My jumping off point for composition was the Interstellar Space album of duets by tenor saxophonist John Coltrane and drummer Rashied Ali, following the model of John's music hero, Ravi Shankar, with sitar and tabla duets. Having decided to make composition my music focus, my perspective was unique, including believing jazz became the true classical music of the Western world beginning in the forties, joined by various forms of rock and pop beginning in the sixties. I was taken aback when Nazir invited me to lecture at his Indian classical music class at UCLA, introducing me with the statement, "He probably knows as much about improvisation as anyone." It was a beautiful coincidence when first meeting Nazir, to learn his favorite jazz artist was Lee Konitz whom he first heard in the fifties. Luckily, all of these masters of improvisation had a shared fascination with my ideas and questions. From rock, I became good friends with Ray Manzarek, including working on some music projects together, and had a memorable encounter with George Harrison, who at one point in an extended conversation was moved to sing his favorite Raga Charukeshi for me. Subsequent Indian teachers included Nazir Ali Jairazbhoy, who founded the first ethnomusicology department in America, Pandit Jasraj, the leading Hindustani music vocalist of our time, known in India as the Sun of Music, and my current Guruji, legendary tabla player Anindo Chatterjee. From Indian classical, I first studied with Harihar Rao, the senior disciple of Ravi Shankar, who earlier taught Don Ellis, Lalo Schifrin, Ed Shaughnessy, George Harrison, Robby Krieger, John Densmore and Brian Jones. From jazz, I studied improvisation with Lee Konitz, later becoming close friends. I've been fortunate to know masters of improvised music personally from jazz, Indian classical and rock. Playing my personal vision of jazz, claiming that name as part of my heritage, I endeavor feeling the rhythms of life in the present, past and future, entering into them through touch and nuance at the piano, connecting rajas, sattva and tamas circular movement, cohesion and disintegration.
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