Shambhu Das

Shambhu Das (born 1934) is an Indian classical musician and educator. He is best known for his long association with Ravi Shankar, on whose behalf Das has acted as an ambassador for Indian music in Canada since the early 1970s, and his friendship with George Harrison of the Beatles, whom Das helped teach sitar in 1966. His assistance in Harrison's immersion in Indian culture helped inspire the Beatles' career direction and, due to the band's popularity and influence, the direction of the 1960s counterculture. In 1970, Das established the Indian Music Department at Toronto's York University, where he taught for four years.

Das recruited the Indian musicians and played sitar on Harrison's 1968 solo album Wonderwall Music, which was partly recorded in Bombay. He occasionally accompanied Shankar at his concerts and has performed himself throughout North America, Europe and India. From the 1990s, Das's work has increasingly drawn on the connection between music and meditation as a means of physical and spiritual healing. In the early 2000s, he formed the Indo jazz ensemble Shanti. A 24-hour sitar recital he gave in Toronto in October 2004, undertaken as a benefit for those affected by floods in India and Bangladesh, is recognised by Guinness World Records as the longest non-stop sitar performance.