Raghu Rai, India`s best known photographer, first shot a series of memorable photo essays on the masters of Indian classical music for India Today magazine in the mid- 980s. Since then, he has ever stopped shooting them in concerts, in their homes, with their gurus, and in special locations. Rai profiles only thirteen masters the greatest of the great nayak musicians who went much beyond their gharanas and broke new ground with their approach to music. They include Ravi Shankar, Ali Akbar Khan, M.S. Subbulakshmi, Mallikarjun Mansur, Kumar Gandharva, S. Balchander, Alla Rakha, Zakir Hussain, Vilayat Khan, Bismillah Khan, Kishori Amonkar, Hari Prasad Chaurasia and Bhimsen Joshi. Eight of these masters have passed away, so these portraits in turn affectionate, intense, playful, and reverent will remain their definitive ones, a precious and unsurpassable record of Indian musical heritage. Only a true rasik like Rai could have taken these pictures, for they required someone who possessed not only an understanding of classical music but also complete humility. Both aspects are evident in the extraordinary images that follow. The book is accompanied by a perceptive text written by noted writer and music expert Ashok Vajpeyi, chairman of Lalit Kala Akademi. His profiles of these musicians show what makes them great, alongside giving us remarkable snapshots of their lives, on and off the stage. A fonder photographic tribute to the custodians of Indian classical music could not have been possible. This is undoubtedly a collector`s edition.

Author's anecdotes and impression on the life and musical genius of musicians of Hindustani music style.

Both were gifts-the rarest of the rare- offered by India to mankind. For these gifts, humanity will remain in perpetual debt which cannot be redeemed merely by paying homage by different means but by allowing these luminaries to affect us, catalyze us, help us remove all callousness, and sensitize us towards a new spiritual level of consciousness. The great Masters brought before humanity, for the first time, the most efficacious and practical methods of understanding ultimate verities and application of such verities/truths in their practical day-to-day life. The contribution of both the masters in the field of personal development and especially in the case of education of children is ideal for all nations. Both Swami Vivekananda and Paramahansa Yogananda were great masters of humanity. No, ordinary man, surely, is worthy of this spiritual title. But now and then there appears on earth one of the noble lineages of God-realized souls to carry out the plans of Divinity and establish righteousness on earth. Vivekananda's work prepared the ground in America and planted the seeds of Eastern spiritual values. These seeds were to be nurtured by another spiritual giant from India, Paramahansa Yogananda (1893-1952).

Pandit Amarnath was regarded as a musicians' musician and the foremost interpreter of the Indore Gharana. In this book, he demystifies the many terms associated with Hindustani classical music for the common man interested in this art form. From crucial terms such as avaart and kharaj bharna to musicological terminology like moorchhana and shrutee to short profiles of stalwarts in the field and telling musical 'proverbs' and sayings of the great masters, this is a pathfinder to the otherwise closed traditions of Hindustani classical music whose secrets and philosophies have been restricted to masters and connoisseurs. Pandit Amarnath reveals the terms in both their etymology as well as their implications in musical practice and listening. First published twenty-five years ago to great critical acclaim and now being updated by Rekha and Vishal Bhardwaj, this will be a must-read for music lovers and musicologists, musicians and students, linguists and historians alike.