“I worked on my first real record with Mickey Hart called Diga in 1974 and 1975,” classical tabla virtuoso Zakir Hussain observes. “At the same time, I was also doing Shakti. Now, it’s happening again at the same time. It’s amazing.”

On May 1, Hussain returned to the stage with Planet Drum, joining Hart, Giovanni Hidalgo and Sikiru Adepoju at the Frost Amphitheater in Palo Alto, Calif., for their first performance in 15 years. This show anticipated the August release of the percussion ensemble’s In the Groove album.

A couple weeks after the Frost show, Hussain’s pioneering Shakti collective announced that they would regroup as well. Shakti originally teamed Hussain with guitarist John McLaughlin, violinist Shankar and ghatam player T.H. “Vikku” Vinayakram. McLaughlin and Hussain will record and tour with a new version of Shakti in 2023 that will also include Vinayakram’s son, V. Selvaganesh on percussion, along with vocalist Shankar Mahadevan and violinist Ganesh Rajagopalan.

Hussain was a child prodigy, who became a disciple of his father, celebrated tabla master Ustad Alla Rakha, before embarking on a career that has seen him tour the globe many times over—performing Indian classical music, while also taking part in cross-cultural endeavors with artists such as Herbie Hancock, Charles Lloyd, Béla Fleck and Edgar Meyer.

You’ve appeared in so many different musical settings over the years. Were you initially trained that way or did you chose to explore those on your own?

When I was learning tabla, I had blinders on and I was trying to emulate my dad. I tried to sound like him, play like him and act like him. I never really thought about the instrument in any other context. I was being true to the Indian classical rhythms and repertoire.

That’s where I was until I started working as a 13 or 14-year-old in Bollywood film orchestras. Those film orchestras were a strange combination. In one part of the room, you would have a whole string section: violin, viola, cello, bass. On another side of the room, you would have the Indian solo instruments like the sitar, the sarod, the bamboo flute, the sarangi and the santoors. Then, directly opposite that, you would have the saxophone, the silver flute, the trumpet and all that stuff. At the end of the room, opposite the strings, would be the piano. And, in the center of the room—sitting in a circle— would be the rhythm section. That rhythm section would include tabla, Indian folk drums, bongo drums, congas and various percussion stuff, like tambourines, cowbells and clave sticks.

All of them existed in one room. There were 50-60 musicians sitting there playing, and one singer would be in a corner in a closed booth suffocating while trying to get some separation from the orchestra.

When I arrived in that situation, I started to see beyond the blinders. I started to jam with the horn players, the drummers and the piano player. Then my music started to reveal itself in a whole different way.

Maybe that’s why my father sent me to the Bollywood film orchestra—because he used to compose music for Bollywood films. That’s when it all started to open up. I began to see a world away from what the Indian traditional art form was like. It started to sink in that my father wanted me to see all the shades that the music has to offer, to look through all the shelves and find the expression that most appealed to me.

By the time you first connected with John McLaughlin, how comfortable were you with jazz?

My first memory of listening to jazz was a big band I went to see with my father. It was 1959- 1960, and I was 8 or 9 years old. We walked into the concert hall a bit late, and I remember hearing this piano line. Then, “Take the ‘A’ Train” kicked in. It was the Duke Ellington Orchestra. They were traveling Asia on a USO tour and they made a stop in Bombay.

My father was very close friends with Yusef Lateef and Elvin Jones. So he brought me their records along with Miles Davis’ Kind of Blue and all that.

He was responsible for helping me get rid of the blinkers that I had—my worship for him and the worship of the Indian classical art form. I began opening my eyes and my ears to it.

That continued when I arrived in America. One of my first gigs after playing with Ravi Shankar on the East Coast was coming to the West Coast and sitting down face to face and playing with the saxophone maestro John Handy and Ali Akbar Khan, the great Indian sarod maestro. We played two or three concerts, then we went on tour to Germany.

So all that was already starting to happen. When I arrived in John’s presence, enough baking had been done for the cake to be assembled.

Our first get-together was me giving him a vocal lesson. So we were both out of our comfort zone—me without my tabla, him without his guitar and we were singing raga.

It was a very strange first meeting, which led to us meeting again and jamming with him on an acoustic guitar and me on tabla in the living room of the maestro Ali Akbar Khan. At the time, I was teaching at his music school here in the Bay Area. John came by and we went to see the maestro and played for him. That was the first time we actually played together. It was very clear that there was a lot to be shared, and my father always mentioned to me that a teacher doesn’t only teach, a teacher also learns—so it’s both ways.

Shakti’s first record was so innovative and impactful. To what extent were you consciously trying to create something novel?

I think the reason why Shakti had that energy when we first got together was because there was no commercial aspect of it in mind—no idea that this was going to become a band or start touring. We just wanted to play together.

John was curious and it was his energy that brought it all together. At that time, he was following this spiritual leader and he wanted to have a little concert for his guru. So he called us in because after he had played with me in the living room of Ali Akbar Khan, it really got him thinking. He had also worked with Shankar, the violin player at Wesleyan University, so he thought that we should come together.

That’s what we did, and we immediately experienced the joy of playing together. When I first played with John McLaughlin, we hadn’t rehearsed. I hadn’t even heard him play yet. I hadn’t heard Mahavishnu Orchestra yet and he hadn’t heard me. But when we sat down and started playing together, it was like we had been playing together for decades. We started and stopped at the same time. We thought of the same rhythmic melodic patterns. It was just like, “Wow!” We looked at each other and broke out in giggles because how was that even possible? And it was the same playing with Shankar.

So that kind of uncontrolled joy of having found lost brothers was so clearly there when we started playing together that nothing else really mattered. We never thought, “Hey, we could do something with this.” It just was there and it happened to be recorded. Then, a couple months later, John called and said, “Hey, guys, there’s this recording and it’s great. You think we could make a record?” That’s how it all began.

What prompted your decision to revisit Shakti once again?

There are a couple of milestone landmark Himalayan experiences that everybody has in their lives and the opportunity to plug into that once again is always something that one desires. At this juncture, when John is 80 and I’m 72 years old, I guess we are at a point where we both feel that we should just go around the block once more while we still can and experience that incredible energy.

John had a very strong attack of arthritis in his hand, four or five years back. He couldn’t even hold a pick in his hand. It was that bad, and he was not sure that he was ever going to play again. But by taking injections and through great pain, he did one tour thinking that it would be his farewell tour. But in the meantime, in India and various other places, he found treatments that have brought him back. It’s a miraculous recovery, so I guess he felt that Shakti had been such a milestone moment in his life that he would like to experience it one more time.

One of the greatest moments of my life was sitting on stage with John McLaughlin, Shankar and Vikku—flying high up in that sky, really feeling free and totally devoid of any worries or any issues. We were flying with wings and having such a great time with that music. That has always been there, and now it’s time to make that run one more time, embrace that moment and hope that it will come again.

When you mention John’s ailment, I also think of Planet Drum’s Giovanni Hidalgo, who lost the tips of his fingers yet has made an extraordinary recovery of his own.

We were all distraught when we found out what he was going through. We were shaken up and felt so sad for him. But he’s found a way to express himself. He’s found a way to be Giovanni again in a different way. He tried that up at the Frost Amphitheater Theater and it worked. It was great.

So the new record has suddenly become more future-thinking than we originally imagined. The idea was to make a record and that would probably be it because Giovanni wouldn’t be able to tour. But he’s found a way, and he has embraced the situation. He’s a comeback champ and we are so glad that he’s with us and that we are able to go into the fray once more.

How would you compare the experience of being inside both of those ensembles: Shakti and Planet Drum?

The core feeling that they inspire inside of me is the same. When I first heard Giovanni, I was like, “Oh, he’s playing tabla.” That was my first reaction. So I jumped onto my instrument and started playing along. The patterns, the phrasing, the tempos and the speed—it was like he was playing tabla. So I started playing along with him and his eyes went wide. There was that energy. And it was same with John McLaughlin, the same with Shankar. It was like John was playing tabla and I was playing guitar, maybe on the drums. So that core excitement, that feeling, that experience, is pretty much the same in both.

The differences are that one has a fabulous combination on an equal basis of rhythm and melody, which is Shakti, and the other hits you with the pulse and the rhythm and the tempo and gets you going in that way, which is Planet Drum. So for me, it is really the best combo to go out there and experience the rhythm and the melodies together, and then just unabashedly go rhythm.

But, at the same time, I can exist in these two combos that project the same feeling, the same experience, the same vibrations, the same wavelength interaction among people involved in these two different things.

The fact that both of these have come back at the same time is almost beyond words.

Have you started recording the new Shakti record or is that still yet to come?

We’ve been doing it via the courtesy of COVID protocols. So we haven’t been able to assemble on a stage or in a studio physically and play live, but we’ve been sending music back and forth. Through Zoom gatherings, we’ve been able to discuss music and record music. So we’ve got about four or five pieces already done and we have three more that are under construction. Once we get that done, we will have a record. But we are hoping that in the next month and a half or so, we will be able to assemble and play all those songs live in the studio and see if we can put together a combo of all the studio work that we have done without playing live together, and then play live together and assemble the songs in that manner.

This year is also the 50th anniversary of Mickey Hart’s Rolling Thunder record. Although you’re not on the entire album, you’re certainly a presence on a number of the tracks. Thinking back to those sessions, what image or memory comes to mind?

Two very unusual things that I had never done before in my life: One was sitting in the back of a pickup truck with Mickey, trying to hold onto a 16-track Ampex machine to keep it from rolling off the pickup truck while we were driving at full speed on highway 101 toward Mickey’s place in Novato, Calif. We had just basically stolen that machine from Warner Bros., we were bringing that to Mickey’s and we were going to plug it in.

We arrived at Mickey’s barn and, of course, we didn’t have a soundboard. So we took the microphones and the cables and connected them directly into the 16-track Ampex machine. The first tracks for Rolling Thunder were recorded there.

Two days later, I got into a Cessna airplane from the Novato airfield and flew over the Sierra Mountains to get Chief Rolling Thunder. I had never been in a small airplane and it was such an amazing experience, basically sitting in the cockpit and seeing the mountains and California in that way.

We landed in Reno, picked up Chief Rolling Thunder and flew him back to Novato. Then, he performed the fire ceremony to kick off the recording of the album. That’s one of the reasons why it’s called Rolling Thunder.

Those two experiences were so non-Indian for me that it was like: “What the heck is going on? Am I going to get arrested? Am I going to fall out of the sky? And does this guy even know how to fly the plane? If something happens to him, what am I gonna do?”

It was just amazing how that relationship, that journey began. The first thing that was recorded for Rolling Thunder was when I walked into the studio and Mickey handed me this crazy looking thing that looked like a drum. I’d never seen a drum like that before, and he said, “Here, play this.”

That was the beginning of an education. It was like, “OK, you’re not just a tabla player. You’re gonna do other things as well.” So he hands me this drum and I start playing it. That was the first track after he had plugged in the Ampex 16-track machine.

I walked into the room, started playing, then Dan Healy said, “You know, Mickey, we’re going to have to soundproof this barn. Too much noise is coming in from outside the barn and bleeding into the recording.” So then we had to soundproof. We were all very busy with all kinds of curtains and materials and whatnot, stapling them to the walls and trying to get it to a point where it was dead enough for us to be able to record. It was a great experience.

Were those sessions the first time you played with Jerry Garcia?

The record took some time to reach its conclusion but, in between, there were other things that were going on. For instance, one of the things that happened was that Mickey decided that we should play and see how long we could jam nonstop. The rule was that, at any given time, there should be at least two musicians playing and it shouldn’t stop. So musicians kept filing in and music was playing constantly.

I was basically an innocent boy from India. I was 18-19 years old and I hadn’t heard of any kind of stimulations to keep yourself going. I remember at some point, like maybe 15- 16 hours into it, that started happening to keep people going.

I fell asleep on the floor of the barn, while the music continued. Then, after a couple of hours, I woke up. When I looked up from my sleeping position, two gentlemen were standing right above me jamming and playing and singing. Those two were Jerry Garcia and David Crosby.

I looked at them, rubbed my eyes and looked around for a drum. Then, I found one and started playing with them. That was my first interaction with Jerry and David Crosby—in that gathering of nonstop music. We ended up playing music for just short of four days nonstop. Somewhere in the vault, there are tapes of that happening.

I’m surprised those haven’t surfaced.

It’s not fixed songs. It’s people conversing. It hasn’t been assembled or arranged in any way. In those days, the record companies ruled the roost. They’d say, “Oh, this is not a song” or “This is not something we can sell.” So that didn’t happen.

But, in those days, contracts, managers and booking agents did not run your life. You just walked in. There was a club called The Lion’s Share in town. You’d walk in there and, on any given night, there might be Sons of Champlin playing and Jerry Garcia would sit in with them. Or Country Joe and the Fish would be performing and Carlos Santana would walk in, plug in his guitar and start jamming.

That’s what was going on in those days. And to have arrived in that atmosphere— the unabashed give and take of music and ideas with an incredible amount of love and positivity—was something unusual for me. It was heaven-sent and one of the greatest schools to be hanging out at.

Jumping to In the Groove, did you have a particular charge or animating principle in mind as you approached that album?

We wanted to resurrect that feeling of Planet Drum and bring it into the 21st century. It also involved our experiences over the many decades, how they have crystallized for us and what is available to us—vis-a-vis tools that make it possible for us to be able to convey that crystallization to the audience.

For Mickey, it meant the Beast, the big instruments—the big drums on the back riser— and, most important, The Beam. I’m still deeply connected to my roots, so my instrument is still the tabla; I am still using an acoustic instrument. I have not gone electronic with it but, under Mickey’s guidance, I have brought the tabla to a point where it exists and mixes to a satisfying degree with the world of electronica, and drum and bass.

Giovanni needed to be where he is now and fight his demons and emerge at the other end, being able to share that experience rhythmically. Sikiru has always been a very stable, constant energy among all of us. He’s a very sage-like character who doesn’t speak much and still represents the world that he came from. You can imagine him somewhere in the desert in an oasis just sitting there, totally at peace with himself, totally at peace with what he has achieved and experienced, and without any hesitancy, being able to share it.

The Beam was the tonal element that served as the ribbon to tie all our collective experiences over the decades into this neat package, which is rhythm-oriented but has not just remained in that world. We have taken our organic instruments and brought them into a place where with today’s technology, it’s put into a frying pan so that it cooks even better. It emerges as a rhythmic dish, the palate of which allows you to taste what was, what is and what will be, in terms of rhythm-oriented statements.

Is there a song on the record that stands out as particularly striking or satisfying?

I think, for me, it’s “Gadago Gadago,” which is very organic, but still has an equally prominent, electronic element to it. It’s also probably the most complete marriage of rhythm and melody on the album.

All the melodies are processed sounds of the drums and the fun part of it is that they can be recreated by exactly those drums onstage. It’s not like they can only be done on the record. There was a little hesitancy at the first gig, whether we’d be able to do it to that extent, but it turned out we were able to do so.

There were a couple hiccups but they’ve been ironed out. So by next time, it should be a nicely oiled machine.