Pt Shiv Kumar Sharma to be honored with lifetime achievement award

            Sursagar Society of Dilli Gharana has announced that Santoor maestro Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma will be conferred upon with the annual Sangeet Martand Ustad Chand Khan Lifetime Achievement Award 2016.

About Pt Shiv Kumar Sharma :

Pandit Shivkumar Sharma born on 13 January 1938 is an Indian Santoor The Santoor is a folk instrument from Jammu and kashmir.

• His father started teaching him vocals and tabla when he was just five. Uma Dutt Sharma did “extensive research” on the santoor, and decided that Sharma should be the first musician to play Indian classical music on the santoor. So he started learning santoor at the age of thirteen, and made his father’s dream come true. He gave his first public performance in Bombay in 1955.
• Shivkumar Sharma is the master instrumentalist of the Santoor, after some years as a vocalist. He is credited with making the Santoor a popular Classical Instrument.
• In a 1999 interview to rediff.com, Shivkumar said that it was his father who decided that he should play the Santoor and that he never thought he would be choosing it when he started learning music. He composed the background music for one of the scenes in Shantaram’s Jhanak Jhanak Payal Baje in 1956. He recorded his first solo album in 1960.
• In 1967, he teamed up with flautist Hariprasad Chaurasiaand Brij Bhushan Kabra to produce a concept album, Call of the Valley(1967) which turned out to be one of the greatest hits in Indian Classical Music.
• Shivkumar is the recipient of national and international awards, including an honorary citizenship of the city of Baltimore, USA, in 1985, the Sangeet Natak Akademi Awardin 1986 the Padma Shri in 1991, and the Padma Vibhushan in 2001.

Sangeet Martand Ustad Chand Khan Lifetime Achievement Award:-

The 23rd edition of the festival that celebrates Indian classical art is scheduled to be held on September 13 and September 14 here with performances by some of the leading Hindustani classical vocal and instrumental maestros.

• The society has been felicitating stalwarts of Indian classical music and dance with the award since 1986 to recognize their contribution towards enriching the art forms.
• the festival aims to resonate a musical spirit among “music connoisseurs from far and wide” as well as offer them an opportunity to connect with the art form.
• Highlights of the two-day celebration include a vocal recital by Khalifa of Dilli Gharana, Ustad Iqbal Ahmed Khan on the first day, and a sarod recital by Pandit Tajendra Narayan Majumdar followed by a vocal piece by Pandita Ashwini Bhide Deshpande on the second.
• Established by Ustad Chand Khan Sahab in 1940, the Sursagar society aims to conserve and promote an awareness of our rich and heterogeneous culture by focusing on the classical arts.