Shakti, the recently reconvened global fusion trailblazers, have been nominated for 2024 GRAMMY™ Award for Best Global Music Album for This Moment – the group’s first new studio album in more than 45 years, released on June 30, 2023, on the Abstract Logix label. “After our most successful tour ever of three continents, Shakti gets a GRAMMY Nomination for our album This Moment…” reacted co-founding guitarist and composer John McLaughlin, “We are thrilled and delighted beyond words.”

When Shakti co-founders John McLaughlin (guitar) and Zakir Hussain (tabla) first directed their virtuosity towards exploring common ground between Eastern and Western musical traditions – starting in private sessions, then on their 1975 debut album – the notion of such a hybrid was so novel that fans, industry executives, and even the media expressed concerned bafflement.

SHAKTI, featuring British guitarist John McLaughlin and Indian tabla player Zakir Hussain alongside vocalist Shankar Mahadevan, violinist Ganesh Rajagopalan, and percussionist Selvaganesh Vinayakram (son of original Shakti ghatam player T.H. “Vikku” Vinayakram) have launched their 50th Anniversary tour, their first in over sixteen years. This must-see tour includes stops in Nashville, Atlanta, Seattle, Chicago - eighteen cities in all, boasting five sold-out markets with others close behind.

Fifty years is a long time to participate in anything. So long, in fact, that gold is the appropriate anniversary gift. The multi-cultural, mixed genre Shakti brought their Fiftieth Anniversary Tour to the famed Capitol Theatre in Port Chester, NY on August 19, 2023. The band's unique mix of blues with North and South Indian rhythmic and melodic perspectives captivated the crowd and exemplified how exceptionally gifted these musicians are.