"Along with the steady diet sitar, sarod, and tabla, several new instruments and players came to my attention. The first of these was Ustad Bismillah Khan, master of the sonorous double-reed instrument known as shehnai. This beautiful wind instrument, with finger holes and a bell-shaped opening at the bottom, sounded to me like a hybrid of soprano saxophone and oboe, and Bismillah Khan’s tone very much influenced what Coltrane and Terry Riley would do with the soprano sax. Primarily used at weddings, the shehnai had been rejected as a classical instrument until Bismillah Khan elevated it to a higher status among listeners. His unique fingertips and sublime breath control produced the necessary range of sounds for raga making shehnai one of the more popular instruments in North India."

“He was the undisputed jewel in the crown of Indian music; one who will not be born in the next few centuries. He gave a new meaning to shehnai.”

“Allahee...Allah-hee... Allah-hee....I continued to raise the pitch. When I opened my eyes I asked them: Is this chutiyap? I am calling the God. I am thinking of him. I am searching for Him. Why do you call my search chutiya?”

“He did not even leave his favourite Banaras where the notes of his shehnai wafted across the Kashi Vishwanath and Sankat Mochan temples and intermingled with the placid waters of the Ganga,”

“Tradition takes time to change. But it changes, all right. All that I have to do is to keep trying.”

“Ustad Bismillah Khan’s specialization lies in his ability to produce intricate sound patterns on the Shehnai, which was hitherto, considered impossible on this instrument.”

“Khan saheb’s music has found its way, penetrating barriers of religion, caste and class, to the hearts of millions of our people, uniting them in a shared ecstasy....He has never accepted that there is any contradiction between music and his religious faith, rather he sees perfect unity , a connection between the two....”