The blending of two musical cultures

This weekend will see a collaboration between Scottish jazz musicians and Indian musicians

The Edinburgh Jazz Festival is bringing together two distinct types of music, which are traditionally worlds apart.

This weekend will see a collaboration between Scottish jazz musicians and Indian musicians, brought together by the British Council.

The council said they wanted to increase the international programme at Edinburgh's jazz festival.

The jazz trio AAB will be playing with the Indian musicians from the group Ganesh Kumeresh on Sunday.

Tom Bancroft, from AAB, said the British Council introduced them to the organisers of the Delhi jazz festival and they met musicians from the group Ganesh Kumeresh and planned a collaboration for Edinburgh.

He said: "We have very compatible skillsets so it's very interesting in many ways."

'Different cultures'

Ganesh Rajagopalan, from Ganesh Kumaresh, said: "As musicians we are open to all different cultures and what happens is we are able to communicate with each other through the medium of music as language."

He added: "The music we play is a lot like jazz, lots of improvisation."

Dana MacLeod, senior arts adviser at British Council Scotland, said: "British Council Scotland have been working with Festivals Edinburgh on increasing the international programmes across all of the festivals between 2012 and 2014, in the run up to the Olympics in London and the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.

"I think this will be the first of many international partnerships for Scotland's artistic community and will encourage more international working and more exciting projects, to raise the ambition of what is possible in Scotland.

"British Council Scotland will be at the forefront of supporting that process."