Raag Madhuvanti is a creation of the sitar legend, Ustad Vilayat Khan. Comprised of the softer shades of Multani, an afternoon melody, this raga conveys romantic emotions. It was created sometime around the early 1940’s. The word ‘romantic’, however, is a broad canvas of emotions and in case of M...

Set against the sunset over Lake Mulshi in Maharashtra, Pelva Naik sings Raag Maru which is considered as a Raāgputra of Malkauns but opinions differ among scholars. It's not sung much being too similar to Yaman and also Maru Behag being more popular. The notes go- Sa Ga ma (sharp) pa ni sa. Sa ...

Raag Ahir Bhairav | Thaat Bhairav | Samay 6am to 9am
Recorded at Ravenna, Italy

Debasmita Bhattacharya is one of India’s finest young sarod players. She balances a deep knowledge of classical forms with an expansive mindset, pushing the Hindustani tradition into the 21st century without compromi...

Shashank Subramanyam started learning early in life - some say he could recognise all 72 Melakarta scales by the age of two-and-a-half. His first musical immersions came with singing and violin, but he fell in love with the venu bamboo flute as soon as he picked it up, focusing on it from that po...

Mridangam maestro Patri Satish Kumar plays unaccompanied on Mahabalipuram beach in Tamil Nadu, substituting a tanpura for sound of the waves.

Patri Satish Kumar is one of India’s leading mridangam players, known for fine dynamic control and architectural solo phrasings. First inducted into musi...

A special rendering of Raag Gauri and accompanied by Dattatray Bhave (tabla) and Leeladhar Chakradev (harmonium). Bodas is a khayal vocalist, singing in the Gwalior gharana style. His father Narayanrao Bodas was a famous singer and Marathi stage-actor, and passed his love of music onto his son. K...

D Srinivas is one of the finest unplugged carnatic veena exponents in India. He performs a short piece at a farmhouse in Mulshi, India. Renowned for his speed and mathematical approach to Carnatic classical music, he continues to tour and teach, constantly developing his style. He studied in the ...

Kamal Sabri demonstrates the sarangi, a bowed instrument from North India renowned for its ability to capture the expressive flexibility of the human voice.

Kamal Sabri carries his family’s musical tradition forward to a seventh generation. He absorbed the rich Senia sarangi gharana from his fat...

Young Carnatic vocalist Bharat Sundar sings Behag, a raga imported from Hindustani Music. It is popular for tukda (‘little pieces’) and other lighter songs.

Bharat Sundar is a young Carnatic vocalist. He first studied under Gayathri Mahesh, and became the first winner of Jaya TV’s Carnatic Music...

Young sitarist Dhruv Bedi plays the early night-time raga Shudh Kalyan, a blend of Bhupali and Yaman. Dhruv studies under Imdadkhani maestro Budhaditya Mukherjee.

Bedi is one of India’s most promising young sitarists. The son of sitar and surbahar exponent Jagdeep Singh Bedi, he also receives tr...

Amidst the incessant chirping of birds in this stunning temple complex in South India, Jayanth Ambedkar explores the Carnatic raga Kapi on his bansuri – the bamboo flute.

This video was shot early in the morning at the sandstone-carved Tiger Caves in coastal Tamil Nadu. The stark sound of the ...

It is said that the ancestors of the Mallick family, Darbhanga court musicians, once ended a drought in the area through singing the rain-bringing Raag Megh.

Pandit Ramkumar and Samit Mallick are leading exponents of the Darbhanga dhrupad court music tradition, named for a former state near the ...

Dhruv Bedi is one of India’s most promising young sitarists. The son of sitar and surbahar exponent Jagdeep Singh Bedi, he also receives training from Budhaditya Mukherjee in the traditional guru-shishya style. He is renowned for his natural ability at capturing gayaki ang [singing style], and al...

A special performance against the Bay of Bengal beach, Shashank perfoms Raag Ahir Bhairav. Born to a biochemist father in the extraordinarily musical village of Rudrapatna, Shashank Subramanyam started learning early in life. He mastered all 72 Melakarta scales by the age of two-and-a-half, promp...

Filmed on location at Singur, West Bengal, Mita Nag performs Suha Kanada. Nag is the sixth generation of sitarists in her family - a lineage including Manilal Nag (her father) and Gokul Nag (her grandfather). She hails from the Bishnupur gharana, a dhrupad-influenced tradition of Bengal, and is k...

Ramakant Gaikwad calls out across the Maharashtra plains as if to an unseen companion, using Bageshree to alternate between optimism and introspection

Ramakant Gaikwad is a promising young khayal singer who fuses the Kirana and Patiala gharanas. He started learning aged 4 at his father’s music s...

Indrani Mukherjee sings the morning Raag Todi amongst the lush setting of The Rajbari Bawali near Kolkata. Mukherjee is from the Kirana-Rampur style and thumri in Purab Ang. After training in the family she studied under gurus from Allahabad and Benares, and was selected as a scholar of the ITC ...

Shashank Subramanyam substitutes a tanpura for the sounds of the ocean for an outdoor take of Raga Charukeshi.

Born to a biochemist father in the extraordinarily musical village of Rudrapatna, Shashank Subramanyam started learning early in life. He mastered all 72 Melakarta scales by the age of...

Sitar maestro Budhaditya Mukherjee’s spectacular rendition of the rain-bringing Raag Mian Ki Malhar, live from an Indian thunderstorm.

Darbar doesn't usually share what goes on behind the scenes of our shoots, but on this occasion the events that we witnessed were too spectacular to keep to our...

Set amongst the stunning Tiger Caves said to have been built in the 8th century AD, Jayanth plays Sindhu Bhairavi. As a child his grandmother V.S. Sundar gave him a grounding in Carnatic vocal music, and his grandfather T.S. Sankaran taught him the venu (bamboo flute). Over the years he developed...

A stunning rendering of morning Raag Todi set in the ground of The Rajbari Bawali near Kolkata. Mukherjee is revered for his extraordinary command of the sitar and surbahar - at age 22 veena maestro S Balachander described him as the ‘sitar artist of the century’. He first started learning from h...

Kaushiki sings the evocative Raag Jaunpuri in the Kolkata botanic gardens at sunrise for an exclusive Darbar on location shoot. Despite being bitten by mosquitos her focus remained unwavered as she meanders through the alaap to the bandish. During the recording a crowd of regular walkers and runn...

Filmed as a farmhouse in Mulshi, Mevundi sings as the rain falls Raag Brindavani Sarang. Accompanying is Dhattatray Bhave (tabla) and Leeladhar Chakradev (harmonium). Born in Hubli, his initial training began at home, informally singing bhajans and other devotional music. He recounts that “there ...

Pandit Ramkumar and Samit Mallick are leading exponents of the Darbhanga dhrupad court music tradition, named for a former state near the Nepalese border. It is said that their ancestors once ended a drought in the area through singing the rain-bringing Raag Megh, and the family still live on lan...