Bhaskar Das is a professional flautist based out of the finance capital of India, Mumbai. You only have to listen to one of Das’s renditions to understand that music is universal in its peculiar charm, and the instrumental it chooses to exhibit in is simply an extension of the personality that nurtures it. In Bhaskar’s case, his flute and his music are intertwined like roots within the earth, sustaining the breath of melody and cadence of the symphony. Having grown up in an atmosphere of music, his father, Pandit Gopal Das, is one of the pioneers of Indian classical music on the clarinet. Bhaskar’s journey into this world of music began at the age of three, his father being his first guru. It was such an unconscious and organic initiation that Bhaskar finds it difficult to separate music from his life. At the age of eight, Bhaskar performed for the first time at the Prayag Sangeet Samiti’s conference in Allahabad; there was no looking back since then. Till date, he has played and performed extensively in India and abroad, both as a soloist and as part of a group. Over the years, he has won several music competitions such as the Sangeet Samiti, Sangeet Natak Academy, and Sahara International Music Competition. He is also the recipient of the national scholarship by the Government of India, which allowed him to finish his Master’s degree from Banaras Hindu University with distinction. Bhaskar also received guidance by Acharya Pandit Anupam Rai. For the past decade, he has been under the tutorship of Pandit Udai Mazumdar, a renowned tabla exponent and music composer of Benaras-Maihar Gharana. Bhaskar’s strength lies in his ability to absorb the spirit of classical music’s rich heritage while being able to then render it in his various collaborations. Bhaskar has also worked on two solo albums – Bhaskar and The Rising – released in 2014 that brought out his versatility as a contemporary artist, and a to-be-released classical album of duets with his father and Ustad Akram Khan, a long-standing dream coming to fruition.