# Raga desh on harmonica



## Sourav Chowdhury

Respected Members,
Let me introduce myself.Ihave been playing harmonica with a special orientation on Indian classical music.Basically i started learning harmonica some 12 years back from my maternal uncle Mr.Bhaskar Chowdhury,one of the closest deciple of late Mr.Milon Gupta and currently an A.I.R.[all India radio] empaneled artist in WESTERN section.I was only 8 years of age at the time i picked up playing harmonica.I was immensly fortunate that i grew up listening to recorded-performances of Larry Adler, Jerry Murad,Charlie-mcCoy,Tommy Reily and so on.These were some of the precious possessions of my uncle, which he received as gift from Milon Gupta.

I still remember those days when i used to wake up in the morning listening to the renditions made in 'nat-bhairavi'[a morning raga] in my mother's voice and after whole days of hectic school and study schedule used go to bed with Larry Adlers harmonica creating the night's musical scene.In this connection let me tell you that my mother is an exponent of Rampur-Sahaswan gharana and my own musical journey started with tabla at the age of 5 with my father,a student of Farrukhabad Gharana..
Presently I am trying to introduce Hindustani classical music on harmonica.Pete Lockett--the person behind the music of JamesBond movies is absolutely excited about it.I am getting constructive technical help from him.As you can apprehend that it takes a modified style of playing when you are trying out a raga based composition.At the same time there must not be any element of monotony.Rabindranath Tagore's compositions are a balance of all.

From the year 2007 i kept on receiving invitations in some of the leading harmonica festivals of the world including APHF2008[Asia Pacific Harmonica Festival] after they received my performance.I topped the indian harmonica association's [built in memory of late Milon Gupta]annual competition for 4 succecive times.Last year i was selected in the ministry of culture's,govt.of India, young musiciations scholarship scheme.Bhanu Gupta--harmonica plyer in movies like Sholay,Dosti etc. was very happy after he came to know that it has been first such inclusion with harmonica.Bhanu uncle provides lot of insights about harmonica playing to me.Recently i received an invitition from Harmonica museum,Trossingen,Germany regarding Harmonica festival.
I often get bereaved in seeing that the world harmonica circuit knows hardly anything about Indian music and how harmonica can do wonders with it.Hence if Hindustani classical music gets a global stage through your organization then I fervently believe that the effort will for sure add a new dimension to the world-music fraternity.

PLEASE do reply...
Hope to hear from you soon.Bye for now,
Sourav.
Visit: 



Now everyone from around the world should be able to view this without difficulty..
Enjoy the celebrations.. Abe
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## anacrusis

I checked out your video, I thought it was cool. I had never heard Indian classical music on the harmonica.


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