The Brooklyn-based Arun Ramamurthy Trio fuses traditional South Indian Carnatic and raga styles with jazz. As both Carnatic music and jazz are perfectly suited to improvisation, the marriage of the two is highly compatible.

Violinist Arun Ramamurthy is a first generation artist who grew up in New Jersey and remains deeply committed to his musical heritage. His mother was a Carnatic vocalist, and his father booked tours for visiting Indian performers. Also an educator, he passes on his knowledge to students in workshops at universities, conservatories at more.

Percussionist Sameer Gupta is a jazz percussionist and tabla player. Influenced by jazz Tony Williams and Elvin Jones, he also found inspiration from the great tabla player Alla Rakha (who often accompanied the legendary Ravi Shankar). With Ramamurthy, he founded the artist collective Brooklyn Raga Massive to create “cross-cultural understanding through the lens of Indian classical music.”

Bronx-born bassist Damon Banks has worked with artists across the musical spectrum, including Peter Gabriel, Nat Adderley, Nat Adderley, the Neville Brothers, KRS- ONE, Arto Lindsay, Caetano Veloso, Bobby Womack, and many more.

The trio’s most recent release is the second chapter of the four part New Moon Suite. An exploration of his roots and family, Ramaurthy calls it his “most personal compositional work to date.”

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