The Sitar’s Journey in Melody

Ramprapanna Bhattacharya is an internationally acclaimed sitar and surbahar artist, renowned for his precision, speed, command over raagdari, and seamless interplay of power, grace and technique. He trained under Shri Ram Udar Bhattacharya, Late Pt. Kashinath Mukherjee and Pt. Arvind Parikh. A recipient of the Government of India’s National Scholarship in Sitar, his honours include the Kaustuv Samman from BHU and the Telangana Sangeet Ratna Award. He has performed at the Dover Lane Music Conference, Sankat Mochan Sangeet Samaroha, NCPA Mumbai and India International Centre, and was the first musician to perform at the Buddha Statue venue at Hussain Sagar, Hyderabad.

Rahul Pophali began learning tabla at age seven under Pt. Raghunath Agashe in Akola, Maharashtra. After ten years of training in the Delhi and Farukhabad gharanas, he moved on to advanced study with Pt. Nishikant Barodekar of the Punjab gharana, a senior disciple of Ustad Alla Rakha and Ustad Zakir Hussain. A gifted soloist, he has collaborated with leading Indian classical artists and in genres including rock, jazz and flamenco, and has toured widely in Asia, Europe and the USA. He also teaches through lessons, lecture-demonstrations and workshops. He holds a master’s degree in Tabla and a bachelor’s in Electronics Engineering, working in IT for eight years before becoming a full-time musician. He is currently pursuing PhD research in tabla, and is based in Bangalore.