Prasad Bhandarkar at Ustad Amir Khan Music Festival, June 1, 2019. Accompanied by Vikas Yendluri.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Prasad Bhandarkar started learning Hindustani music when he was 8 years old. He was initiated into classical music by his mother. Prasad got his initial training on Harmonium and Hindustani vocal music.

During his engineering college years, Prasad wanted to learn a solo performing instrument and happened to attend a concert by the renowned maestro Padma Vibhushan Pandit Hari Prasad Chaurasia in Gunidaas Sammelan in Mumbai. The simplicity of the Bansuri flute and Hariji's playing style really appealed to him. Soon he started learning Bansuri from Shri Anantrao Patwardhan of Mumbai. In 1988, he was fortunate to become student of Pandit Hari Prasad Chaurasia. Prasad derives strong influence from Pandit Chaurasia’s emotional and soulful style of playing Bansuri. In recent years, Prasad has been learning music from the noted Sitar player of Maihar Gharana, Pandit Partha Chatterjee who is one of the prominent disciples of the late Pandit Nikhil Banerjee. Partha-da perfectly combines the gayaki (vocal) and and tantrakari (string instrumental) styles in his music and Prasad finds this approach very attractive and replicable in Bansuri.

Vikas Yendluri

Vikas Yendluri is a tabla artist in the tradition of Punjab, and a disciple of Sri Arshad Syed since the age of 5. He has also been studying with Ustad Zakir Hussain. Vikas has accompanied some of the most illustrious artists of Indian classical music in concerts across the United States.