Gingger Shankar | |
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| Background information | |
| Origin | Los Angeles, United States |
| Genres | Pop, Rock, Electronica, World, Carnatic |
| Occupations | Singer-songwriter, violinist, composer |
| Instrument(s) | Vocals, double violin, violin, viola |
| Years active | 2003—present |
| Labels | Sony, Varese Sarabande, Milan Records, Universal |
| Website | ginggershankar.com |
Gingger Shankar is an American singer, composer and multi-instrumentalist. She has scored several films, including Circumstance .
Shankar was born in Los Angeles, California and raised there and in India. She is the eldest daughter of violinist Dr. L. Subramaniam. Her mother, Viji Subramaniam, was a classical singer just like her grandmother Lakshmi Shankar, sister-in-law of noted sitarist Ravi Shankar. [1] [2] As a child, she learned to sing, dance, and play violin and piano and attended the Kalakshetra creative arts school in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. Later, she studied opera vocals with professional opera singer Tantoo Cardinal in Sherman Oaks, California. She also modeled and acted in stage productions. She began performing professionally at age 14. In 2024, she joined anti-Israel protests at UCLA. [3]
Shankar plays the violin, cello and piano. She is the only woman in the world to play the double violin. [2] This ten-string, stereophonic instrument covers the entire orchestral range, including double bass, cello, viola and violin. [4]
In 2004, she performed on the score of composer John Debney for the movie The Passion of the Christ . [5]
She is also credited as a performer on the score the 2007 film Charlie Wilson's War , alongside composer James Newton Howard. [6]
Shankar contributed to the 2008 film The Forbidden Kingdom . [2]
She composed music for the 2011 film, Circumstance , which won the Sundance Audience Choice Award. [7]
In 2012, she debuted her multi-media project Himalaya Song at the Sundance Film Festival. It was a project about climate change in the Himalayas with live film, narration and music created by Gingger, Mridu Chandra and Dave Liang of the Shanghai Restoration Project. It was chosen as one of the 10 Best Music Films at Sundance by Rolling Stone Magazine. [8]
In May 2013, Monsoon Shootout, a thriller she scored for director Amit Kumar premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. [9]
In 2014, Brahmin Bulls, a film she scored for director Mahesh Pailoor opened in the US. Starring Sendhil Ramamurthy, Roshan Seth and Mary Steenburgen, it won film festival awards. [10]
In 2015, she composed the music for the virtual reality 'Project Syria' created by Nonny De La Peña which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. [11]
Shankar has performed in numerous festivals and venues alongside acts such as Smashing Pumpkins, Tony Levin, Steve Vai, Steve Lukather and Sussan Deyhim. [12]
She performs on a track in the 2007 Saul Williams album Niggy Tardust , produced by Trent Reznor. [13]
In July 2008, Shankar appeared in two Sgt. Pepper's 40th-anniversary concerts at the Hollywood Bowl. [14]
On July 16, 2012, she appeared in the music video "Love All Humans" alongside guitarist Anthony Gallo, actress Kate Kelton, model Tara Bre and others. [15]
In 2014, she performed at the George Fest in Los Angeles with the Flaming Lips honoring George Harrison. Other artists included Weird Al Yankovic, Brandon Flowers, Norah Jones, Dhani Harrison, Brian Wilson and more. [16]
In 2014 she released music video cover of U2's Sunday Bloody Sunday directed by Nicholas Bruckman through Paste Magazine. [17]
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Shankar Lakshminarayana, better known as L. Shankar, is an Indian violinist, singer and composer who also goes by the stage name Shenkar. Known for his innovative contributions to world music, he is often regarded as one of the pioneers of East-West fusion, blending the rich traditions of Indian classical with Western genres such as rock, pop, jazz, and electronic music. His extensive body of work spans a wide spectrum of genres, encompassing vocal and instrumental compositions. He has released 28 solo albums, the two latest being Full Moon and Over the Stars, which were released in September and August 2024, respectively. Shankar is credited with inventing the stereophonic Double violin (known as the LSD - L.Shankar Double Violin), which covers the orchestral string family's range.
Subramaniam Lakshminarayana is an Indian violinist, composer and conductor, trained in the classical Carnatic music tradition and Western classical music.
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Anoushka Hemangini Shankar is a British-American sitar player and musician of Indian descent, as well as occasional writer. She performs across multiple genres and styles—classical and contemporary, acoustic and electronic. In addition to releasing seven solo studio albums beginning with Anoushka (1998), she has also worked alongside a wide variety of musicians, including Karsh Kale on the full-length collaboration Breathing Under Water (2007) and her father Ravi Shankar. She has received nine Grammy Awards nominations and was the first musician of Indian origin to perform live and to serve as a presenter at the ceremony. She was the youngest and first woman to receive a British House of Commons Shield.
Kavita Krishnamurthy, is an Indian playback and classical singer. She has recorded numerous songs in various Indian languages including Hindi, Bengali, Kannada, Rajasthani, Bhojpuri, Telugu, Odia, Marathi, English, Urdu, Tamil, Malayalam, Gujarati, Nepali, Assamese, Konkani, Punjabi and other languages. She is the recipient of four Filmfare Best Female Playback Singer Awards, and the Padmashri which she received in 2005. She was awarded a Doctorate for her contributions to Indian music by Bangalore-based Jain University in 2015. In 1999, she married noted violinist L. Subramaniam and resides in Bengaluru.
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Maryam Keshavarz, is an American filmmaker, of Iranian descent. She is best known for her 2011 film Circumstance distributed by Participant Media and Roadside Attractions, which won the Audience Award at Sundance Film Festival.
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Ravi Shankar's Music Festival from India was an Indian classical music revue led by sitarist and composer Ravi Shankar intended for Western concert audiences and performed in 1974. Its presentation was the first project undertaken by the Material World Charitable Foundation, set up the previous year by ex-Beatle George Harrison. Long a champion of Indian music, Harrison also produced an eponymous studio album by the Music Festival orchestra, which was released in 1976 on his Dark Horse record label. Both the CD format of the Ravi Shankar's Music Festival from India album and a DVD of their performance at the Royal Albert Hall in London were issued for the first time on the 2010 Shankar–Harrison box set Collaborations.
Ambi Subramaniam is a violinist, composer, and educator. He started performing on stage when he was six years old and was described as the "new king of Indian classical violin" by the Times of India.
Monsoon Shootout is a 2013 Indian Hindi-language neo-noir action thriller film written and directed by Amit Kumar and produced by Guneet Monga, Trevor Ingma, Martijn de Grunt, and co-produced by Anurag Kashyap, and Vivek Rangachari, starring Vijay Varma, Geetanjali Thapa, Sreejita De, Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Tannishtha Chatterjee in the lead roles. The film received positive reviews at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival in the Official Midnight Screenings section. Belonging to the school of Parallel cinema, Monsoon Shootout was released worldwide four years later on 15 December 2017 to positive reviews.
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Viji Subramaniam, also known as Viji Shankar, was an Indian singer. She was the daughter of singer Lakshmi Shankar and Rajendra Shankar. Like her mother and uncle, Viji was a musician and trained in both the Indian classical systems.
Ragini Shankar is an Indian violinist who performs Hindustani classical music and fusion. She is the grand-daughter of the renowned Padmabhushan Dr. N. Rajam. and the daughter of Dr. Sangeeta Shankar
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