A Hundred Strings in Manchester: Strings of Kashmir and Delhi

Four musicians bring Indian classical music to The Stoller Hall, inside Chetham's School of Music, on 20 November: two string traditions, and two tabla players who carry three gharanas between them.

Vinay Desai plays the santoor, Kashmir's hundred-stringed instrument, as a direct disciple of Padma Vibhushan Pandit Shivkumar Sharma. Adnan Khan, the Grammy-nominated sitarist from Delhi, plays in the gayaki ang, which models sitar playing on the singing voice. He trains with his father, the sitar player Ustad Saeed Khan.

Two tabla masters share this night, and Manchester is the only date on the tour with both. Ustad Akram Khan is the seventh generation of his family in the Ajrada gharana and has played more than eleven thousand concerts. Ustad Shahbaz Hussain learned from his father, the vocalist Ustad Mumtaz Hussain.

He then studied with Ustad Faiyaz Khan of the Delhi gharana, and with Ustad Shaukat Hussain Khan and Ustad Allah Rakha of the Punjab gharana. The Government of Pakistan gave him the Son of Lahore award in 2008.