Maharaja Musicals started by accident. I was collaborating with musicians in the US and Europe, and some of them began asking me to bring back a tabla or a sitar when I travelled to India. It happened often enough that it stopped feeling like a favour and started looking like a gap: good Indian instruments were hard to buy from abroad without either paying a specialist dealer's markup or gambling on a photograph.
That was the beginning. We have been shipping instruments worldwide ever since.
How we work
Most of what we sell is made for us by craftsmen near Delhi, people we have worked with for years, building to our specification rather than to a wholesale catalogue. Those instruments then come to our own workshop, where they are finished, tuned and checked before they go anywhere.
The rest of the range comes from named makers: Bina, Monoj K Sardar, Kanai Lal & Sons, Hemen & Co, Sarfuddin, Paul & Co and others. We do not build those, and we say so on every product page. What we do is inspect and set them up before they ship, which is the part most online sellers skip.
What that means in practice
Every harmonium leaves us tuned to A440, with the reeds voiced and every key played through. Every tabla is skinned and tuned. Every sitar and tanpura is strung to its designed gauges with the jawari cut by hand, because a badly cut bridge makes a good instrument sound dead.
Before anything ships, we send you photographs and video of the actual instrument. Not a catalogue image, the one going into your box. Buying a hand-built instrument from another continent is a leap of faith, and this is how we take some of the guesswork out of it.
Where we ship
Worldwide, by FedEx, DHL and UPS, with transit insurance included. Prices are in US dollars and the price you see is the price you pay. Nothing is added at checkout.
We take no payment when you place an order. We confirm the instrument is available, send you the photos and video, and only then arrange payment. If something is not right, you have not paid for it.
Talking to us
WhatsApp is the fastest way to reach us, and the same people who set up the instruments answer the messages. If you are unsure which harmonium suits your voice, which bansuri scale to start on, or whether a tanpura is right for the singer you are buying for, ask. We would rather spend twenty minutes getting it right than take an order that comes back.