Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri is associated with which instrument?

Explanation

Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri is one of the leading tabla players of Hindustani music. He is known for his skill as an accompanist to great musicians and for his long career as a teacher of tabla in the United States. He received the Padma Shri in 2019.

Swapan Chaudhuri was born in Kolkata in 1945. He learnt the tabla mainly from Pandit Santosh Krishna Biswas, of the Lucknow gharana. He became known for his clean, precise and sensitive playing and his ability to follow and support the main artist closely. He accompanied many of the greatest musicians of India, including Ravi Shankar, Ali Akbar Khan, Vilayat Khan, Nikhil Banerjee, Bhimsen Joshi and Pandit Jasraj. For many years, he has been the director of percussion studies at the Ali Akbar College of Music in California, founded by Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, where he has trained many students from around the world. He has also performed in collaborations with Western musicians.

The tabla is a pair of drums, the dayan (right-hand drum) and the bayan (left-hand drum), and is the most popular percussion instrument of Hindustani music. The black circle (syahi) on the drumheads, made from a paste of iron filings, rice flour and other materials, gives the tabla its ringing tone. There are six main gharanas of tabla: Delhi, Ajrara, Lucknow, Farukhabad, Benaras and Punjab. The Lucknow gharana, to which Swapan Chaudhuri belongs, is known for its resonant style, influenced by its close link with Kathak dance.

Other famous tabla players include Ustad Allah Rakha, Ustad Zakir Hussain, Pandit Kishan Maharaj, Pandit Anindo Chatterjee, Pandit Bickram Ghosh and Talvin Singh.

Why not the other options?

• ✗Sarod is linked with Amjad Ali Khan and Ali Akbar Khan.
• ✗Santoor is linked with Shivkumar Sharma.
• ✗Sitar is linked with Ravi Shankar.