Alam Khan, son of the legendary late Sarod maestro, Swara Samrat Ali Akbar Khan, is a Sarodist, Composer, and Producer based in the San Francisco Bay Area. Since his initial training into the Maihar Seni Gharana (a classical tradition from India dating back to the 16th century) at the age of seven, Alam was blessed to learn and live under his esteemed father's careful crafting and guidance. Since accompanying his father from 1996 to 2006, Alam has established himself internationally as the face of a new generation of Sarod players of the Maihar Gharana, and has performed alongside many of the finest Indian musicians of our time. His collaborations with both traditional and contemporary artists of varying genres has set him apart as a visionary and progressive artist.

Alam was the personal assistant to his father during his final years of life, helping aid him in teaching at the Ali Akbar College of Music in San Rafael, California–a mecca for students and lovers of Indian classical music. For the past 13 years, Alam has assumed the role of director of instrumental studies at the Ali Akbar College of Music and has dedicated his life to preserving, performing, and teaching this music to the world. 

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 Arjun Verma is an Indian-American sitarist and composer. Beginning with his father, Roop Verma, and continuing with the legendary Ali Akbar Khan and his son Alam Khan, Arjun’s meticulous training has imbued him with a rich musicality that encompasses both the profound majesty and the exhilaration of North Indian classical music. 

Arjun has performed at international venues including the United Nations, the Fillmore, Prague Castle, and on the NBC TV network, collaborating with a diverse host of musicians including the London Symphony Orchestra, Swapan Chaudhuri, Alam Khan, Bob Weir (Grateful Dead), the St. Louis Symphony, and GRAMMY-winning pianist and arranger John Beasley. 

Arjun’s performance repertoire has stretched the limits of the sitar as an instrument.

Arjun is the recipient of a Mosaic America commissioning grant (2020), a Creative Work Fund grant (2018—Haas Foundation), and a Shenson Fellowship (2007—San Francisco Foundation). 

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Nilan Chaudhuri has spent his life immersed in the tradition of Indian classical percussion. Iniated into Tabla at the age of five by his father, Swapan Chaudhuri, Nilan has performed as a Tabla soloist and accompanist for nearly twenty years. He’s shared the stage with some of Hindustani Classical Music’s greatest treasures, like maestros Alam Khan, Shujaat Khan, Ramesh Misra, and Amjad Ali Khansaib at venues such as Carnegie Hall, The Fillmore, Fox Theater, and San Francisco War Memorial & Performing Arts Center. In addition to maintaining a busy performing schedule, Nilan teaches Tabla throughout the Bay Area as a faculty member at the Ali Akbar College of Music, in San Rafael, and as the Director of percussion at Chitresh Das Institute, in San Mateo.

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San Francisco’s Del Sol Quartet believes that music can, and should, happen anywhere -
screaming out Aeryn Santillan’s Makeshift Memorials from a Mission District sidewalk or a rural
high school, bouncing Ben Johnston’s microtonal Americana off the canyon walls of the
Yampa River or the hallowed walls of Library of Congress, bringing Huang Ruo’s Angel Island
Oratorio home to the island detention barracks or across the Pacific to the Singapore
International Arts Festival. Del Sol’s performances provide the possibility for unexpected
discovery, sparking dialogue and bringing people together.

Since 1992, Del Sol has commissioned or premiered thousands of works by composers
including Terry Riley, Tania León, Frederic Rzewski, Vijay Iyer, Mason Bates, Pamela Z, Chinary
Ung, Chen Yi, Andy Akiho, Erberk Eryilmaz, Theresa Wong, and Reza Vali. They especially value their ongoing relationship with the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music in Boonville, California.

Huang Ruo - A Dust in Time, Del Sol’s eleventh album, was described in the New York Times
as “excavations of beauty from the elemental.” New Del Sol recordings in 2023 include The
Resonance Between, a collaboration with North Indian musicians Alam Khan & Arjun Verma,
and SPELLLING and The Mystery School with Oakland magical-futurist pop phenomenon
SPELLLING.    

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Composer and pianist Jack Perla is active in opera, jazz, chamber and orchestra music. His music is widely performed, and he has played in the U.S., Europe, India and Japan. Beginning over twenty five years ago in New York with his group Music Without Walls and continuing after moving to San Francisco, Jack has steadily forged a reputation for his unique cross-fertilization of jazz, improvisation and classical music. He has been commissioned by the Los Angeles Opera, Opera Theatre St. Louis, Houston Grand Opera, Seattle Opera, The Paul Dresher Ensemble, TwoSense, MATA, and many other performers and organizations.

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