Ragas Live Festival 2025
“24 hours of uninterrupted, absolutely incredible music performances”
- The New York Times
24 hours of performances
October 18-19 2025
TIME
Doors: 6 PM
Starts: 7 PM
Ends: 7 PM
LOCATION
Pioneer Works
The 14th annual Ragas Live Festival featuring 24 hours of transcendent music in the Pioneer Works Main Hall. The entire program will be broadcast live on video at Pioneer Works' YouTube & WKCR 89.9 FM in NYC (audio only).
For the 2025 festival, more than 50 artists and legendary maestros of the South Asian classical tradition will perform alongside groundbreaking contemporary artists in a musical journey through day and night. The artist lineup features some of the greatest living sitar players Shahid Parvez Khan and Purbayan Chatterjee, the ecstatic Saami Brothers Qawwal, L. Shankar, the legendary co-founder of Shakti with John McLaughlin, a Zakir Hussain Tribute led by his Grammy-winning collaborators Sikiru Adepoju and V. Selvaganesh, the jaw-dropping violin virtuosity of Charumathi Raghuraman, and the exploratory electronics of eucademix (Yuka Honda).
Schedule
OCTOBER 18
ARAJ: Ishaan Ghosh, S. Akash, Mehtab Ali, Pratik Singh & Vanraj Shastri ( tabla, bansuri, sitar, vocals, sarangi)
7:00 PM
Charumathi Raghuraman & Anantha R. Krishnan (violin, mridangam)
8:25 PM
Eucademix (Yuka Honda) (electronics)
9:50 PM
Saami Brothers (Qawwali)
10:50PM
OCTOBER 19
Light Over Shadow (Zakir Hussain Tribute): Sikiru Adepoju, V. Selvaganesh, Ishaan Ghosh and special guests (global percussion)
12:15 AM
Arun Ramamurthy Trio - (Arun Ramamurthy, violin; Sameer Gupta, drums; Damon Banks, bass)
1:40 AM
Sannan Mahboob & Karamat Khan (Afghan rubab)
2:55 AM
Asif Khan & Karamat Khan (vocal, tabla)
4:00 AM
Vishnu Ramprasad, Praveen Narayan, and Sriram Raman (navtar, tabla, mirdangam)
5:05 AM
Radhika Samson & Tejas Tope, (surbahar, pakawaj)
6:15 AM
Whispering Worlds w/ Aaron Shragge (John Hassell Tribute) (Aaron Shragge -trumpet/shakuhachi/fx/composition; Luke Schwartz, guitar; Damon Banks, bass; Deric Dickens, drums)
7:45 AM
Vinay Desai & Vivek Pandaya (santoor, tabla)
9:05 AM
Purbayan Chatterjee & Amit Kavthekar (sitar. tabla)
10:05 AM
NESOM honors Allah Rakha and Zakir Hussain (tabla ensemble)
11:30 AM
Mandolin U. Rajesh, Swaminathan Selvaganesh, Praveen Narayan (mandolin, kanjira, tabla)
12:30 PM
Priya Purushothaman, Pratyush Goberdhan & Tejas Tope (vocal, sarangi, tabla)
1:55 PM
Anand Avirmed (Mongolian throat singing & horsehead fiddle)
3:10 PM
L. Shankar, V. Selvaganesh, Swaminathan Selvaganesh, Amit Kavthekar (double violin, kajira, mridangam, tabla)
4:05 PM
Shahid Parvez Khan & Nittin Mitta (sitar, tabla)
5:40 PM
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About Ragas Live Festival
Ragas Live Festival was born as an in-studio radio broadcast at Columbia University's radio station, WKCR, in 2012 and immediately gained a global listening audience. The annual presentation of 50-70 musicians, and its expansive presentation of music inspired by the Indian classical tradition, became central to a musical movement that The New York Times, The New Yorker, NPR, and others have called “The Raga Renaissance.” The event first left the studio and became a live, in-person broadcast in 2016 at Pioneer Works, where it has since grown a passionate following.
The event is inspired by raga, the classical music tradition from South Asia, where specific modes harmonize with the moods and energy of particular times of day, such as sunrise, sunset, or the darkest hours of the night. Master musicians from the raga tradition are presented alongside legends in ambient music, minimalism, jazz and global traditions.
Ragas Live Festival is produced by Pioneer Works in collaboration with the Society for Arts and Culture of South Asia (Palo Alto), NYC Radio Live, People of Rhythm Productions, and Brooklyn Raga Massive. Ragas Live Festival is sponsored, in part, by the Greater New York Arts Development Fund of the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, administered by Brooklyn Arts Council.
Ragas Live Retrospective
Ragas Live Festival 2012-2017
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Help Us Keep the Music Flowing!
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About Ragas Live Festival
Ragas Live Festival was born as an in-studio radio broadcast at Columbia University's radio station, WKCR, in 2012 and immediately gained a global listening audience. The annual presentation of 50-70 musicians - and its expansive presentation of music inspired by the Indian Classical tradition - became central to a musical movement that the New York Times, New Yorker, NPR, and others have called “The Raga Renaissance”. The event first left the studio and became a live, in-person broadcast in 2016 at Pioneer Works, where it has since grown a passionate following.
The event is inspired by raga, the classical music tradition from South Asia, where specific modes harmonize with the moods and energy of particular times of day, such as sunrise, sunset, or the darkest hours of the night. Master musicians from the raga tradition are presented alongside legends in ambient music, minimalism, jazz and global traditions.