Amjad Ali Khan is an Indian classical musician who plays the Sarod.
Background
Khan was born into a musical family and has performed internationally since the 1960s. Khan was born in Gwalior on 9 October 1945 as Masoom Ali Khan, the youngest of seven children, to Gwalior court musician Hafiz Ali Khan and Rahat Jahan. Khan received homeschooling and studied music under his father.
Education
He attended Modern School from 1958 to 1963.
Career
His family is part of the Bangash lineage and Khan is in the sixth generation of musicians. His family claims to have invented the sarod. His personal name was changed by a sadhu to Amjad.
In 1957, a cultural organization in Delhi appointed Hafiz Ali Khan as its guest and the family moved to Delhi.
He has experimented with modifications to his instrument throughout his career. Khan played with the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra and worked as a visiting professor at the University of New Mexico.
Recognition Khan has recently been awarded 21st Rajiv Gandhi National Sadbhavna Award. 20 August is celebrated as harmony day, the birth anniversary of Rajiv Gandhi.
He was awarded the Fukuoka Asian Culture Prize in 2004.
The United States. state Massachusetts proclaimed 20 April as Amjad Ali Khan Day in 1984. Khan was made an honorary citizen of Houston, Texas, and Nashville, Tennessee, in 1997, and of Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 2007. He received the Banga-Vibhushan in 2011.
Sarod maestro Amjad Ali Khan, who has shared his rich experience in Indian classical music in classes across the West, will now teach for a quarter (three months) at Stanford University, this course will have lessons on Sarod as well.