Badal Roy passes away
Badal Roy passes away: How the Bangladeshi tabla virtuoso pioneered Indian classical music-influenced jazz albums Badal Roy, a Bangladeshi tabla player whose drumming propelled East-West fusions for some of the most prominent musicians in and out of jazz, died on Tuesday in Wilmington, Delaware. He was 82. Badal Roy, a Bangladeshi tabla player whose drumming propelled East-West fusions for some of the most prominent musicians in and out of jazz, died on Tuesday in Wilmington, Delaware. He was 82. His son, Amitav Roy Chowdhury, said the cause was COVID-19. Roy was largely self-taught. He was not trained in the Indian classical apprentice tradition of gurus and disciples. Where classical tabla players use a pair of differently tuned drums, Roy sometimes used three or four. His improvisational flexibility and his skill at sharing a groove made him a prized collaborator for jazz, funk, rock, and global musicians. He first became widely known for his work in the early 1970s with English gu