25 Ravi Shankar Quotes on Music, Spirituality, and Cultural Bridges

Ravi Shankar (1920–2012) was an Indian musician and composer who was the world's best-known exponent of the sitar and one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century. Through his collaborations with George Harrison of the Beatles and his performances at festivals including Monterey Pop and the Concert for Bangladesh, he introduced Indian classical music to the Western world. Few know that Shankar began his career as a dancer in his brother Uday's troupe touring Europe at age ten, that his training under the master Allauddin Khan required seven years of grueling study (including a vow of celibacy), or that his daughter Norah Jones is a nine-time Grammy-winning artist.

In 1966, George Harrison sought out Shankar to learn the sitar, beginning a friendship that transformed Western popular music. Shankar patiently taught Harrison not just technique but the spiritual philosophy underlying Indian classical music — that music is a form of devotion, not entertainment. When Shankar performed at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967, the audience was spellbound by his three-hour afternoon raga. At the start of the Concert for Bangladesh in 1971 (organized by Harrison at Shankar's request to aid refugees), the audience burst into applause when the musicians finished tuning up. Shankar smiled and said, "If you appreciate the tuning so much, I hope you will enjoy the playing more." His philosophy that "the goal of Indian classical music is to take the listener on a spiritual journey" challenged Western assumptions about music as mere entertainment and opened a dialogue between Eastern and Western traditions that continues to this day.

Who Was Ravi Shankar?

Robindra Shankar Chowdhury was born on April 7, 1920, in Varanasi, India, one of the holiest cities in Hindu tradition. He was the youngest of seven brothers in a Bengali Brahmin family, and his father, Shyam Shankar Chowdhury, was a distinguished scholar, lawyer, and statesman who spent much of his time abroad. Young Ravi grew up largely without his father's presence, but was immersed in the rich cultural and spiritual atmosphere of Varanasi, where music and devotion were inseparable aspects of daily life. At the age of ten, he moved to Paris to join the dance troupe of his eldest brother, Uday Shankar, who had become a celebrated figure in European avant-garde circles.

During his years touring Europe with Uday's troupe, the young Shankar absorbed Western music and culture while performing Indian dance for international audiences. A pivotal turning point came when the legendary court musician Allauddin Khan, who served as the troupe's musical director, agreed to take Ravi as his disciple. At eighteen, Shankar left behind the glamour of European tour life and submitted to the rigorous traditional guru-shishya system of training, living with Khan in the small town of Maihar for seven and a half years. Under Khan's demanding tutelage, Shankar mastered the sitar and the deep theoretical framework of Indian classical music, which he described as the most transformative experience of his life.

After completing his training, Shankar emerged as one of India's foremost musicians. He composed music for Satyajit Ray's acclaimed Apu Trilogy of films, served as director of music at All India Radio, and became the most prominent ambassador of Indian classical music to the Western world. His performances at international festivals in the 1950s and 1960s captivated audiences who had never heard a sitar, and his collaborations with violinist Yehudi Menuhin demonstrated that Indian and Western classical traditions could engage in profound musical dialogue. His recordings introduced millions of listeners to the ragas, talas, and improvisational structures of Hindustani classical music.

Shankar's influence reached its peak in the 1960s when George Harrison of the Beatles became his student, bringing the sitar and Indian musical concepts into the heart of Western popular culture. Shankar performed at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 and the Concert for Bangladesh in 1971 — a landmark benefit concert organized by Harrison that raised global awareness of humanitarian crisis. While he welcomed the attention Indian music received, Shankar was often troubled by the counterculture's association of his sacred musical tradition with recreational drug use, and he spoke against it publicly and consistently.

Ravi Shankar continued composing and performing into his nineties, creating concertos for sitar and orchestra, film scores, and collaborations that spanned musical genres and generations. He received numerous honors including the Bharat Ratna, India's highest civilian award, three Grammy Awards, and an honorary appointment as a member of the Rajya Sabha, India's upper house of parliament. His daughter, Anoushka Shankar, carried on his musical legacy as a world-renowned sitarist. He died on December 11, 2012, in San Diego, California, at the age of ninety-two, universally recognized as one of the most important musicians of the twentieth century.

Ravi Shankar spoke about music with a depth that reflected decades of devotion to his art and his spiritual tradition. Here are 25 quotes from the master sitarist who brought Indian music to the world.

On Music and Its Sacred Nature

Ravi Shankar dedicated his life to demonstrating that Indian classical music was among the most profound and intellectually rigorous artistic traditions on earth. Born in Varanasi in 1920, he spent his childhood touring Europe with his brother Uday Shankar's dance troupe before committing to seven years of intensive study under the legendary sarod player Allauddin Khan in Maihar, living in near-monastic conditions. The sitar, a nineteen-stringed instrument of extraordinary complexity, became his vehicle for expressing ragas — melodic frameworks that can take decades to master and a lifetime to fully interpret. His 1956 album "Three Ragas" for Angel Records was one of the first Indian classical recordings widely distributed in the West, and his performances at the Edinburgh International Festival and the United Nations General Assembly in the late 1950s introduced Western intellectual audiences to the depth of the Hindustani classical tradition. Shankar insisted that Indian music was not background sound or exotic novelty but a disciplined art form demanding the same reverence as a Beethoven symphony.

On Learning and the Guru-Disciple Tradition

Shankar's relationship with his guru Allauddin Khan was defined by a rigor that would be unimaginable in Western music education. Khan demanded absolute obedience, prescribed specific ragas for specific times of day and seasons, and expected Shankar to practice for eighteen hours at a stretch. This training produced a musician of extraordinary depth — Shankar could improvise within a single raga for hours, exploring its melodic possibilities with the thoroughness of a scientist and the passion of a poet. His influence on Western musicians began with his friendship with violinist Yehudi Menuhin, who invited him to perform at the Bath Festival in 1966, and exploded when George Harrison of the Beatles became his student in 1966. Harrison's use of sitar on "Norwegian Wood" (1965) and the Beatles' embrace of Indian spirituality brought Shankar unprecedented fame in the West, though he was troubled by the counterculture's tendency to associate Indian music with drug use rather than disciplined practice.

On Bridging East and West

Shankar's Concert for Bangladesh at Madison Square Garden on August 1, 1971, organized with George Harrison, was the first major benefit concert in rock history, raising awareness and funds for refugees of the Bangladesh Liberation War. The event, featuring Harrison, Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, and Leon Russell, raised nearly $250,000 for UNICEF relief efforts and established the template for charity concerts that would later include Live Aid and the Concert for New York City. Shankar's compositions bridged Eastern and Western traditions with growing sophistication — his Concerto for Sitar and Orchestra (1971), premiered by the London Symphony Orchestra under André Previn, and his second concerto "Raga-Mala" (1981) demonstrated that the sitar could function within a Western orchestral context without sacrificing its Indian essence. His collaborations with Philip Glass on "Passages" (1990) explored the intersections between Indian raga and Western minimalism. Shankar spent seven decades building musical bridges between civilizations with patience, dignity, and unwavering artistic standards.

On Life and Spirituality

Shankar's journey from the ghats of Varanasi to concert stages on every continent embodied his belief that music was a spiritual practice transcending geography and culture. He was a devoted Hindu whose performances often began with a prayer and who viewed the act of playing raga as a form of meditation connecting performer, listener, and the divine. His personal life was complex — he maintained relationships with multiple women simultaneously, fathering daughters Norah Jones (who became a Grammy-winning singer-songwriter) and Anoushka Shankar (who became a virtuoso sitarist) by different mothers. He received the Bharat Ratna, India's highest civilian honor, in 1999, and three Grammy Awards across his career. When he died on December 11, 2012, at age ninety-two in San Diego, he had succeeded beyond any reasonable expectation in his lifelong mission — Indian classical music was no longer an exotic curiosity in the West but a respected art form studied in conservatories and performed in concert halls around the world.

Key Achievements and Episodes

The Sitar Master Who Brought Indian Music to the West

Robindro Shaunkor Chowdhury was born in Varanasi, India, into a Bengali Brahmin family. As a child, he toured Europe as a dancer with his brother Uday Shankar's dance troupe. At 18, he abandoned dance to study sitar under the legendary court musician Allauddin Khan, enduring seven years of rigorous training that required total dedication. He became one of the greatest sitar players in Indian history and served as music director of All India Radio from 1949 to 1956. His Western breakthrough came through a collaboration with violinist Yehudi Menuhin in 1966 and his performances at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 and Woodstock in 1969, which introduced Indian classical music to millions of Western listeners.

Teaching George Harrison and Shaping the Sound of the Beatles

In 1966, Beatles guitarist George Harrison sought out Ravi Shankar to learn the sitar, beginning a friendship that lasted until Shankar's death in 2012. Shankar taught Harrison not only the technical aspects of the instrument but also the spiritual philosophy underlying Indian classical music. Harrison's sitar playing on tracks like "Norwegian Wood" (1965) and "Within You Without You" (1967) introduced the sound of Indian music to the global pop audience. Shankar was initially ambivalent about the association, concerned that Indian classical music was being trivialized. However, the partnership genuinely broadened Western appreciation for Indian culture and earned Shankar worldwide recognition.

The Concert for Bangladesh: The First Major Benefit Concert

On August 1, 1971, Ravi Shankar and George Harrison organized the Concert for Bangladesh at Madison Square Garden in New York, featuring Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Ringo Starr, and other major artists. The concert, which raised awareness and funds for refugees of the Bangladesh Liberation War, is widely regarded as the first major benefit concert in music history, establishing the template for Live Aid, Farm Aid, and every subsequent charity concert. The live album and film raised over $12 million for UNICEF relief efforts. The event demonstrated that popular musicians could mobilize their audiences for humanitarian causes on a massive scale.

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