Sarangi - Kamal Sabri
Tabla - Monir Hussain
Kamal Sabri
Sarangi Maestro Kamal Sabri is the son of Sarangi Legend Ustad Sabri Khan and is carrying forward the rich legacy of the Sania Gharana of Moradabad. Kamal is the seventh generation of a distinguished family of tradition musicians. He was initiated and trained by his father in the style of the Sania Gharana of Rampur, Moradabad starting at the tender age of 5. Very soon this child prodigy made waves in the musical world with his talent. His musical brilliance and talent as a seasoned accompanist gained immense popularity amongst eminent classical vocalists.
Now an "A" Graded Artist of All India Radio, Kamal is a regular performer on All India Radio and Indian National Television. He has appeared in many Radio Sangeet Sammelans and National Programmes of Music. He has won several awards including 'The Best Instrumentalist'(2000), Surmani'(2001), Sangeet Bhushan Award(2002),'The Young Maestro Award' (1999) conferred by the Indo-Sri Lankan Cultural Council and the 'Young Ustad Khitab (Title) (2005) at the Prestigious Harballabh Music Festival.
Kamal has many other achievements to his credit, including, the privilege to be the youngest Indian musician to participate in "Les 24 heures du raga" (the 24 hours Millennium concert) in Paris, France. He made a record of sorts in that Festival by playing 9 concerts with the all the vocalists, leaving the audience spellbound. Kamal was invited several times to showcase his musical skills by the BBC, Radio France, Radio Pakistan, Radio Switzerland, Radio Italy, Radio Barbados, Finnish Broadcasting Company, and NRK Norway.
Today he is well known in the International cultural scene. While honing his skills in the traditional style of music, he has also adapted to the changing musical scenario and is constantly trying to set new trends and standards within his tradition. He has worked with renowned musicians like Zakir Hussain, Fateh Ali Khan, Hossam Ramzy, Ricky Niles from Barbados (West Indies), Jukka Tolonen from Finland, the Rondo Vienna Orchestra from Austria. He performed with Jan Garbarek for the King of Norway. Kamal has recorded his genre of music for famous Bands like Massive Attack, One Giant Leap, also for Hollywood and Bollywood films. This multifaceted musician is also a composer, who has delivered powerfully ambient scores for documentary films, such as The Big Question featuring Mel Gibson and Monica Bellucci, Bollywood Boulevard, Mystics of Sufism for BBC, and Red Cross, Mother Teresa. Kamal has also composed music for several albums and orchestras like Dance of the Desert, the Sabri Ensemble, Sarangi Funk, Ellam Anggekkai (South Indian Album), Tera Naam, the Indian Contemporary Music Orchestra, and the Vienna Chamber Orchestra, to name a few. Kamal continues to explore the vast realm of the music world yet retaining the purity of the Indian Classical Music thorough the strains of his Sarangi.
Monir Hossain
Monir Hossain has established himself as a dynamic tabla performer both as a solo and as an able accompanist with numerous prestigious performances to his credit.
He was born in a musical family, son of ustad Hafiz Hossain and grandson of late ustad Kader Bux of Murshidabad, West Bengal. He is a senior disciple of Tabla Maestro Pandit Samar Saha.
Some of his notable performances were with Sarod Maestro Pt. Budhadev Das Gupta, Legendary (Late) Ustad Vilayet Khan, Pandit Hariprasad Chaurasia, Pt. Budhaditya Mukherjee, Pandit Debashish Bhattacharya, Lakshmi Shankar, Ustad Fateh Ali khan, Pandit Rajiv Taranath, recently with sitar Maestro Ustad Shahid Parvez and numerous other musicians.
Some of the major venues at which he has played include the Smithsonian Institution, Washington Conservatory of Music (WCM), Toranto Public Library, Colombia University, University of Alabama, Statson University, University of Maryland (UMBC) and numerous other prestigious venues. Monir also performed tabla solo in Berhampore, West Bengal, India on the occassion of his Grandfather (Late) Ustad Kader Buksh's birthday. Some of the noteworthy vocal performers from Pakistan and Bangladesh that he has performed with include Pakistan's Pop sensation Alamgir, Shahanaj Rahmatullah, Sabiha Mahboob and Fatema Tuz-zuhrah among many others.