Ustad Vilayat Khan (28 August 1928[1] – 13 March 2004) was an Indian classical sitar player, [1][2] considered by many to be the greatest sitarist of his age.

[4] Vilayat Khan performed at All Bengal Music Conference, as his first concert, organized by Bhupen Ghosh in Kolkata with Ahmed Jan Thirakwa on tabla.

His performance at the concert organized by Vikramaditya Sangeet Parishad, Mumbai in 1944 drew the headline "Electrifying Sitar".

[4][2] When he died from lung cancer in 2004, Vilayat Khan had been recording for over 65 years and broadcasting on All India Radio almost as long.

In the 1990s, his recording career reached a climax of sorts with a series of ambitious CDs for India Archive Music in New York, some traditional, some controversial, some eccentric.

During his long career, he toured and performed in South Asia, China, Africa, Europe and the former Soviet Union.

[2] Vilayat composed and conducted the score for three feature films – Satyajit Ray's Jalsaghar (1958) in Bengali,[4][8] Merchant-Ivory Productions' The Guru (1969) in English,[4] and Madhusudan Kumar's Kadambari (1976) in Hindi.

In an interview given to Karan Thapar for BBC in early 2002, Vilayat Khan admitted to having the Rajput name – Kahan Singh.

The ceremony appears in a documentary made in 1991 and also in India's Ministry of External Affairs film on his life, entitled Spirit to Soul.

Vilayat Khan made the United States his second home and had a residence in Princeton, New Jersey besides Dehradun and Kolkata, India.

[4] NDTV (New Delhi Television) reportedly quoted the prime minister of India, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, saying this in a statement, "Ustad Vilayat Khan was a child prodigy to whom goes the credit of taking the sitar beyond the shores of this country.

[16] According to The Hindu newspaper, "As for the eternal question, who is the greatest of them all, it would appear that there are many greats and there is Vilayat Khan"..."an artist who had transformed his instrument to resemble the human voice"[17] ^ He kept his childhood interest in vocal music all his life, often singing in concerts, and composed khyal bandishes using the pen name Nath Piya.