Andras Kozma

ANDRAS KOZMA was born in 1952. At the age of 20 he was carefully thought about to be one of the best guitar players in Hungary. He played classical guitar as well as jazz. As a guitarist he has received several awards at different jazz festivals all over Europe. He has composed music for more than a dozen documentaries and feature films. He started studying Indian classical music in 1973 and took up the interest of playing the SITAR. Having dedicated himself to Indian classical music he gave up playing western music of any kind in order to pay the possible deepest attention to his studies on sitar. He took his first instruction from Ram Chandra Mistry in Paris and later received lessons from the well known flute master Malhar Kulkarni. He spent long years in India and became a disciple of Prof. DEBU CHAUDHURY from whom for some valuable years he had the opportunity to study the pure Seniya gharana style of Sitar and Surbahar.
In 1981 he was accepted as a student by the world famous sitar virtuoso Pandit Ravi Shankar. As a disciple of Ravi Shankar his style and musical approach have undergone a very significant change. After long years of intesive training under the well known sitar virtuoso, Andras became one of the best sitar players in the gharana, and is well recognized as Ravi Shankar's only European student. Mr. Kozma is an M.A.Mus. and in 1987 he received his Ph.D. He wrote his thesis on the significant changes in clasical instrumental music in India in the 20th century.
He is among the very few the non-Indian born musicians who very often perform in India, as well as other countries all over the globe. He is the founder of Calcutta Trio and Mr.Kozma is an active member of several Indian music related societies and also has leading role in UNESCO’s Asian music council.
Since 1989 Mr.Kozma is the director of RIMPA (Ravi Shankar Institute for Music and Performing Arts) in Budapest, where the Central European Branch was inaugurated by Pt. Ravi Shankar in 1990. He is a part time music producer of Hungarian Radio and published several papers on Indian music.
Andras Kozma is not the only European disciple of Pandit Ravi Shankar, but is well known for rigorously following the style of his Guru, as well as the tradition of the well known Seniya-Maihar gharana.
He has been regularly touring with his Calcutta Trio and give lectures and lecture-demonstrations on Indian classical music.
His recent book, titled "Nada Brahma" is dealing with Indian music, his experiences in India while studying music, and of course his unique relationship with his guru.

Andras Kozma sitar

Andras Kozma
sitar