When Pandit Ravi Shankar created history by winning the prestigious Grammy award in 1967, as the first Indian musician to do so, he paved way for numerous other Indian artists, who followed in his footsteps and achieved this glorious award that was only dominated by the west before. Grammy awards (originally called Gramophone Award) is a prestigious award presented by the Recording academy to recognize outstanding achievement by artists in the music industry of the United States. It is given to celebrate soothing musical tracks and today In this article we will be discussing twelve indian artists who have won grammy awards over the years.
1. PANDIT RAVI SHANKAR (1920-2012)
Winning under the category of ‘Best Chamber Music Performance’ Pandit Ravi Shankar created history by being the first Indian musician to win a Grammy for his composition- West meets East in 1968. Pandit Ravi Shankar was born to a Bengali family in 1920 and started playing sitar in 1938 under court musician Allauddin Khan. It was Pandit Ravi Shankar, who introduced the magics of the sound of sitar to the western world. In 1956, Ravi Shankar began touring all over through Europe and America to play Indian Classical Music. He went about receiving four more Grammys over the years :
- 1973 : Album of the year – The concert for Bangladesh.
- 2002 : Best world music album – Full Circle: Carnegie Hall.
- 2013 : Best music album – The living room sessions Pt.1.
- Lifetime achievement award received at the 55th Annual Grammy Awards.
After his death he was posthumously nominated in the 56th Annual Grammy Awards for his album – The living room sessions Pt.2.
2. ZUBIN MEHTA (1936)
Zubin Mehta is an Indian orchestral conductor for Western Classical music. Zubin won the first Grammy in 1981 for his work on Isaac Stern 60th Anniversary Celebration, under the category of ‘Best classical performance – Instrumental Soloist with orchestra’ and in the same year won the ‘Best Engineered Recording, Classical’ for the same project. He once again won Grammy in 1982 for his classic recital Verdi: Arias under the category ‘Best Classical Vocal Soloist Performance’. He then won two awards in 1990 for his performance in Shostakovich: Violin Concerto No.1 Minor under ‘Best Classical Performance, Instrumental Soloist with orchestra’ and for his performance in Glazunov: Violin Concerto in A Minor and Carreras, Domingo, Pavarotti in Concert under ‘Best Classical Vocal Performance’.
3. ZAKIR HUSSAIN (1951)
Zakir Hussain is an Indian table player, composer, percussionist, music producer and film actor. In the year 1992, Hussain won the first ever Grammy for his album Planet Drum under the category of ‘Best Word Music Album’. Hussain went on about creating history again by winning another Grammy in the year 2009 at the 51st Grammy awards for Global Drum Project along with Mickey Hart, Sikiru Adepoju and Giovanni Hidalgo. Hussain is an influential figure in the Indian Music Industry.
4. VISHWA MOHAN BHATT (1950)
Vishwa Mohan Bhatt is a Hindustani Classical Instrumentalist who plays Mohan Veena (slide guitar). He is the younger brother of Manju Mehta, a trained disciple of Pandit Ravi Shankar. He created history by winning a Grammy in the year 1993 for his album, A Meeting by The River composed along with Ry Cooder which was released on Water Lily Acoustics label. He has taken his music to a global level by collaborating with many international artists like Taj Mahal, Bela Fleck, and Jerry Douglas.
5. AR RAHMAN (1967)
Rahman began his career composing music for Tamil films and rose to prominence for his music composition for the film- Slumdog Millionaire. Apart from winning several accolades during his music career, he has won two Grammy awards, under the category of ‘Best Compilation Soundtrack Album’(shared with H. Sridhar and P. A. Deepak) and ‘Best Song written for Visual Media’ (shared with Best Children’s Music Album category Tanvi Shah and Gulzar) for the Oscar winning movie, Slumdog Millionaire in the year 2009. Rahman is influential figure among young artists all around the globe.
6.GULZAR (1934)
Gulzar is an Indian poet, lyricist and author working in Hindi Cinema. Gulzar has worked with many music directors including RD Burman, AR Rahman, Salil Choudhary and has won 5 Indian National Film Awards, 22 Film fare Awards and 1 Academy Award. He won Grammy along with AR Rahman and Tanvi Shah in the year 2009 for the Oscar winning movie Slumdog Millionaire under the category ‘Best Song written for Visual Media’.
7. RICKY TEJ (1981)
Ricky Tej is a Bangalore based , self-taught Indian music composer and an environmentalist who has won several Grammy awards during his music career. He bagged his first Grammy along with Wouter Kellerman (South African composer) for his work Winds of Samsara under the category of ‘Best New Age Album’ in 2015. He later won another Grammy in the year 2022 shared with Stewart Copeland (American musician and composer) for Divine Tides under the category of ‘Best New Age Album’.
8. NEELA VASWANI (1974)
Neela Vaswani in an American writer of Indian origin based in New York. She won Grammy for narrating the audio version of I Am Malala, which is the remarkable tale of a family uprooted by global terrorism and the resulting fight for girls’ education. Inspired by the real-life story of Malala Yousufzai, this story won Neela a Grammy in the year 2015. Neela is also a recipient of 2006 O. Henry prize.
9. FALGUNI (FALU) SHAH (1981)
Falguni Shah created history by being the only Indian origin woman to be nominated at the Best Children’s Music Album category at the Grammy twice. This Indian American singer bagged the Grammy in the year 2022 for A Colorful World in the ‘Best Children’s Music Album’ category. Her music is characterized as a blend of ancient Classical Indian Melodies with contemporary western sounds. She has also collaborated with Grammy award winner AR Rahman for the movie Slumdog Millionaire.
10. TANVI SHAH (1985)
Born on 1st December 1985 in Tamil Nadu, Tanvi Shah is the first Indian woman to win a Grammy. She won Grammy in the year 2009 in collaboration with AR Rahman for the movie Slumdog Millionaire under the ‘Best Song written for Visual Media’ category. She is a singer/songwriter in running collaboration with AR Rahman and even wrote Spanish lyrics for the song “Jai Ho.”
11. H.SRIDHAR (1958-2008)
Sridhar was an Indian Sound Engineer who is known to have collaborated with artists like AR Rahman. He began his career as professional sound engineer in 1988. Sridhar won Grammy for Slumdog Millionaire (Sound Engineer) in the year 2009 under the category of ‘Best Compilation Soundtrack Album’
12. P. A. DEEPAK (1982)
Deepak is a mix engineer and record producer. In the year 2010, he won the prestigious Grammy award for ‘Best Compilation Soundtrack for Visual Media’ for the movie Slumdog Millionaire at the 52nd Annual Grammy Awards. He was also nominated under the category of ‘Surround Mix Engineer’ for the album Winds of Samsara at the 57th Annual Grammy Awards.
In this article we shared all the Grammy winners from India over the years. Hoping to see some more pretty soon!
FAQs
1) How many India won Grammy Award?
there are 18 Indians who have won the GRAMMY. Sonu Nigam is the recent winner of the award (in 2017) for the album named Mubarakan
2)Who was the first Indian to win Grammy?
Pandit Ravi Shankar
Pandit Ravi Shankar Out of Indian artists who won the Grammys, he was not only the first Indian musician to ever win a Grammy Award but won four more honours over the years.
3)Does Badshah have Grammy?
The answer is Zero. He has never even been nominated. A Grammy Award
