Australian Bebop Ragas (also known as ABR) features original compositions based on Hindustani Ragas.

Teed Rockwell learned these Ragas from over a hundred classes with Ali Akbar Khan, and from dozens of classes with Sitar Maestros Shahid Parvez and Habib Khan. Teed is the only person in the world to play in this musical tradition on the Touchstyle Veena, a unique customized instrument which has a guitar-like fretboard played by tapping the strings simultaneously with both hands.

Jesse Sheehan is one of the very few saxophonists trained in the Hindustani musical tradition. He understands that keeping the rules of the raga gives a special kind of freedom that is as powerful, but importantly different from, the freedom of jazz improvisation. He studied tabla in India for years with living legend Pandit Nayan Ghosh, and also performed with many of India’s finest musicians.

Andy Graham plays (Australian) didgeridoo and (Bebop) drums simultaneously, using a unique rack mounted system that he designed and built himself. He played with Teed in the popular Sonoma county band DyaTribal, and is widely known as the inventor of many unique musical instruments. He is especially known for the slaperoo, which is played by musicians as diverse as Stevie Wonder and Indian Percussionist Shivamani.

ABR was originally formed with Teed Rockwell on the Touchstyle Veena, Stephen Kent on didgeridoo, and Sameer Gupta on drums. This version of ABR played numerous concerts across the state and country, including several shows at the famed Berkeley venue Freight & Salvage. They also recorded an album called Snakes and Ladders, which sold thousands of copies through a variety of distributors, has over a hundred listener-created stations on Pandora, and is widely listened to on Spotify. You can hear the entire Snakes and Ladders album here