"He introduced the Beatles to the Indian sounds that informed their later music. Shankar became a superstar in the Western world, but was always drawn back to the revered traditions of the sitar," said The BBC in their obituary.
"The violinist Yehudi Menuhin was enchanted by Ravi Shankar's music, comparing his genius to Mozart," The BBC said, while adding that Shankar was described as "the godfather of world music" by George Harrison, the Beatles' lead guitarist.
Washington Post said Ravi Shankar became "the world's leading representative of South Asian music, exerted a major influence on popular music in the 1960s and was the father of the jazz-pop musician Norah Jones..."
"One reason Mr Shankar's music had such influence over audiences and musicians was the otherworldly quality of its tones and rhythms; the sitar produces more tones than a guitar and is based on a different theory of music," Post added.
New York Times described Ravi Shankar as a soft-spoken, eloquent man whose performance style embodied a virtuosity that transcended musical languages and was trained in both Eastern and Western musical traditions.
"Although Western audiences were often mystified by the odd sounds and shapes of the instruments when he began touring in Europe and the United States in the early 1950s, Mr Shankar and his ensemble gradually built a large following for Indian music," the paper said.
Calling Harrison Shankar's most famous disciple, Los Angeles Times said his association with the Beatle gave "the Indian musician-composer unexpected pop-culture cachet".
"Suddenly the classically trained Shankar was a darling of the hippie movement, gaining widespread attention through memorable performances at the Monterey Pop Festival, Woodstock and the 1971 Concert for Bangladesh," it said.
"His classical career outlived his counterculture fame, but he continued to meld East with West and composed concertos, which harmonized his sitar with orchestras," said CNN.
Britain's The Guardian said, "It was Shankar's vision that brought the sounds of the raga into western consciousness, thus bridging the gap between eastern and western music for the first time.
"In a long career he was still winning awards in 2002 when his album Full Circle/Live at Carnegie Hall (2000) achieved a Grammy for best album in the world music category. Shankar's distinction as a sitar player was his brilliant virtuosity, creativity and vast range of musicianship. In the west, certainly, his name is also synonymous with the music of India."
