Traveller

In a decade long ago, and a place far away, I saw Ravi Shankar demonstrate his mastery of the sitar in an atmosphere heavy with the scent of patchouli and pot. I wasn’t then, and I’m not now, a big fan of Indian ragas, but I really like this album by the less famous of Shankar’s two gorgeous and extremely talented daughters. (Norah Jones is the other one.) To my ears, Anoushka Shankar has a genetically transmitted affinity for sitar, and a hard-earned mastery of the instrument to go with it. But she also brings a spirit of innovation to her music, notable here for the melding of traditions of East and West, and the fascinating interweaving of Spanish and Indian musical genres. Shankar is joined on several pieces here by Javier Limón, a man as gifted on guitar as she is on sitar. Together, they blend ragas and flamenco seamlessly, a blending that seems obvious once heard, but an affinity I wouldn’t have thought of before I heard this album, despite the fact that flamenco has roots in India. (There is even a Spanish band—Ojos de Brujo—that has become popular by celebrating that shared heritage.) If you are, yourself, a “traveller,” this album will take you on a fascinating auditory journey, rich, exotic, but oddly familiar.