Being so busy with my own music plus the mundane distractions of life I rarely read or hear the news and only just now learned of the passing of Ustad Aashish Khan the greatest ud player in recorded history by far surpassing even his legendary father Ustad Ali Akbar Khan.

We only spent a bit of time together but the real time together was hearing him with Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri (a teacher of mine) at the Interfaith Chapel at Occidental College where President Obama spent his first two years of college.

While listening to these two towering geniuses at one point I began staring at the glorious stained glass panels of this magnificent church where I had the opportunity to perform with dancer and choreographer Sharon Aoki and through the interplay of sun light and multi-hued sculpted glass there appeared in my level of discernment spurred by the heavenly music Haridas the guru of Tansen sitting alongside a rushing stream where he famously threw away priceless jewels rather than perform for anyone expect God the offering made to him by Akbar the Great who was later imprisoned by his son who was to build the Taj Mahal.

My only real disagreement with Aashish is how he told me that Pandit Shivkumar Sharma was not an Indian classical musician because he played an intrument Aashish regarded as inferior the santoor which is ridiculous of course no one is perfect and how he turned down Harihar's idea to teach me because I am too gifted and he feared I would become the first Westerner to be a raga master which is true of course and that is why sad academics and sad music critics are intimidated by me knowing legions more than they ever will.

Bath yourself in the sonic splendor of recently departed Aashish Khan and Alla Rakha no doubt playing now together in the Forest of Brinda as recorded by my dear departed teacher and friend George Harrison of the Beatles with his Guruji Ravi Shankar and my Guruji Pandit Harihar Rao his senior disciple and the person closest to him since teenage years among those present in the private audience with my teachers Pandit Shivkhar Sharma and Pandit Hariprasad Chaurasia and Lakshmi Shankar whom I heard sing in the rains of Los Angeles City of Angels together with George who was visiting the Krishna Temple on Venice Boulevard and Govindas in Culver City California one Saturday afternoon years ago that seems like yesterday.

This stormy cloud bursts day was the last time I saw George Harrison who seemed both tense and stimulated about being in public.

If the rain comes They run and hide their heads They might as well be dead If the rain comes If the rain comes When the sun shines They slip into the shade (When the sun shines down) And sip their lemonade (When the sun shines down) When the sun shines When the sun shines Rain, I don't mind Shine, the weather's fine (The Beatles)

One wonders if Aashish had changed his first name to something like Asa if he would have reached a wider audience around the world outside of India but whatever he did worked perfectly and I hope scores more of his recordings both live and in studios are forthcoming and made available for free on his website.

- Michael Eric Robinson Longhi, January 2025, Kula Maui Hawaii

© 2025 by Michael Robinson All rights reserved

Michael Eric Robinson Longhi is a Los Angeles-based composer, programmer, pianist and musicologist. His over 200 albums include over 150 albums for meruvina featured on National Public Rado, Pacifica Radio and University, College and Public radio stations across America in addition to the rest of the world.

There are also over 50 albums of piano improvisations both solo and duet with Guruji Anindo Chatterjee of India and Eliot Zigmund of the Bill Evans Trio both among the greatest percussionists in recorded history.

Michael's primary jazz teacher was alto saxophonist Lee Konitz of the Lennie Tristano Quartet who would fill in for Charlie Parker when he was indisposed joined by Bud Powell, Charlie Mingus and Max Roach, lead soloist with the Stan Kenton Orchestra that included Dizzy Gillespie, Stan Levey and Bird, led a quartet featuring Billy Bauer, Don Bagley, Arnold Fishkin, Miles Davis and Roach, performed at the first Newport Jazz Festival with Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Sarah Vaughan and Dave Brubeck with Paul Desmond and Joe Morello before becoming strictly a solo artist with various accompanying musicians like Hal Galper, Chick Corea, Red Mitchell, Joe Henderson, Elvin Jones, Jack DeJohnette, Peggy Stern, Blue Mitchell, Bill Evan, Alan Dawson, Phil Woods, Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Stan Getz, also Hank Freeman of the original Artie Shaw Orchestra who recorded Begin the Beguine and Dinah Washington would later never record without him playing lead alto, Charlie Colin, Rollan Masciarelli from Columbia University in NYC, Ray Shiner of the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra who earlier did the arrangements for Benny Goodman (he being Lee and Bird's primary jazz Guru together with Lester Young, Lennie, Artie and Louis Armstrong) and New York Philharmonic, Reggie Johnson featured on Archie Shep's greatest album, Makambo Ken McIntyre who founded the first jazz program in the USA and Paul Jeffrey of the Thelonious Monk Quartet.

His primary Western Classical Music composition teachers were Adele Berk, Don Funes, John Cage and Steve Reich, also Morton Feldman, Leonard Bernstein, Gunther Schuller, John Chowning, La Monte Young, Robert Washburn, Eliot Del Borgo, James Ball, Arthur Frackenpohl and Perry Yaw.

Longhi's primary North Indian Classical Music teachers were Harihar Rao of UCLA, the senior disciple of Pandit Ravi Shankar who invited Michael to study with him too, Pandit Shivkumar Sharma who reinvented the ancient folk music instrument Voice of A Hundred Colours the Indian santoor which is a powerfully influential precursor of our Western keyboard instruments including the piano anticipating Robinson's Meruvina realization and conecption, Nazir Ali Jairazbhoy of the Oriental Music School in London, England who was born in a Palace on the Indian Ocean in Bombay a Hindu family that converted to Islam working in forest trees, Pandit Jasraj The Sun of Music in India, Popat Savla, Ustad Zakir Hussain, Pandit Ram Narayan and N. Rajam from recordings, Kala Ramnath, Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri and his current Guruji is Pandit Anindo Chatterjee.

His over 400 essays mostly about music have been used by Carnegie Hall, New York University, the University of California at Berkeley and Los Angeles and New York University.

Michael has been a lecturer at UCLA, Bard College and California State University Long Beach and Dominguez Hills, the Pasadena California Libraries and Wantagh High School in Nassau County on the South Shore of Long Island in the State of New York.

Robinson has performed in the New York City Libraries, the Beverly Hills California Library, La Mama La Galleria and the Knitting Factory in Manhattan, Hunter College of New York City University and myriad churches in Manhattan New York City, Los Angeles County including the first Film Festival of India and Maui Hawaii to name a few.

Michael was born in French Hospital in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan later named Chelsea where The Godfather was later filmed and has lived in Borough Park Brooklyn, North Merrick in Nassau County Long Island, Wantagh named for a Chief of the Montauk Native Americans, the Upper East Side of Manhattan, Beverly Hills and Los Angeles California and Kapalua and Kula Maui Hawaii the Aloha State.

The above bio is a brief ongoing summation due to limitations of time and Akasha and have everything to do with Johnny Winter an albino from Texas being the greatest rock guitarist in recorded history the electric guitar being the essence of rock, the piano the essence of Western classical music, the saxophone being the essence of jazz, the Meruvina being the essence of computer and electronic music (our current Western Classical Music) and the tabla being the essence of Hindustani music with sitar close behind.

Michael will soon be adding alto and tenor saxophone recordings to his oeuvre together with the gatra vina.