To understand the importance of this performance, one has to keep in mind the state of popular music at the time. There was virtually nothing in Western countries like what is called "world music." There had been some hints, especially in the last year or so with George Harrison of the Beatles dabbling with Indian music, especially with the song "Love You To" on the Revolver album. But those were a mixture of Western and non-Western musical styles. This festival was really the first mass cultural event in the U.S. to go all out with authentic music from India in the form of Ravi Shankar. On top of that, the previous day featured a set by Hugh Masekela, a South African who performed jazz influenced by South African musical styles. (Unfortunately, his impact was lessened by the fact that only one of the songs from his set has become publicly available.)
As a result, many if not most of the people in the audience were blown away to experience something so different and interesting for the first time. That included most of the stars of the other musical acts, who were very curious after knowing a little bit about Harrison being recently tutored in sitar playing by Shankar. For the recording I have of this performance, I was surprised that the cheering at the end went on and on and on, much longer than any other in the festival that I came across. And you can see some of that rapturous response from the "Monterey Pop" movie documentary, which chose to make about 12 minutes of Shankar's performance the finale of the movie.
Instead of explaining more, I've found some interesting quotes about this performance from famous people who were there at the festival.
Mickey Dolenz, drummer and vocalist for the Monkees: "Ravi Shankar was the most moving, spiritual experience, and it allowed you to get into the pulse and the rhythm and into the deepest meditation. If you opened your eyes, you saw people with their eyes closed just listening and being and swaying. No one was smoking, no cell phones [laughs]. It was two hours of uninterrupted meditation. In the afternoon. It probably had a great effect, but first of all it was dark in the sense most people had their eyes closed... It was just being in the presence of those musicians [Shankar, Ustad Alla Rakha, and Kamala Chakravarty] and experiencing a form of music not yet really known. The Beatles had sort of introduced [Indian music] to us, but we had never heard Ravi Shankar do a concert. This was something new to the entire audience. It was as close to a kind of 'born again' experience that anybody could have had in that audience. But to be honest, it wasn't just him. It was the tabla player, Rakha. Of course being into drumming, those rhythms I was very unfamiliar with, as were most people of those Indian rhythms. So it wasn't just Ravi, it was the whole thing, Rakha, along with the third performer Kamala (Chakravarty) on tamboura."
Al Kooper, keyboardist for the Blues Project, as well as Blood, Sweat and Tears: "Great set. I was sitting in the audience with another artist. And I'm getting an education because I don't know much about [Indian music]. Didn't know much about him, just picked up on him through the Beatles, like everybody else. Watching the musicianship between Alla Rakha and Ravi Shankar killed me. I thought that was amazing when they were trading passages."
Singer, model, and actress Peggy Lipton: "Monterey reached its climax for me when we took [some drugs] in the early afternoon and there was a light drizzle and we went to hear Ravi Shankar. I remember I left my body. That was it for me. It was beautiful, peaceful, and chilled everybody out. Ravi transported me. It was gently raining, and he transported everybody. We were all taken there. It was like we were put on a spaceship and driven to another planet."
I've read in places that the performance lasted three hours, which would mean this isn't complete. But the quote from Dolenz says it was two hours. I think this was the full thing. Part of the set was released as the live album "Live: Ravi Shankar at the Monterey International Pop Festival." That came out before the end of 1967, and it peaked at Number 43 on the U.S. album chart, a remarkable result for this type of music. But it was only 53 minutes long, far from the full performance here.
Personally, I found listening to this interesting, but it's not for everyone. I think of a lot of the rapturous response had to do with the exact circumstances of what was happening musically in 1967. One can easily find "world music" of many varieties these days, so the context is very different.
Here's another interesting quote, Shankar's own impressions of the performance: "In the afternoon, we set up a special section between 1:00-3:00 p.m. where there would be no one in front of me and after me. It was cloudy, cool, it had rained a little and that's when I played, and it was like magic. Jimi Hendrix was sitting there. [Jerry] Garcia was there. I remember a few names. All of them were there, and you can see on the [Monterey Pop documentary] film what magic it had. I was so impressed and it is one of my memorable performances. I didn't plan for this. I was grateful to God that I was sitting in the atmosphere without anyone disturbing me. It drizzled for a few minutes and then it stopped. So, it was was cloudy and there were flowers from Hawaii and you know, what atmosphere! After my set, it was crazy. I have never felt such a commotion of this sort. It was so pure, in spite of the fact that there were many people who were also strong. But it didn't matter, because the whole atmosphere was so clean and beautiful and I could give my best. That's all I can say."
I found all the quotes included in this write-up at this webpage. I highly recommend it if you want to know more about the festival, since it mainly consists of many more quotes from famous people who were there:
The 1967 Monterey International Pop Festival | Cave Hollywood
As with the vast majority of everything else I'm posting from this festival, I got this music from Simon, a person who put together a collection of all the music from the festival he could find in 2022. There are more details in the PDF included in this download zip, written by Simon. This full version has excellent sound quality, despite being unreleased.
Also, for once, I didn't do any audio editing. Since this was all instrumental, there were no vocals possibly needing adjusting. I did break the banter into their own tracks, however.
This album is an hour and 39 minutes long.
01 talk (Ravi Shankar)
02 Raga Todi-Rupak Tal [Instrumental] (Ravi Shankar)
03 talk (Ravi Shankar)
04 Tabla Solo in Ektal [Instrumental] (Ravi Shankar)
05 talk (Ravi Shankar)
06 Raga Shuddha Sarang-Tintal [Instrumental] (Ravi Shankar)
07 talk (Ravi Shankar)
08 Raga Bhimpalasi [Instrumental] (Ravi Shankar)
09 talk (Ravi Shankar)
10 Dhun [Dadra and Fast Teental] [Instrumental] (Ravi Shankar)
https://pixeldrain.com/u/bErdoe6Q
alternate:
https://bestfile.io/en/6wIafIITkDSptke/file
The cover photo is from this exact concert.
