r meets George Harrison and Harrison brings Indian music to the world in the following years. Harrison brought Ravi Shankar to play at music festivals and on American tours. Harrison took on the task of learning the sitar and even included Indian inspired music on The Beatles album “Revolver” and “Sargent Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band.”
1966 Peter Walker’s album “Rainy Day Raga” was a breakthrough album blending folk, and Indian raga. Peter Walker was born in 1937 in Boston MA. In the early 1960’s “during a stint in San Francisco he heard the legendary Ravi Shankar perform and Walker’s lifelong fascination with Eastern raga was formed, along with his like passion for the flamenco tradition(6). ” “He studied with Ravi Shankar for a time in Los Angeles and also studied with Ali Akbar Khan in San Francisco. Returning to the Boston area, he became a regular on the 1960’s Cambridge and Greenwich Village folk scenes, where he became close friends with guitarist Sandy Bull and the tragic folksinger Karen Dalton(6).”
His debut album “Rainy Day Raga” is best described in the linear notes by Walker: “American raga, or as Bob Shelton of the New York Times calls it, American folk raga – the word raga is used because of the association with Indian classical and folk music, employs the Indian concept of starting with a drone, then a melodic line based on the scale, then weaving, reweaving, and interweaving the melodic line so that a freely improvised piece is constructed… Then when the melody line has been inserted I feel free to improvise, based on emotion…The music reaches a fusion point, and a sound is produced like running brook water with the improvisations like bubbles flickering over the surface. Then the piece must be closed out. (7).” A critic wrote “Peter Walker – tall, thin, dark haired, and intense – is an exciting young guitarist and creative musician who through his own playing, and as a musical director for Timothy Leary’s “Celebrations” is giving a new direction and a new sound to American “folk” music today. (7).”
1968 The Pentangle releases their first album “Sweet Child” immediately followed by the amazing albums “The Pentangle” and “Basket of Light.” The same year Incredible String band released “Hangman’s Beautiful Daughter” and “Wee Tam” featuring Robin Williamson and Mike Heron. These albums are hippie psychedelic folk with whimsical charm and eastern raga-acid-folk embellishments. Green Crown is a notable track which is a wonderfully psychedelic raga folk song the likes of which have yet to be recreated.
Takoma Records released Minneapolis based Leo Kottke’s second album “Circle Round the Sun” in 1970 which sold well (3). The rare and classic band Magic Carpet released its one and only self-titled album which infuses sitar into folk music.
Leo Kottke – Circle Round the Sun
In 1972 Glenn Jones is introduced to John Fahey in high school. (2)
1973 Ravi Shankar and Ali Akbar Khan release “Ragas” a stunning double disc LP featuring two of India’s greatest musicians.
On Feb. 28 1986, Robbie Basho dies on a chiropractor’s table in Berkeley after an “intentional whiplash” procedure causes several blood vessels in his neck to burst.
At the same time thirty-three-year-old guitarist Steffen Basho-Junghans first hears Basho’s music while living in East Berlin. “I discovered it with a German-licensed release of the first Windham Hill guitar sampler from 1981… About five or six months later, I got a message that Robbie died nearly at the same time that I was discovering him.” Throughout the 1980 to present day Steffen Basho-Junghans has been playing in the raga folk style. He was born in 1953 in Germany and toured extensively and developed a guitar festival in Berlin. In the 2000s he began releasing solo guitar albums which display incredible musical talent, creativity and impeccable skill. One of the most refined and polished integrations of folk and raga in meditative form. Steffen added Basho to his name out of respect and to honor his fallen musical hero’s legacy.
1992 Pandit Debashish Bhattacharya, a world renowned In