2009 has turned out to be a great year for music! At the beginning itself there is recognition galore for Indian musicians at the global platform. AR Rahman had emerged a black horse sweeping Golden Globe, BAFTA and Oscar for ‘Slumdog Millionaire’.

Ustad Zakir Hussain has picked up his second Grammy for Global Drum Project, which won in the Contemporary World Music Album category. The album is collaboration between Zakir, Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart, Nigerian percussionist Sikiru Adepoju and Puerto Rican jazz percussionist Giovanni Hidalgo. He received the first-ever Grammy for Best World Music Album in 1991 for Planet Drum, which was also a collaboration with Hart.

“I was fast asleep when I heard the news from my daughter and the phone hasn’t stopped ringing since,” says Hussain. “If a guru gives you his blessing or a senior artiste appreciates your work, no one cares; but if another country gives you some recognition, every one talks about it. But to me, the former matters more than awards. I’ve been appreciated only twice by my guru, my father (the late Ustad Allah Rakha), who thought I played reasonably well. That’s the biggest award I could have ever got,” he adds.

He’s now the second Indian after Pandit Ravi Shankar to have received the Grammy twice. He says, “It is a nice feeling to be recognised by your peers and competing with the names that were nominated was itself something to be proud of. One unfulfilled wish of mine is to win a Grammy for an album that has pure Indian classical music. Collaborating with western artistes makes it easier, in a way, to get recognition, but we will hopefully be able to emulate Pandit Ravi Shankar, who has won a Grammy for an Indian classical music album,” he wraps up.

Courtesy: MusicIndiaonline