Vijay Raghav Rao Biography 
Vijay Raghav Rao was a veteran musician and composer best known as an Indian flutist. He was also a choreographer, musicologist, poet and fiction writer who lived during the period, November 3, 1925 - November 30, 2011. He conducted the music for India's Independence celebration at the Red Fort in Delhi in 1947. For his overall contributions towards the field of Indian music, Government of India honoured him with the fourth highest civilian honour - Padma Shri in 1970. He was also a recipient of Sangeet Natak Akademi award in Creative and Experimental music category. He received the honour in the year 1982. He has been associated with many Indian movies in the music department. He composed music for 1969 National award winning Bengali film, Bhuvan Shome (1969).
Pandit Vijay Raghav Rao, also pronounced as Vijaya Raghav Rao was born in Chennai in 1925. He married Lakshmi V. Rao in 1947 and had two children. He had a permanent US citizenship, and he lived both in India and US, regular with his performances and other works. He contributed more than 6 decades to the field of Indian music, and also created a niche of his own. His performances on the Indian flute had followers in India as well as foreign countries. He has been a team member in the music department of iconic movies like Gandhi (1982) and Bhuvan Shome (1969). He conceived a number of new ragas and also wrote thousands of compositions of traditional ragas.
He played the bamboo flute since he was a child. He originally divided his time between classical dance and Carnatic (South Indian) music. He has studied and collaborated with Pandit Ravi Shankar, master of the sitar, for long three decades during his glorious years. In 1945, he switched his focus solely to Hindustani Sangeet. He toured internationally, composed and conducted orchestras, and also spent decades as chair of All India Radio's Film Division. He has collaborated with Ustad Alla Rakha, Pandit Anindo Chaterjee and Sabir Khan, and recorded albums as well. G.S. Sachdev, Ronu Majumdar and Kerry Kriger are among his successful students.
Published: February 18, 2019
Updated: February 18, 2019
