Grammy & Oscar Award musician Shri. L Shenkar
double violin performance for Swaralaya, Palakkad
After performing with various Indian singers for several years, Shankar founded a trio with his brothers, L. Vaidyanathan and L. Subramaniam, that performed throughout India.
While attending college at Wesleyan University, he met jazz musicians like Ornette Coleman, Jimmy Garrison, and John McLaughlin.[2] With McLaughlin, Shankar founded the group Shakti in 1975, one of the early groups in which Eastern and Western musical traditions met.[2] They released three albums: Shakti (1975), A Handful of Beauty (1976), and Natural Elements (1977).
After the band dissolved, Shankar was a violinist with Frank Zappa for a short time, and then founded the group The Epidemics and released a number of albums as a band leader.[2] With Peter Gabriel, he wrote the soundtrack for the film The Last Temptation of Christ (1989),[2] for which he received a Grammy Award. In the following years, Shankar worked on several of Gabriel's albums. Since 1996, he has been working with the violinist Gingger Shankar (she is his brother's daughter) as the duo Shankar & Gingger.
Shankar has also performed with Elton John, Eric Clapton, Phil Collins, Bruce Springsteen, Van Morrison, Yoko Ono, Stewart Copeland, John Waite, Charly García, Steve Vai, Ginger Baker, Nils Lofgren, Jonathan Davis and The SFA and Sting.
SHRI. VIKKU VINAYAKAM
Vinayakram's concert career began at the age of 13. His first performance was on 5 March 1957 at the Rama Navami festival in Thoothukudi. While proceeding for the arangetram the tuned ghatam instrument was broken by a child named Ganesh, which by itself had been a good omen for his bright career. where he accompanied V.V.Sadagopan. He was soon accompanying many vocalists in Carnatic music at the time, including Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavatar, M K Thiagaraja Bagavathar, Dr Sirkazhi S.Govindarajan, Mangalampalli Balamuralikrishna, G. N. Balasubramaniam, Madurai Mani Iyer, Semmangudi Srinivasa Iyer, M. S. Subbulakshmi and Maharajapuram Santhanam. His brother, T. H. Subhash Chandran, also excelled in the field. The Ghatam rose to fame as a percussion instrument that required nimble fingers and strong stomach muscles to control the mouth of the pot.[2]
Vinayakram's tryst with the international music platform came in the early 1970s when he joined Shakti to play along with John McLaughlin and Zakir Hussain.
He has also performed at Basant Utsav, the annual fund raiser for the Banyan.
Vinayakram is Principal of Sri Jaya Ganesh Tala Vadya Vidyalaya in Chennai, India - the academy established by his late father and teacher in 1958. It continues to produce new stars of Carnatic percussion. Vinayakram's son V. Selvaganesh is a percussionist, especially after tours with John McLaughlin's