Dr. Prakash & Mrs. Chaitra Sontakke

 Dr. Prakash Sontakke  

A Vocalist , Multi Instrumentalist , Composer , Director, Filmmaker , Innovator, TED Speaker  and Traveller . Marked with creativity and exploration, Dr. Sontakke’s concerts bring about a unique sense of melody that has mastered by  performing Classical and Fusion music on the Hawaiian Slide Guitar and various other instruments.

Dr. Prakash Sontakke is a Phd in Music and belongs to the illustrious Gwalior Gharana .                

His father Dr RB Sontakke is one of the senior most disciples of Pt Omkarnath Thakur and his mother Dr Mani Sontakke is the disciple of Pt Lalmani Mishra. Both Dr R B Sontakke and Dr Mani Sontakke were Educators in Benaras Hindu University  for over 40 years. His parents established the Hindustani Sangeet Vidyapeeth in Bangalore where they coached hundreds of students who are also busy performers in the field.

A Co-Composer , Vocalist and Guitarist on the Grammy Winning  Album “WINDS OF SAMSAARA” and the only one to have won the Independent World Music Awards, USA and the Nashville Award for composers where his composition was chosen over the maestro Illayaraja. An A grade artiste from Akashvani and Doordarshan with over 2000 Concerts experience Prakash has toured extensively with his troupes namely  “Dr Prakash Sontakke Group” (Progressive Hindustani Crossover ), and International Trio “Lehera” (World Fusion )

One can hear Dr Prakash Sontakke’s  Guitar as well as his voice in over 300 movies in Bollywood , Tollywood, Sandalwood movies apart from Malyalam Bengali , Assamese , Oriya Gujrati , Punjabi and Malay .Recent popular movies were RAM LEELA , BANGISTAN , HAMARAY PYARE PRIME MINISTER  .

He has composed and directed music for several plays and productions and the work has been appreciated largely . His music for Charandas Chor and Girish Karnad’s “Yayati ” were critically acclaimed.
He has innovated the instrument “Swar Veena”, on which he can play the Indian Raga Music as well as western sounding style. Dr. Sontakke prefers to play the Gayaki Ang (vocal style) which recreates the emotion of the human voice on the slide guitar.

He is a panel artiste of the ICCR ( Indian Council for Cultural relations ) .
He is on the board of advisors for SHANKAR MAHADEVAN ACADEMY for Online Music Learning
Mentor and Consultant at Octavium Academy of Music.

Mrs. Chaitra Sontakke

 
Equally at ease with Hindustani Classical as well as as Bhajan, Sufi and Fusion. Chaitra Sontakke is presently employed with the Shankar Mahadevan Academy! Born in a music loving family her interest in music was nurtured by her grandmother Smt Narayani Pai . She went on to formally begin Music education under Sri Subramanya.

She later started Hindustani Music lessons from Dr Smt Mani Sontakke and graduated to learning from Dr. R. B. Sontakke. Under his guidance she mastered the Gharanedar Gayaki of Pandit Omkarnath Thakur's famous Bhavapoorna Gayaki style.

Mrs. Sontakke has completed her MPHIL from Jain University and is presently pursuing her PhD degree under the able guidance of  Dr Arati N Rao.

Mrs. Chaitra has been performing across cities in India and is a regular performer at many television channels.