Sunil Ganguly (Bengali: ????? ????????; 1 January 1938 – 12 June 1999) was an Indian instrumentalist from the city of Kolkata (Calcutta) who played the Hawaiian electric guitar.
He created many albums from HMV, Concorde Records, Sagarika, during his long career (1957 - 1999) with his instrumental renditions of Indian Hindi film songs, Classical based songs, Ghazals of prominent composers like Mehdi Hassan, Ghulam Ali, Jagjit Singh, Bade Ghulam Ali, Bengali film songs and modern songs, Nazrulgeeti, Rabindrasangeet (Songs of Tagore) and popularised the Hawaiian guitar in India, with his unique style that touched the hearts of listeners.
His renditions often had subtle twists and turns that made it even more melodious than the original song.
At his peak, there used to be two LPs released during the yearly Puja celebration by HMV, one containing songs by Lata Mangeshkar, and the other having instrumentals by Sunil Ganguly.
The instrumental film hits he recorded were hits with the youth, in Bengal as well as all over India.
Sunil Ganguly was a very busy artist in his heyday, and did many public performances all over India, including Kolkata, Mumbai, Delhi, Lucknow, Patna, Guwahati, Agartala etc.
He did one-man whole night shows in Mumbai, played in reputed College fests like the IITs, Regional Engineering Colleges.
He had a big group of musicians accompanying him on his performances, and recreating the songs, and some of the best musicians of the era, like Sri Y S Mulki, Sri Dilip Roy, Sri Samir Khasnabis, Sri Swapan Sen, Sri Manohari Singh accompanied him on his recordings and performances.
A sample of the kind of atmosphere he created with his renditions can be found here.
He was a regular performer at Doordarshan programs (TV) in Kolkata and Mumbai, AIR (All India Radio),Radio Ceylon (Sri Lanka).
His radio programs were popular and were listened to by many all over India and abroad, and this program continues to this date, over the internet.
He inspired an entire young generation to listen and play Indian music on the Hawaiian guitar.
He had many number of successful students, who are continuing his style of playing songs and in turn are coaching students in India and abroad.