Ravi Shankar (7 April 1920 – 11 December 2012), often referred to by the title Pandit, was a Grammy Award-winning Indian musician best known for his virtuosity on the sitar. In becoming world-famous, Shankar was awarded the three highest national civil honours of India: Padma Bhushan, in 1967, Padma Vibhushan, in 1981, and Bharat Ratna, in 1999. He received the music award of the UNESCO International Music Council in 1975, three Grammy Awards, and was nominated for an Academy Award. Post his death, Grammy announced Pandit Ravi Shankar as a recipient of the lifetime-achievement Grammy. Grammy award-winning singer Norah Jones and Anoushka Shankar, also a noted sitarist, are amongst his children.

Born on April 7th, 1920 in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, India into an orthodox, well-off Brahmin family, Rabindra Shankar Chowdery’s father, ShyÆm Shankar, was employed as a diwan (minister) by the Maharajah of Jhalawar. By the age of 13, Ravi Shankar was going along on every tour of his brother Uday Shankar’s Compagnie de Danse et Musique Hindoue (Company of Hindu Dance and Music). At the All-Bengali Music Conference in December 1934, he met the multi-instrumentalist Allauddin Khan. Precisely when Allauddin Khan was born is uncertain. People hazard dates in the 1860s around 1862, but in later years he himself gave his age haphazardly. He would transform many musicians’ lives, but he had an incalculable effect on Ali Akbar (his son), Annapurna Devi (his daughter), and Shankar himself. Allauddin Khan joined Uday’s troupe as its principal soloist around 1935-1936.