Das recruited the Indian musicians and played sitar on Harrison's 1968 solo album Wonderwall Music, which was partly recorded in Bombay.
[17][18][nb 1] There, Harrison saw first-hand the aspects of Hindu culture and religiosity that would inform his work with the Beatles, including their 1967 album Sgt.
[31] In 1970, Shankar organised for Das to move to Canada[31] to help promote Indian classical music in North America, through a program of lectures, public performances and private tuition.
[34] In August 1976, Das played tambura at Shankar's dusk-to-dawn recital at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City, a concert celebrating the twentieth anniversary of his first public appearance in the US.
[3] In 1994, Das made two cassette recordings, titled Dhyanam and Shanti Vani, of musical pieces designed to accompany yoga and meditation practice.
[2][nb 4] In 2004, Das responded to an initiative launched by the Ontario premier, Dalton McGuinty, to contribute humanitarian aid to citizens of India, Bangladesh and Nepal after the region had been subject to devastating floods.
[40] On 8–9 October, Das performed a 24-hour sitar marathon at the University of Toronto's William Doo Auditorium[41] to raise awareness and funds for those affected in India and Bangladesh.
[42] Das overcame poor health to complete the day-long performance; as stipulated beforehand,[40] he left the stage only for toilet breaks, during which his place was taken by one of his students.
[41] In September 2005, the Federation of Bangladeshi Associations in North America (FOBANA) presented him with an award for "his outstanding contribution in promoting Bengali culture to the new generation".
[9] After debuting the work in Chicago in 2007, Das presented In Search of Peace – Music and Meditation, a combination of performance and lecture, in Chennai in February 2008.
A solo presentation, it included an alap (based on raga Komal Rishabh Asavari) that incorporated aspects of Hindustani classical, fusion, and Indo jazz, accompanied by a video projection of scenes from Benares and the Ganges.
[44] When asked in a 2010 interview for Canada's National Post why he had never attempted to become a commercial recording artist, Das replied: "I love to perform, but I am not sure that what I have to offer is as good as or better than my guru ...
As a result of this loss, Das returned to India and lived in monasteries there, a period of reflection and re-energising that led to his meditation-based recordings and book later in the 1990s.
He was persuaded to re-engage with his passion for music by Shankar,[3] whose son Shubho had also died in 1992, and who himself has begun to suffer serious heart problems at this time.