Pandit Raghunath Prasanna

Raghunath Prasanna was born in 1913 into a Varanasi family of wind players. His first training came from his father, the shehnai player Gauri Shanker, and he also studied with Dauji Mishra of Varanasi. He performed on both the shehnai and the bansuri, and his playing was documented on record: Alain Danielou recorded him for the anthology of Indian classical music later issued as "A Tribute to Alain Danielou" (1955), a survey that also carried recordings of Ravi Shankar, Ali Akbar Khan and the Dagar brothers.

Although the family was historically associated with the shehnai, Raghunath Prasanna brought the bansuri into its repertoire and developed a flute manner that drew on shehnai technique alongside elements of Hindustani vocal music. That approach became the foundation of the Prasanna family's bansuri tradition and passed to later generations, among them his son Rajendra Prasanna. He died in 1999.

His flute playing drew technique from the shehnai and phrasing from Hindustani vocal music — the basis of the Prasanna family bansuri style.