West Meets East: Indian Music and its Influence on the West

The bottom has rather dropped out of the market for world music compilations but just occasionally a valuable collection can still come along with a fresh idea that makes you wonder why nobody thought of it before. Borrowing the title of a landmark 1967 fusion album by Ravi Shankar and Yehudi Menuhin, West Meet East is a three-disc set that explores the influence of Indian music on Occidental culture and brings to mind two quotes. The first comes from David Harrington of Kronos Quartet, who once posed the rhetorical question, “Can you imagine what Beethoven would’ve sounded like if he’d heard Indian music?” The second quote comes from George Harrison, who, when rock’n’roll embraced the sound of the sitar in the 1960s, credited Shankar with opening Western ears to “the wondrous aesthetics of India’s ancient musical tradition.” In fact, between Beethoven and the Beatles, a panoply of visionary musicians from the jazz and classical worlds drew inspiration from Indian music and it is this pioneering body of work that is celebrated over these 40 tracks.

Compositions by Ravel, Debussy and Britten all illustrate how an Oriental aesthetic had penetrated Western conservatoires by the early decades of the 20th century. By the 1950s, jazz was also enthusiastically absorbing the scales and motifs of Indian music, heard here on John Coltrane’s ‘India’, Dave Brubeck’s ‘Calcutta Blues’, Cannonball Adderley’s ‘New Delhi’ and Miles Davis’ ‘Milestones’. Meanwhile, Shankar’s 1962 cut ‘Improvisation on the Theme of Pather Panchali’ featuring the American jazz flautist Bud Shank, illustrates that it was a two way street. Elsewhere the 1950s easy listening ‘exotica’ of Martin Denny and Les Baxter raises a nostalgic smile and even the flamenco guitarist Sabicas gets in on the global cross-pollination. The result is an eye-opening history lesson, crammed with great music.