World Routes - Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma

Lopa Kothari and Jameela Siddiqi introduce a recital by the Indian santoor virtuoso Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma, accompanied by Anindo Chatterjee on tabla, recorded earlier this year at the Darbar Festival in London. This is the last of three programmes from the 2010 Darbar Festival, which took place over the Easter weekend at Kings Place in London. Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma is a revered maestro of Indian classical music: he is based in Mumbai, but he regularly performs across the world - he first played in London back in 1968. The santoor is a hammered dulcimer which was originally a Kashmiri folk instrument - it was Shiv Kumar Sharma who reinvented it as an instrument suitable for playing Indian ragas, adding strings and developing a new delicate but powerful style of playing.