Zakir Hussain (musician)
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Ustad Zakir Hussain (Hindi: ज़ाकिर हुसैन, Urdu: زاکِر حسین), born March 9, 1951, son of tabla player Ustad Alla Rakha, is a well known classical tabla player in India. He has also won awards and recognitions for his contribution to the world of music. He is arguably one of the greatest tabla players ever, and an excellent entertainer.
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[edit] Personal Details
Ustad Zakir Hussain is a prodigious percussionist. He is the son of Ustad Alla Rakha, himself the leading tabla artist of his time. Zakir is married to noted Kathak dancer and student of Sitara Devi, Antonia Minnecola, an Italian American. Minnecola earlier worked as Hussain's manager. His two daughters, Anisa Qureshi and Isabella Qureshi, are in the field of arts. Anisa graduated from UCLA and is a filmmaker and video producer. His second daughter, Isabella, is studying in Manhattan as a dance major.
He has one late sister, Razia, and two younger brothers, Fazal Qureshi and the younger Taufiq Qureshi.
[edit] Musical career
Zakir was touring by the age of twelve. He attended St. Michael's High School in Mahim, and graduated from St Xaviers, Mumbai. Zakir went to the United States in 1970, embarking on an international career that today includes no fewer than 150 concert dates a year.
Zakir has worked with many western and Indian artists, and has produced many works for fusion, perhaps most notably with The Beatles. In 1971 he recorded with an American psychedelic band called Shanti. He has also worked with John McLaughlin in Shakti in 1975, with L. Shankar (Lakshminarayanan Shankar) in the Diga Rhythm Band, and with Mickey Hart on his Rolling Thunder album (on which he and his father played a tabla duet). Although Shakti was disbanded a few years later, it reunited under the name Remember Shakti.
In 1987, his first solo release, Making Music, was acclaimed as one of the most inspired East-West fusion albums ever recorded. In 1988, he became the youngest percussionist to ever be awarded the title of Padma Shri. In 1990, he was awarded the Indo-American Award in recognition for his cultural contribution to relations between the United States and India. In April, 1991, he was presented with the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award by the President of India, making him one of the youngest musicians to receive this recognition from India's governing cultural institute.
In 1992, Planet Drum, an album co-created and produced by Zakir and Mickey Hart, was awarded a Grammy for Best World Music Album, the Downbeat Critics Poll for Best World Beat Album, and the NARM Indie Best Seller Award for World Music Recording. The band Planet Drum, with Zakir as music director, toured nationally in 1996 and 1997. Zakir also continues to tour with the musicians from Shakti — John McLaughlin, Shankar and T.H. Vinayakram — in different collaborations and ensembles as well as leading various percussion ensembles of his own design. In Summer'99, Shakti re-grouped for an international tour.
In 1992, Zakir founded live concert performances by masters of the classical music of India. The label presents Zakir's own world percussion ensemble, The Rhythm Experience, both North and South Indian classical recordings, Best of Shakti, and a Masters of Percussion series. He has recorded and performed with artists as diverse as George Harrison, Ali Akbar Khan, Ravi Shankar, Aashish Khan,Vasant Rai, Imrat Khan, Joe Henderson, Van Morrison, Jack Bruce, Tito Puente, Pharoah Sanders, Billy Cobham, Charles Lloyd, the Hong Kong Symphony and the New Orleans Symphony.
[edit] In present life
Zakir is a founding member of Bill Laswell's 'World Music Supergroup' Tabla Beat Science.
He was a visiting professor at Princeton University for one semester in 2006, as well as a visiting professor at Stanford University for a quarter in 2007.
He starred in the Merchant Ivory Film Heat and Dust, in which he also composed the score. He has composed soundtracks for several movies, most notably In Custody and The Mystic Masseur by Ismail Merchant, and has played tabla on the soundtracks of Francis Coppola's Apocalypse Now, Bernardo Bertolucci's Little Buddha, and other films.[1]
Zakir composed, performed and acted as Indian music advisor for Vaanaprastham, which screened at the Cannes Film Festival in 1999. He is the recipient of the 1999 National Heritage Fellowship, the United States' most prestigious honor for a master in the traditional arts.
Zakir starred in the documentary "The Speaking Hand: Zakir Hussain and the Art of the Indian Drum" (2003 Sumantra Ghosal) and the 1998 documentary "Zakir and His Friends".
Zakir participates in the Silk Road collaborative musical project. [1]
Zakir teaches Tabla to advanced students in both San Francisco and Mumbai.
Zakir participates in the Global Drum Project. [2]
[edit] Selected discography
- Sangam (2006)
- Maestro's Choice Series One - Alla Rakha & Zakir Hussain (2005)
- Punjabi Dhamar (2004)
- Raag Chandrakauns (2004)
- Selects (2002)
- And the Rhythm Experience (1998)
- Essence of Rhythm (1998)
- Magical Moments of Rhythm (1997)
- Kirwani (1997)
- Jog And Rageshri (1994)
- Music of the Deserts (1993)
- Flights of Improvisation (1992)
- The One and Only (1992)
- Tabla Duet (1988)
- Making Music (1987)
- Diga (1976)
- Shakti (1975)
- Rolling Thunder (1972)
- Shanti (1971)
[edit] Awards and accolades
- Awarded the civilian honour of Padma Shri by the Indian government in 1988
- Planet Drum (Produced by Zakir) awarded Grammy for Best World Music album in 1992
- Awarded the title of Padma Bhushan by the Indian government in 2002 for his contributions to the field of Indian music.
Zakir received the distinct honor of co-composing the opening music for the Summer Olympics in Atlanta, 1996, and was commissioned to compose music for San Francisco's premiere contemporary ballet company, Lines and to compose an original work for the San Francisco Jazz Festival, both in 1998. He has received numerous grants and awards, including participation in the Meet the Composer programs funded by the Pew Memorial Trust.
[edit] Notes
[edit] References
- Drummer World
- Moment Records
- Zakir Hussain at the Internet Movie Database
- Pennsylvania State University Page
- Little India article
