Music OnLine : Classics : sitar

Texas quartet haven't forgotten the original m.o. of hard rock music is driving rhythms, strong vocals and powerful riffs. They elect to use hand percussion, disembodied sitar sound-alike, and the grunge bellow for the "quiet" compulsory of their quiet-then-loud dynamic.

Chatterjee has many talents. He's adept at everything from traditional Hindustani sitar and vocal performances to a deft hybrid of Indian music and jazz guitar playing. He's performed with everyone from Fusion keyboardist Joe Zawinul to guitarist Eric Johnson, but it's perfectly fulfilling just to hear him tackle a raga on his own.

Fast, electric dance tracks get a dose of even faster sitar runs from an artist intent on fusing jazz, rock, and dance music with traditional Indian classical music. He's worked with everyone from Zakir Hussain to the Violent Femmes, playing with zest and speed through raga-rock excursions.

Poppy and electronic, this self-tiled 2000 release is diva-driven, with dance anthems and Downtempo tracks that sound like a cross between Morcheeba and Deee-Lite. Their multicultural background is revealed through a mix of electronic beat programming and instrumentation, including the use of sitar and violin.

This first of four volumes features the verses of the Bhagavad Gita, a key Hindu sacred text, sung in the original Sanskrit, sparingly accompanied by sitar and tambura. Even if you don't understand Sanskrit, it makes for soothing listening, but be sure to track down a translation of this classic philosophical dialogue between Lord Krishna and the warrior Arjuna.

This 1966 classic is one of the Stones' absolutely essential records. Arguably the best of their original lineup, with the doomed Brian Jones on guitar and sitar, Aftermath includes "Paint It, Black," "Flight 505," "Under My Thumb" and "High And Dry." It was their first record of all-original material.

People may not know this, but India actually created the art of seemingly directionless soloing (popularly known as "noodling") in the 12th century. Bhatt brings his thoughtful, circular playing to jazz, treating his guitar like a sitar, and it works: the cool otherworldly tones could revive jazz's sagging fortunes.

Psy-trance can cause the brain to spin like a pinwheel -- it's fast, hard and totally trippy. But Electro Illusion offer more than just synthetic highs: on Project X they merge organic themes with angelic vocals ("Cosmic Mother Shine") plus real tabla and sitar ("Svadhisthana").

Khan is one of India's most distinguished and respected musicians, coming from a lineage that can trace itself back to the court of sixteenth-century Moghul emperor Akbar. Legend has it his family was responsible for inventing the tabla, the sitar and also the surbahar, a bass sitar on which Imrat Khan has become one of the true masters (he also plays sitar). With his brother Vilayat, Imrat developed a style of playing based on the ancient vocal style of druphad called "gayaki ang" -- the style is more austere and disciplined than that of other schools of music in India. Khan can make you laugh or cry at will -- he displays the tiny inflections of pitch and intricacies of conceptualizing a raga that characterize a true master. In a slow surbahar alap section, he'll often play an entire scale on one fret, and you find your emotions directly correlated to the movements of his fingers. Similarly, on faster sections of a composition he can generate intense excitement with his blistering runs, which often leave a listener breathless. While he has carried musical tradition from his ancestors (like his grandfather Imdad), he also provides the world with a new link, what he calls "the Fifty Fingers": himself and his four sons Nishat, Shaffaatullah, Irshad and Wajahat, all excellent rising music stars in the world of Indian music.

The mandolin is not the first instrument on which you'd expect to hear strict Indian classical music played, but Mozdumer renders ragas perfectly, creating a sound that's something like a cross between a sitar and guitar. The instrument is larger than a Western mandolin, with thick, heavy strings that emit a deep, mournful sound with a slightly twangy edge. The melodies display slight bends (sruti) or blistering passages that take you through myriad emotions; the compositions are often meant to accompany times of day or a specific season. He uses the instrument to its fullest, brushing the non-melody strings much like a sitar player uses his drones to generate excitement and enhance the rhythmic sections of a piece. Accompanied by excellent tabla drumming from performers such as Subhen Chatterjee.

His credentials are rock-solid: a direct lineage to the sixteenth century Mogul Emperor Akbar, a family that (legend has it) invented the sitar and the tabla, and a father (Imrat), uncle (Vilayat) and grandfather (Imdad) who are three of the most influential and important Indian musicians. It comes as no surprise that Ustad Nishat Khan has developed into an astounding sitar virtuoso, with a delicate mastery of raga intricacies. The tone of the Khan family is mellower and more austere than that of India's other major gharana (school), that of Ali Akbar Khan, Ravi Shankar and Allaudin Khan. Nishat follows tradition in his playing, but he also allows himself to experience the music of other cultures, teaming up with diverse international musicians including Ray Charles, Philip Glass, John McLaughlin and the early vocal music ensemble Gilles Binchois.

As the great-grandson of Imdad Khan, son of Vilayat Khan, and nephew of Imrat Khan, there's no doubt that Shujaat Khan comes from one of the most illustrious musical lineages in India. He started sitar at age three and played his first concert at six. He has since developed into one of the finest singers and players in the North Indian Hindustani style.

One-hit-wonders the Seeds pushed "Pushin' Too Hard" into the top 40 in 1967, following up with a number of rote repetitions. Uniformly consisting of garage-y Farfisa organ, sitar-like twangy guitars and meandering vocals, none of their tunes would again pass muster on U.S. charts, and the act was soon relegated to Nuggets obscurity.

Philadelphia's Asteroid #4 make no attempt to hide their swirling, psychedelic tendencies: rainbow colored album covers tint their four somber-looking faces; the song title "Underbelly of a Mushroom"; the occasional use of sitar and tablas. Uncommonly original, their music spirals and hypnotizes as tape manipulations induce glazed eyes and effects often border just north of monotony. Asteroid #4 are consistently inventive enough in composition to keep their reverb and chord drones from crashing head-on into a 1960s-obsessed roadblock.

A beautiful combination of Iranian and Indian musical styles fuse in these compositions utilizing the romantic song form known as Ghazal, for which the band is named. Shujaat Khan, son of legendary Indian musician Vilayat Khan, performs the sitar and sings while Iranian artist Kayhan Kalhour plays the Kamenchech, an ancestor of the violin. With rhythmic accompaniment by tabla virtuoso Swapan Chaudhuri.

The ADF are that rare thing -- a politically committed band with the musical and cultural nous to remain fresh and relevant even as their sound has broadened and developed. This retrospective showcases that progression, and also offers several remixes and rarities. Newcomers should start with the excellent "Buzzin" -- a delicious and exiting blend of UK Jungle soaked in sitar -- before moving onto "Oil," with its increasingly relevant message.

To some people, the sound of the Psychedelic '60s is 20-minute guitar solos and blissful sitar jams. To others it's the scuzz-rock grind of The 13th Floor Elevators. This quintet exploded out of Austin, Texas in 1965 on the strength of their first and biggest single, "You're Gonna Miss Me." That proto-punk track, a heavy influence on bands like New York Dolls and Sonic Youth, is found on their debut. If Erickson's whisky-rasp vocals don't spin your gourd, Tommy Hall's manic electric jug pumping will.

For all their training -- singer Rachel Valfer spent six years studying maqam and Persian modal systems in Israel and Palestine -- this San Francisco-based trio is no slave to tradition. When it takes their fancy, they break into North Indian sitar-and-tabla runs. Still, Songs of Qadim for the most part hews close to the stately grace of classical Arabic music, played with reverence and skill.

Just because T&C layer droning, exotic, acoustic instrumental mantras doesn't mean they've gone freak folk. Influenced by Japanese Gagaku court music, Up utilizes sitar, shakuhachi (bamboo flute) and a Chinese mouth organ to create textures that recall Linda Perhacs' gossamer Parallelograms and Bruce Langhorne's desolate score for The Hired Hand.

"Sunshine Superman" -- both the song and the album -- marked a turning point for Donovan Leitch. With his third album, released in 1966, the previously strummy Anglo folkster tripped into the psychedelic underground and discovered jazzy arrangements, electric guitar, and global instrumentation, especially the exoticizing effects of copious sitar. The title track is a damnably hummable psych-pop masterpiece, and "Season of the Witch" is an oft-covered classic, but don't overlook the lovely, lazy "Bert's Blues" and Summer of Love postcard prequel "The Trip."