Hussain’s Celtic Connections comes to Chan Centre for the performing arts at UBC Saturday, March 21 (next Saturday) at 8pm in the Chan Shun Concert Hall.
VANCOUVER – Zakir Hussain, one of the world’s most revered percussionists and Chan Centre favourite, is returning to Vancouver, this time with a brand new and original sound, fusing captivating Indian tabla rhythms with the rich sounds of the Celtic tradition.
Hussain’s Celtic Connections comes to Chan Centre for the performing arts at UBC Saturday, March 21 (next Saturday) at 8pm in the Chan Shun Concert Hall.
Appearing alongside the Indian prodigy and multi-GRAMMY Award winner is an all star, international ensemble of musicians hailing from Ireland, Scotland, France and India, in their first North American tour.
While Hussain has collaborated across many genres, with such world-class artists as diverse as YoYo Ma, Bela Fleck and George Harrison, this is his first time combining Indian and Celtic styles and the result is mesmerizing, the tabla and bodhran, Indian flute and Irish pipes, make for a stunning blend.
Highlighting the distinctive percussive sounds of regions worlds apart, Hussain’s skillful prowess on tabla – two small hand drums, the left larger “Bayan” and the right smaller “Dahina”- is artfully accompanied by Ireland’s famed John Joe Kelly on bodhrán, a shallow one-sided Irish drum played with a short wooden stick. The ensemble boasts an array of other musicians accomplished in their own right, including: fiddle player Charlie McKerron of Scotland’s Capercaillie fame; award-winning bansuri (Indian bamboo flute) player Rakesh Chaurasia; one of Scotland’s most distinctive pipers Fraser Fifield; Dublin-based guitarist Tony Byrne; highly sought after Scottish fiddle player Patsy Reid; distinguished Indian violinist Ganesh Rajagopalan; and French flautist Jean-Michel Veillon, renowned for his part in introducing wooden flute into the folk music of Breton.
Hussain, one of the most highly-respected architects of world music fusion, first experimented with fusing Celtic and Indian music together in 2011 as the result of a commission he received for Glasgow’s annual Celtic music festival while in residency with the Scotland Council of the Arts. For this commission he assembled various musicians to create a 90-minute show and received such a strong response that he was requested by the UK Council of the Arts to play at the London 2012 pre-Olympic performances. Since then, the group has successfully toured throughout the USA and India, and now embarks to bring this rich collaboration to audiences in Canada.
“Celtic music has a beautiful spirituality to it that resonates very strongly with audiences, and Hussain has an impressive ability to seamlessly blend together Indian sounds conveyed through the tabla’s deep and methodical beats with many different styles,” said Joyce Hinton, Co-Managing Director of the Chan Centre. “We last welcomed Hussain to our stage in 2012 and are thrilled to have him once again join us to demonstrate his fearless, innovative spirit that truly knows no bounds.”
With a career that began at the age of 12, Hussain has collected countless honours and accolades, among them multiple GRAMMY Awards and the prestigious honour of the US National Heritage Fellowship. In 2012, he was named Best Percussionist in the Downbeat Critics’ Poll.
Zakir Hussain’s Celtic Connections
Date: Saturday, March 21, 2015 at 8pm
Ticket prices: From $36
Address: Chan Centre for the Performing Arts at UBC
6265 Crescent Road
Box Office: 604-822-2697 / chancentre.com
