulness, combined with McLaughlin and Hussain’s introductions of the pieces, infused the performance with humor and engaged the audience further.
The band also performed expanded, improvised versions of pieces from the album, including “Shrini’s Dream” and “Bending the Rules,” as well as non-album pieces such as their versions of Hindustani semi-classical “thumri,” titled “Sakhi” and “Manmohana Madhusudana.”
As in traditional Indian recitals, each of the musicians delved into their own solo spotlights as well as playfully competitive instrumental duets — “jugalbandis” — that peaked in tempo and musical complexity before returning back to the base of the song.
During the two-hour performance, the crowd gave multiple standing ovations and called the musicians back for an encore, prompting a surprise appearance from Hussain’s granddaughter who came from backstage to be greeted by the band and audience. Following the performance, Mahadevan shared the band’s emotional outlook on their performance with The California Aggie.
“It is happy music, it brings us a lot of joy — that joy we have on stage gets transmitted to the audience,” Mahadevan said. “It is a happy experience, besides it being very musically intense, very deep, very complicated, at the same time very soulful. It’s a very unique group, which is a combination of so many emotions together. But what we do is: on stage, we have so much fun that that gets transmitted to the audience, that they feel happy at the end, and it changes people’s lives.”
Selvaganesh discussed how the band brings about their own musical fusion.
“If a band feels like a family, you are there,” Selvaganesh said. “You will hold hands and walk together. Like sometimes your brother says something and you stand for it, or if I say something he stands for me — it is similar in the band.”
Shakti does truly feel like a group of people that have a great love and understanding for each other, through and perhaps beyond music.
The Grammy for “This Moment” was accepted by band members Mahadevan, Rajagopalan and Selvaganesh, and as part of their acceptance speech, they thanked India, exclaiming, “We love you India!” which extracted a huge cheer from the audience.
Hussian also won two other Grammys the same night: Best Contemporary Instrumental Album for “As We Speak” and Best Global Music Performance for “Pashto,” making a huge landmark for Indian music on the global platform.
Reflecting on the Grammy win in an exclusive interview for The Aggie, violinist Rajagopalan expressed gratitude to the band and acknowledged the “faith bestowed upon him by Zakir Hussain ji and John McLaughlin ji.”
“Indian Classical Music has been integral to my journey, and this win is its crowning glory as we continue to create musical masterpieces for global audiences,” Rajagopalan said.
The widespread and international acclaim of Shakti has revitalized Indian classical music as world music, giving it the global cultural platform it deserves. It inspires South Asian musicians and students of music and introduces the rich legacy and heritage of Indian music to an international audience.
If you’re interested in exploring music akin to Shakti, check out UC Davis’ own South Asian music groups, including the Hindustani Vocal Ensemble under the Music Department or student organizations such as the Carnatic Dhvani and South Asian-Western fusion a cappella group, Jhankaar. These groups foster a similar legacy of Indian music within its Western diaspora on campus, becoming the passion and pride of its students and creating a harmonious community through its musical fusion.
Written by: Indranil Basu — arts@theaggie.org
