Those of my generation are likely to remember the release of the album West Meets East in January of 1967. This documented a truly unique (for its time) duo performance by violinist Yehudi Menuhin and the Indian sitar virtuoso Ravi Shankar, who had become an icon for such pop groups as the Beatles. Deciding whether or not guitarist Sharon Isbin took this album as a point of departure for last night’s program in Herbst Theater, produced jointly by San Francisco Performances (SFP) and the Omni Foundation for the Performing Arts, will be left as an exercise for the reader!
Cover of the Live in Aspen album showing Amjad Ali Khan and Sharon Isbin in the foreground with Khan’s sons, Amaan Ali Bangash and Ayaan Ali Bangash, standing behind them (from the Amazon.com Web page for the album)
The title of the program was Strings for Peace, which was previously the title of a Zoho album, released in 2020, on which Isbin performed four duos for guitar and sarod composed for her by sarod master Amjad Ali Khan. However, the program itself provided a track-by-track account of a subsequent 2024 Zoho release entitled Live in Aspen. It began with Isbin’s solo performance of Francisco Tárrega’s “Capricho árabe,” after which all remaining works were by Khan. The duo performances for sarod and guitar were arranged by Kyle Paul. Khan shared the selections on the program with his two sons, Amaan Ali Bangash and Ayaan Ali Bangash; and tabla percussion was provided by Amit Kavthekar. Kahn himself performed only after the intermission, allowing his sons to give duo performances with Isbin during the first half of the evening. Kahn’s performance was solo, preceding an “all hands” account of the final track on the Live in Aspen album, “Romancing Earth.”
I have to confess that the “West Meets East” concept was far more engaging in the interplay of plucked strings than in had been in the Menuhin-Shankar encounter. Ultimately, that early program was more of a publicity stunt, while Isbin’s recordings and performances made for more convincing accounts of the interplay of contrasting cultures. Nevertheless, in a “live” situation (which cannot be manipulated by amplification gear), I have to confess that, particularly in that final “all hands” session, it was difficult to follow Isbin’s performance amid all of those sarods and the tabla! Nevertheless, this was a particularly engaging offering shared by SFP and Omni. While I was familiar with both of the Zoho albums, there was no substitute for the immediacy of last night’s accounts of all the works on the program.
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