Shankar

Lakshminarayana Shankar (born April 26, 1950) is an Indian violinist from Chennai, Tamil Nadu, who played on albums by Archie Shepp and Clifford Thornton during the early 1970s. He rose to prominence as a member of the ethno-jam band Shakti, which released three albums in collaboration with John McLaughlin in 1976 and 1977.

As a solo artist, Shankar released the album Touch Me There on Frank Zappa‘s namesake Zappa Records in 1979. During the 1980s, Shankar released six albums on ECM and played on recordings by Egberto Gismonti, Phil Collins, Talking Heads, Ginger Baker, and Public Image Ltd. One of Shankar’s signature contributions is the violin intro on Echo & The Bunnymen‘s 1983 hit “The Cutter.”

Discography:

• Touch Me There (1979)
• Who’s to Know (1981)
• Vision (1984)
• Song for Everyone (1985)
• Pancha Nadai Pallavi (1989 • Shankar, Zakir Hussain, Vikku Vinayakram & Caroline)
• Soul Searcher (1990)
• Nobody Told Me (1990)
• M.R.C.S (1991)
• Raga Aberi (1995 • Shankar with Zakir Hussain & Vikku Vinayakram)
• Eternal Light (2000)
• One in a Million (2001 • Shankar & Gingger)
• The Violin Trio (2003 • L. Subramaniam, L. Vaidyanathan & Shankar)
• Celestial Body (2004 • Shankar & Gingger)