When Legends of Fusion Music United To Play For A Cause

John McLaughlin, Ustad Zakir Hussain, Shankar Mahadevan, Ganesh Rajagopalan and V Selvaganesh played for a cause.

On Jan 14, what music aficionados in Kolkata witnessed was nothing short of historic. Shakti, the legendary fusion band comprising legendary musicians such as Grammy award winning guitarist John McLaughlin, tabla virtuoso Zakir Hussain, percussionist V Selvaganesh, singer-composer Shankar Mahadevan and violin maestro Ganesh Rajagopalan, performed in the city as part of Seagram’s 100 Pipers ‘Play For a Cause’.

The audience was mesmerised and clearly couldn’t get enough of this musical evening.

Over the years, 100 Pipers ‘Play For a Cause’ has been the pioneer of music with purpose and has leveraged music to raise awareness on several social issues. This once-in-a-lifetime union of music legends was aimed at generating awareness about preserving the art of making handcrafted musical instruments. To be specific, this event raised funds to support the Kolkata’s iconic musical instruments store Hemen & Co., a quaint shop that has been manufacturing traditional Indian musical instruments for over 70 years now and counts many national and international music legends in its clientele.

Hemen & Co. has served some of the biggest names from the world of music, including Beatles’ George Harrison, Jethro Tull’s Ian Anderson, Ustad Amjad Ali Khan and Pandit Ravi Shankar to name a few.

With increasing digitisation, musical sound is fast losing its originality, which is why we need to support makers of handcrafted instruments. The arts form the very fabric of our society & hence it is our responsibility to do our bit for such a cause. The audience not only enjoyed some stupendous performances but were also inspired to do their bit for the cause.

This event comes close on the heels of #100Pipers100Gigs that took place in November 2019 and made 100 Pipers the first ever brand to organise 100 music gigs in a single day! As part of this, over a 100 of India’s leading music bands and artists performed live across 27 cities on Nov 29, 2019 to raise awareness on 15 social causes. The artists/bands included names such as Parikrama, Delhi Indie Project, Indus Creed, The Local Train, Usha Uthup, Hari Sukhmani and Ankur Tewari among others.

100 Pipers ‘Play For a Cause’ not only brings music lovers together, but also inspires them to work towards a better tomorrow. We can’t wait to hear about their next event!