Tabla player Ritesh Das has been studying, teaching and composing since the early 1970’s. After a full career as performers in the famed dance troupe of Uday Shankar (elder brother of Pandit Ravi Shankar), Ritesh’s parents established Nritya Bharati, the first government recognized music & dance institution of independent India in Kolkata. This excellent teaching facility continues today under the guidance of Ritesh’s brother, renowned Kathak dancer Pandit Chitresh Das. Ritesh began studying tabla in Kolkata with Pandit Shankar Ghosh in 1971, and in 1979, he immigrated to the United States to perform with the AMAN Folk Ensemble, in Los Angeles California. He continued his tabla study under Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri, at the Ali Akbar College of Music, developing a relationship that continues to this day. In 1987, he moved to Toronto, where he began teaching tabla on a full time basis, and formed the Toronto Tabla Ensemble in 1991. Playing to sold out audiences since then, The Toronto Tabla Ensemble as an influential voice in Canadian music, brings together the North Indian percussive tradition of Tabla, with some of Canada’s best music and dance groups. Staying true to form, content and feeling, the TTE moves what is traditionally a solo instrument to an unparalleled level of ensemble work.
