Quotes by Ravi Shankar - Page 1

Enlightenment is the journey back from the head to the heart.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Journey
Enlightenment
Heart
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There cannot possibly be a god in heaven watching all of this calmly.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Religion
Heaven
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I started out as a dancer, but gradually became more interested in music.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Gradually
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I was invited for the first Woodstock. Actually, I started the programme.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Invited
Woodstock
Programme
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When people say that George Harrison made me famous, that is true in a way.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Famous Me People
George
People Say
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I don't appreciate avant-garde, electronic music. It makes me feel quite ill.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Appreciate
Avant Garde
Electronic Music
Ill
Music Me Feel
Electronic
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Pop changes week to week, month to month. But great music is like literature.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Great
Great Music
Hygiene
Literature
Months
Week
Month
Changes
Pop
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To me, you know, from my childhood I always had a fascination for United States.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Fascination
Childhood Always Me
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My music has a very spiritual background, a sanctity that is almost like worship.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Sanctity
Spiritual
Worship
Almost
Background
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What Sri Chinmoy does is God-given! He has a tremendous, a fantastic creative urge.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Creative
Doe
Fantastic
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In our culture we have such respect for musical instruments, they are like part of God.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Respect
Culture
Instruments
Musical
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I have always had an instinct for doing new things. Call it good or bad, I love to experiment.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Instinct
New Things
Love Good Always
Love Good Bad
Experiment
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The music that I have learned and want to give is like worshipping God. It's absolutely like a prayer.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Prayer
Absolutely
Worshipping
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I believe in one thing: that anyone who is able to do something good for someone, I mean, should be praised.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Good Believe I Believe
Praised
Something Good
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I was admired by all these hippies, and it was wonderful playing at Monterey and Woodstock, performing for half a million people.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Performing
Woodstock
Admired
Hippies
Million People
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Many people, especially young people, have started listening to sitar since George Harrison, one of the Beatles, became my disciple.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Disciple
George
Young People
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Enlightenment is very possible for the ordinary individual. Actually, it is easier than for someone who thinks that they are special.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Enlightenment
Special
Thinking
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I love the work of Matisse and Picasso, but I don't have enough millions to own one. And I don't really believe in owning art, anyway.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Millions
Love Art Work
Anyway
Love Work Art
Owning
Picasso
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'Ravi' means 'sun.' It's a Sanskrit original word. And 'Shankar' is another name of Shiva, one of the holy trinity god that we worship.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Holy
Sun
Trinity
Worship
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I will keep playing as long as my body lets me, and as long as I'm wanted by my listeners. Because music is the only thing that keeps me going.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Listeners
Music Me Long
Lets
The Only Thing
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I enjoy seeing other Indian musicians - old and young - coming to Europe and America and having some success. I'm happy to have contributed to that.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Indian
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I try to give to my music the spiritual quality, very deep in the soul, which does something even if you are not realizing it or analyzing it - that's the duty of the music.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Quality
Analyzing
Duty
Realizing
Soul
Spiritual
Try
Deep
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I have great difficulty sitting in the middle of the night and writing. Everything I do comes spontaneous. Sometimes it takes a long time; sometimes it comes just like that.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Difficulty
Spontaneous
Time Great Long
Time Great Night
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I do think that my Indian classical audiences thought I was sacrificing them through working with George; I became known as the 'fifth Beatle.' In India, they thought I was mad.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Fifth
Indian
Mad
Beatle
Classical
George
Sacrificing
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I appreciate very much Vilayat Khan, the sitar player, and Bismillah Khan, the shehnai player; and among the tabla players, of course, Alla Rakha, Kishan Maharaja, and all these people.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Appreciate
Among
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I have my own spiritual guru, and I'm so happy, and I feel so satisfied that I might appreciate many other famous gurus, but, you know, I am not attracted that way because I have found the person.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Guru
Satisfied
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In the olden days, I believe Mozart also improvised on piano, but somehow in the last 200 years, the whole training of Western classical music - they don't read between the lines, they just read the lines.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Classical Music
Lines
Western
Music Believe I Believe
Classical
Improvised
Mozart
Olden
Somehow
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Everybody has a right to like or dislike anything or anyone. From a flower to a flavor to a book or a composition but it is very sad that in our country we actually fight over such things in an unseemly manner.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Sad
Book
Composition
Country
Dislike
Flavor
Flower
Manner
Such Things
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In the U.K., classical music is composed by individuals and written down. Indian music is based on certain sequences called ragas. When I perform live, 95% of the music is improvised: it never sounds the same twice.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Music
Certain
Classical Music
Indian
Indian Music
Written
Twice
Never
Based
Perform
Same
Classical
Composed
Down
Improvised
Sounds
Written Down
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My brother had a house in Paris. To it came many Western classical musicians. These musicians all made the same point: 'Indian music,' they said, 'is beautiful when we hear it with the dancers. On its own, it is repetitious and monotonous.'
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Indian
Indian Music
Monotonous
Western
Classical
Dancers
Musicians
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My secret ambition was always to provide music for animation films: something with an Indian theme, either a fairy tale or mythological tale or on the Krishna theme. I still have a very deep desire, but these sorts of chances don't always come.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Ambition
Animation
Deep Desire
Desire
Fairy
Fairy Tale
Indian
Secret
Theme
Chances
Mythological
Provide
Tale
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Ah, 'Pather Panchali' was the most inspiring film that I wrote music for, and it was so spontaneously done. I saw the film, composed on the spot, along with myself and only four other musicians, and everything was done within 4-1/2 hours, I think an all-time record anywhere.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Inspiring
All Time
Ah
Composed
Spot
Musicians
Spontaneously
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There are thousands of ragas, and they are all connected with different times of the day, like sunrise or night or sunset. It is all based on 72 of what we call 'mela' or scales. And we have principally nine moods, ranging from peacefulness to praying, or the feeling of emptiness you get by sitting by the ocean.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Ocean
Connected
Different Times
Emptiness
Night
Nine
Praying
Scales
Sitting
Sunrise
Based
Call
Moods
Principally
Thousands
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In India, I have been called a 'destroyer.' But that is only because they mixed my identity as a performer and as a composer. As a composer I have tried everything, even electronic music and avant-garde. But as a performer I am, believe me, getting more classical and more orthodox, jealously protecting the heritage that I have learned.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Avant Garde
Composer
Electronic Music
Heritage
Identity
India
Jealously
Orthodox
Music Believe Me
Classical
Destroyer
Electronic
Getting
Learned
Mixed
Performer
Protecting
Tried
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Whether you are aware of them or not, whether you recognize them as spiritual or not, you probably have had the experiences of silence, or transcendence, or the Divine-a few seconds, a few minutes that seem out of time; a moment when the ordinary looks beautiful, glowing; a deep sense of being at peace, feeling happy for no reason. When these experiences come...believe in them. They reflect your true nature.
Ravi Shankar / Musician
Experience
Happiness
Beautiful
Spiritual
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