The Dawn of Indian Music in the West

A little more than fifty years ago, in 1955, Ali Akbar Khan issued an LP called "Music of India: Morning and Evening Ragas", with spoken introduction by violinist Yehudi Menuhin. Until then, Indian music was terra incognita in the West. When the same album was reissued as a CD in 1995, under the title "Then and Now", it was nominated for a Grammy. Between "then and now" has been the explosive influence of Indian music and culture in the West. Words such as karma, yoga, raga, nirvana, all once unknown here, have entered the language. Most famously, the wonders of the Indian - musical world were spread by George Harrison and the Beatles. The music also had a profound effect on Mickey Hart and the Grateful Dead, John McLaughlin (Mahavishnu Orchestra), the Byrds, John Coltrane and many others. The annus mirabilis 1967 saw the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi spreading the wonders of transcendental meditation, Swami Prabhupada founding the International Society for Krishna Consciousness in New York