Top 10 Famous Indian Musicians Ever Till 2022  

Indian classical musicians have played a major role in popularising Indian music all across the globe. The music of India is varied as it has many cultures and this diversity of India contributes to a wide range of musical styles within Indian music.

If you are bored of listening to the same tunes, you can lend an ear to these classical musicians. We are certain that their melodic and soothing tunes will definitely put your mind and heart at ease. Here is a list of the top 10 popular Indian musicians along with their instruments for you.

1. Miyan Tansen

Starting our list of popular Indian musicians, we have Miyan Tansen, a composer, musician and vocalist, was an eminent figure in the North Indian Tradition of Hindustani classical music.

Tansen began his career in music and spent most of his adult life in the court of the Hindu king of Rewa, Raja Ramchandra Singh, where Tansen's musical capabilities gained him widespread fame and following. He was very praised for his dhrupad and raga compositions and for his vocal performances.

2. Ustad Bismillah Khan

Qamruddin Bismillah Khan was one of the popular Indian musicians, who played the shehnai with such an expressive virtuosity that he became one of the leading Indian classical music artist. He learned a lot of other musical forms and ragas, and he improvised patterns that had been known impossible for the shehnai. 

He was chosen to perform for the ceremony at Red Fort as the Indian flag unfurled at the hour of India’s independence on August 15, 1947, his music was played on television every Independence Day since then. In 2001 Khan was awarded India’s highest civilian honour, the Bharat Ratna and the country also observed a national day of mourning following his death in 2006.

3. Pandit Ravi Shankar

Ravi Shankar Chowdhury was an Indian sitar specialist and also a composer. He was considered the best-known sitar player in the second half of the 20th century and influenced many other musicians as well throughout the world. 

Shankar was awarded the Bharat Ratna in 1999. During his lifetime he won a lot of other awards as well.

4. Hariprasad Chaurasia

Hariprasad Chaurasia is an Indian music director and a classical flautist, who plays the bansuri, which is an Indian bamboo flute in the Hindustani classical tradition whose performances and compositions brought international recognition to the bansuri (a simple side-blown bamboo flute).Chaurasia’s style popularized classical music and had quite an audience.

5. Pandit Shivkumar Sharma

Pandit Shivkumar Sharma is a known Indian music composer and Santoor player. Sharma began studying music when he was around five years old. When he was a teenager, his father introduced him to the santur that was very well known in the Sufi music of the Kashmir region but foreign to Hindustani tradition. 

6. Ustad Zakir Hussain

Ustad Zakir Hussain is known for a lot of things, he is known as an Indian tabla player, composer, percussionist, music producer, movie actor and eldest son of the tabla player Ustad Allah Rakha. He gave his first performance at a concert at the age of seven and was deemed a child prodigy. He was touring almost by the age of eleven. 

7. Amjad Ali Khan

Ustad Amjad Ali Khan Bangash is a recognised Indian classical sarod player. Amjad Ali Khan gave his first recital when he was six.  He learned from his father Hafiz Ali Khan,  who was a court musician back in Gwalior up until Independence in 1947. 

8. Pandit Ram Narayan

Ram Narayan is an Indian musician who is famous as he popularised the bowed instrument sarangi as a solo concert instrument in Hindustani classical music and became the first globally successful sarangi player. 

9. Ustad Asad Ali Khan

Asad Ali Khan was an Indian musician who played the plucked string instrument known as Rudra Veena. He performed in the style Dhrupad and was considered as one of the best living Rudra Veena player in India by The Hindu.  

He worked at All India Radio, taught the sitar in the Faculty of Music and Fine Arts at the University of Delhi for around 17 years, and continued to train students privately even after his retirement. 

10. Ali Akbar Khan

Ali Akbar Khan composer, expert sarod player and also a teacher. Trained as a classical musician and instrumentalist by his own father, Allauddin Khan and also composed a number of classical ragas and film scores.