Celtic Ragas features sarod player Chinmaya Dunster and guitarist Vidroha Jamie finding a surprisingly fertile common ground between Irish and Indian music. Dunster and Jamie, along with a group of musicians who play violin, percussion, flute, bass, and tanpura, create gentle soundscapes that range from the playful rhythms of “A Gypsy Tale” to the haunting, almost spooky beauty of “The Mists of Ruantallain.”
The arrangements are focused, and even on slow, meditative tracks like “Mere Hamsafar,” the tempo never drags and the melodies don’t meander. The mix of Indian and Irish elements works particularly well on “Tara,” on which the buzzing, microtonal sound of the sarod meshes with the rhythms of a courtly dance and creates a sonic dream where the musicians of Ireland and India play in the castle of an ancient Celtic king.










