The young sitar player Jasdeep Singh Degun makes the Indian tradition accessible, also for western ears ★★★★☆

Leeds sitar player Jasdeep Singh Degun missed people in modern British music: people like him. And thus musicians who process the tradition from India, for example, in new, if necessary Western-oriented music with a low entry level. He found a perfect partner to try something beautiful himself: Peter Gabriel’s label Real World, which already introduced us to the Pakistani singer Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan in the 1990s.

His debut evokes memories of that Real World discography. Jasdeep Singh Degun plays attractive, highly romantic melodies on his sitar, with beautifully resonant overtones, and is accompanied by piano, cello, sophisticated electronics and basses.

In a single song, such as the title piece, the sitar skims past the kitsch. But further on, the experiment is given space: the twenty-minute mahogany is an enchanting and furious rhythmic session, with great percussive work on the small Indian hand drums. And Undertow pushes your head down in a sea of ​​magical sounds. Highly recommended for an hour of pure musical wonder.