Anoushka Shankar 'Chapter III: We Return To Light' LP

Third and final instalment of the trilogy of mini-albums from acclaimed sitar player, producer and composer Anoushka Shankar (co-produced with Sarathy Korwar) via Nils Frahm's Leiter label.

‘Three chapters, three geographies,’ Shankar scribbled in a diary at a café in Goa on New Year’s Day two years ago, manifesting an ambitious trilogy that she hoped would span multiple geographies with nods to her roots, across continents and collaborators. Looking back now, it’s safe to say that the 11-time Grammy Award nominee has outdone herself. Chapter I was recorded in Berlin acknowledging Shankar’s European heritage (she was born and lives in London), while Chapter II was captured in California, where she moved aged 11 and lived for over 15 years. Central to Chapter III is the mindfulness of India at the root of all her music.

Shankar studied Indian Classical music in a deeply immersive fashion from her father Ravi Shankar. She also attended the British School in New Delhi as a kid. But it was only later as a teenager – when she found herself surrounded by friends from the music and fashion scene – that she forged more personal connections with the people and the land. This included a fascination for Goa Trance – India’s electronic music export to the rest of the world. In her twenties, Shankar escaped to the beach state to disappear from her touring and public life every New Year’s. She chased dance floor epiphanies in secret forest raves, participating with wild, youthful abandon, accompanied by its sibling feelings of positivity, hope, connection and joy. Think Inside Out: Millennial Goa Psy Edition.

That sets the template for Chapter III, where Shankar also holds steadfast in her desire to work with a different producer on each mini-album. Here, that responsibility falls to London-based, Indian multi-instrumentalist Sarathy Korwar, one of the most original and compelling voices in the British jazz scene. Shankar also decided that Korwar would help to ground the release and round out the symbolism around working with the album’s third key collaborator, composer and sarod player Alam Khan, son of the famed Indian classical guru, Ali Akbar Khan.Let’s shift the weight of history out of the room first: Anoushka Shankar and Alam Khan belong to two of India’s most legendary – there’s really no other word for it – musical families. Their fathers, Ravi Shankar and Ali Akbar Khan, were both renowned disciples of the legendary guru Baba Alauddin Khan (he is regarded as one of India’s greatest ever musicians). They trained side-by-side within the rigorous Maihar gharana tradition. Their electrifying, soul-stirring performances set a foundation in Indian music history, soundtracking the emergence of a fledgeling nation. Shankar and Khan established their own influential legacies, developing a unique vocabulary for their respective instruments.