Quotes from Ravi Shankar

When people say that George Harrison made me famous, that is true in a way.

One single raga can be performed for two hours, three hours.

I love the work of Matisse and Picasso, but I don't have enough millions to own one. And I don't really believe in owning art, anyway.

Everybody has a right to like or dislike anything or anyone. From a flower to a flavor to a book or a composition but it is very sad that in our country we actually fight over such things in an unseemly manner.

Pop changes week to week, month to month. But great music is like literature.

In our culture we have such respect for musical instruments, they are like part of God.

The best "Puja", the best form of worship is to be happy, to be grateful.

Your sadness is because of the thorn of desire in your heart. If you don`t take notice of it, it will turn into sarcasm, cynicism, frustration, and anger. You need to pull it out and throw it, then you will feel uplifted and happy.

When longing disappears, love disappears.

In our culture we have such respect for musical instruments, they are like part of God.

What Sri Chinmoy does is God-given! He has a tremendous, a fantastic creative urge.

Pop changes week to week, month to month. But great music is like literature.

I think musicians and actors have all these problems, because of the popularity and the opportunity.

There cannot possibly be a god in heaven watching all of this calmly.

In the olden days, I believe Mozart also improvised on piano, but somehow in the last 200 years, the whole training of Western classical music - they don't read between the lines, they just read the lines.

My brother had a house in Paris. To it came many Western classical musicians. These musicians all made the same point: 'Indian music,' they said, 'is beautiful when we hear it with the dancers. On its own, it is repetitious and monotonous.'

The music that I have learned and want to give is like worshipping God. It's absolutely like a prayer.

I have my own spiritual guru, and I'm so happy, and I feel so satisfied that I might appreciate many other famous gurus, but, you know, I am not attracted that way because I have found the person.

In India, I have been called a 'destroyer.' But that is only because they mixed my identity as a performer and as a composer. As a composer I have tried everything, even electronic music and avant-garde. But as a performer I am, believe me, getting more classical and more orthodox, jealously protecting the heritage that I have learned.

To me, you know, from my childhood I always had a fascination for United States.

Everybody has a right to like or dislike anything or anyone. From a flower to a flavor to a book or a composition but it is very sad that in our country we actually fight over such things in an unseemly manner.

I will keep playing as long as my body lets me, and as long as I'm wanted by my listeners. Because music is the only thing that keeps me going.

My secret ambition was always to provide music for animation films: something with an Indian theme, either a fairy tale or mythological tale or on the Krishna theme. I still have a very deep desire, but these sorts of chances don't always come.

I started out as a dancer, but gradually became more interested in music.