Hi, everyone,

My name is Chuck. I've enjoyed the music of Robbie Basho for about
25 years, which is around the same time I've played 12 string
guitar. Heard of him through articles about Kottke and Fahey, and
located a few of his albums (Art of the Acoustic Steel String
Guitar, the Guitar Soli compilation).

I have been reading Peter Lavezzoli's book, The Dawn of Indian Music
in the West - Bhairavi (NY: Continuum, 2006 -- ISBN 0-8264-1815-
5). Although it is very informative and meticulously researched,
I'm disappointed that Basho seems to have been excluded. The book
prominently features Indian musicians Ali Akbar Khan, Ravi Shankar,
Alla Rakha, Zakir Hussain; rock musicians including David Crosby and
Roger McGuinn of the Byrds, Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead and
George Harrison; jazz pioneers John Coltrane and John McLaughlin;
and advant-garde composers Philip Glass and Terry Riley. I am
finding the chapter, Nada Brahma: The Way of the Raga, a basic
theory of Indian music, particularly insightful.

As much as I love the Byrds, though, I'm disappointed by the
exclusion of Basho, vis-a-vis Lavezzolli's comments, such as:

"But in spite of the Yardbirds, Kinks and Beatles dabbling with
sitar and drone in 1965, these elements were solely intended to
provide decorative color for songs that otherwise remained within
the normal parameters of pop music, while the Byrds' 'Eight Miles
High' b/w 'Why' single -- first recorded in December 1965 and
completed in January 1966 -- remains teh first example of pop songs
that were specifically conceived as vehicles for extended modal
improvisations." (page 155).

Does anyone know if Crosby and McGuinn ever saw Basho perform in
Berkley circa 1964 to 1965?

Chuck