Details

Who: Anoushka Shankar’s “Traveller: A Raga-Flamenco Discovery”

When: 8 p.m. Tuesday

Where: Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts, UC Davis

Tickets: $35-$55 general, $17.50-$27.50 students; www.mondaviarts.org, (530) 754-2787

“I have loved flamenco music as a listener for many years,” Anoushka Shankar told The Enterprise in a recent phone interview.

And more recently, she has come to realize there are several connections between the Indian classical music tradition in which she grew up and the flamenco tradition associated with Spain.

As it turns out, there is both linguistic and genetic evidence that the people known to the English-speaking world as gypsies — also known as the Romani or Romany people — originally came from central India, and migrated through Iran, Iraq, Armenia and Eastern Europe, ultimately reaching the Iberian peninsula.

So the sympathetic vibrations that can occur when the two styles come into contact are not as far-fetched as a map of the world might indicate.

Shankar’s 2005 album “Rise” — which paired Shankar and her sitar with a host of collaborating musicians who play in different styles — included a track on which she collaborated with flamenco-influenced pianist Pedro Ricardo Miño. And that experience left Shankar wanting to pursue the flamenco connection further.

“I found the experience intriguing and challenging,” she said. “It wasn’t like stepping out of one tradition and into a whole other tradition” — the connections felt closer. “And I also wanted to do an album focusing on one idea, rather than many ideas (like ‘Rise’).”

So Shankar’s 2011 album “Traveller” became a “voyage of discovery,” as she pursued her musical intuition that the Indian and flamenco traditions ultimately spring from some of the same origins.

“It was the perfect thing for me to choose, because these are two big, rich traditions. And I became more and more aware of the historical connection, which lent validity.”

The “Traveller” album was recorded in Madrid, with a producer from the flamenco tradition.

“Our first sessions together had more to do with listening than with writing. We played a variety of rhythmic patterns, and then we talked about a dream list of musicians, and began reaching out to them, to see if they could participate.”

The finished album drew favorable reviews from critics on several continents. “Traveller” is also her first for the Deutsche Grammophon label, which has released many of her father Ravi Shankar’s albums over the years.

Anoushka Shankar’s concert at the Mondavi Center, at 8 p.m. Tuesday, likewise is titled “Traveller.” “It follows the album in the sense that we play the album’s repertoire — most of the evening is from the album. But we’ve evolved, we will not reproduce the music exactly.

“We’re giving the musicians room for improvisation — including myself. People will recognize the pieces, but they will hear some new solos and other innovative changes.”

Shankar has played at the Mondavi Center twice before — once on her own, and once paired with her famous father, who turned 92 on April 7. And Ravi Shankar is still touring — he’s booked to appear at the Mondavi Center on Oct. 23.

“He is incredible. I don’t know how he does it,” Anoushka Shankar said, adding, “I am looking forward to another concert in Davis. It’s a lovely venue, and the audience has been really warm when I’ve played there in the past.”

She makes her home these days in London, where she was born  in 1981, and once she gets done with her current tour, she’ll start preparing for her next album, which will come out in a year or two.

— Reach Jeff Hudson at [email protected] or (530) 747-8055.

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Anoushka Shankar will perform songs from her 2011 album, “Traveller,” when she plays Tuesday evening at the Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts at UC Davis. Courtesy photo

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