As anyone can see, this is not a sitar... not even close; but it's a rainy day in San Diego and I'm getting my  photo du jour at home; and the nearest... some would say farthest... thing from a sitar is a mountain dulcimer, but I happen to have one hanging on the wall near my computer, so it will have to do.

As you might guess, some of my friends are bloggers. A couple of them I’ve never met face-to-face.  We’ve connected in cyber space, and I’ve come to think of them as not just distant acquaintances but close friends indeed.  One of them, Mark, an engineer on a boat working now out in the Gulf of Mexico who describes himself as an “old fan of rock,” wrote yesterday in his Blog, “I hate to say this, but I think it’s time they wheel Kieth Richards off stage, and Mick Jagger, who looks awesome and is in great shape can’t hide the fact that he is approaching 70.  There’s nothing wrong with 70, but I think you need to stop ripping your shirt off and swaying your hips to “Start me Up” when you’re 70.”  

(http://mark-marksrantsandraves.blogspot.com)  

Another cyber friend, Rajesh (http://inkthatblots.blogspot.com), is Indian and lives and works in Secunderabad, AP, India.  Mark’s post yesterday and Rajesh, just by being an Indian friend and having the soul of a poet, came to my mind yesterday when I learned that Ravi Shankar has died.

Much more than “just a sitarist,” Ravi Shankar has been for me ambassador plenipotentiary from the world of music since I first heard him in Singapore in 1972. I was thirty-something and he was fifty-something at the time. He died Tuesday at the age of 92.  No shirt ripping, hip shaking performances for him... just dreamy swaying by people listening to him.  His sitar was a space ship that has taken me and millions of others on many amazing journeys into the cosmos. His soaring riffs, usually accompanied by tabla, transport me with no help needed from drugs of any kind.  As I write this, I am listening (and vibrating) to one of his albums, the one called India: Ravi Shankar Living Room Sessions.  “Session 2: Raga Khamaj.”  I am transported.

I can’t say anything better about Ravi Shank than the tribute to him by Los Angeles Times music critic, Mark Swed: “In Classical Indian music a raga begins with the choice of a scale.  The musicians toss out the notes in the air, letting them float around for a while to produce an atmosphere.  This becomes the acoustical oxygen that the listener breathes.  The player then emphasizes certain pitches.  An order starts to be suggested.  Notes gradually take on personalities and group into melodies.  A rhythmic cycle gears up, becoming the motor of creation, the life force.  These note/particles eventually burst into a furry of cosmic dancing.  Wild oats are sown, and by the end all hell breaks ecstatically loose, as if life itself has emerged.”  

Yes!