“I’m not going to play”: how The Who almost made Ravi Shankar boycott Woodstock
“George Harrison, on his own, opened up India to England,” said Andy Partridge, the guitarist from XTC. “The man brings back a sitar and flirts with sitar lessons, and all of a sudden, India means things to people […] Single-handily, George Harrison brought India to English consciousness. In a non-colonial and non-judgmental kind of way.”
Partridge certainly has a point. When The Beatles came back from India, they brought back a range of inspiration that they injected into their music. In doing so, they brought the sound of another country across the sea during a time when technology wasn’t there for people to find such music on their own. Of course, it wasn’t just going to India that influenced the band; meeting the musician Ravi Shankar also played a big part in the evolution of their sound.
George Harrison specifically owed a lot to Shankar, who opened his mind to various sounds, cultures and ways of life. Harrison called Shankar “The godfather of world music” before the term “world music” was widely used. Shankar found himself projected to fame on the back end of Harrison’s endorsement of him, where he was billed as a rockstar.
While many people have welcomed Shankar’s rise to fame, it ended up being a double-edged sword. Shankar was a classically trained musician in India who used his art as a spiritual release. Music was a sacred thing for him, and the way that it was interpreted by crowds overseas was completely removed from how it was supposed to be interpreted.
Western audiences attached a stigma to Indian music that Shankar wasn’t a fan of. When they heard the ambient music, they thought of drugs and free love, which didn’t align with the sacred meaning that Shankar held dear to his work. “The association with India was so wrong,” said Shankar. “The superficiality of everyone becoming ‘spiritual’, the cliches of yoga … the Kama Sutra, LSD and hash … It was all against our music and our approach to music because we consider it so sacred.”
Harrison was always disappointed with the way that people misinterpreted Indian music. He had apologised to Shankar because of the disassociation; as Shankar recalled, “He himself was very sorry and sad to see the way it was twisted and taken so casually. He never dreamed it would turn out like this.”
Things got really out of hand when Shankar started sharing lineups with some of the biggest rock bands at the time. He performed at the Monterey Pop Festival alongside acts like Jimi Hendrix and The Who. He watched them, and while he was impressed with the musicianship, the way they acted made him hesitant to play his set.
He cited Hendrix’s “Obscene movement with his instrument” before continuing, “And by seeing The Who break their instruments. I ran away and said, ‘I’m not going to play.’” He almost completely boycotted Woodstock because he had seen these two acts prior. He was also disappointed that “the audience were all stoned and didn’t know who was playing.”
Shankar eventually turned his back on rock and focused more on his Indian following to regain his reputation. The misinterpretation of his music and the chaotic nature of rock music meant that it wasn’t a movement he was happy being involved in.
