MUMBAI: Shankar Mahadevan, the leading Indian classical musician who recently performed at Berklee Signature Series concert on 13 December 2016 is a musical legend, but he constantly strives for better. In a conversation with Radioandmusic.com Shankar Mahadevan speaks about his thoughts behind ‘MY Country My Music’, collaborating with different artists, a few of his upcoming projects and so on.
When asked what inspired him to create brand new presentation of Indian folk music, ‘MY Country My Music’ he explained that he has popular music in regional languages too. These included Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, and Marathi. “All these languages are very active. In fact, I have always contempated bringing them together on a show. There is not a single show in the country, which encapsulates all the art forms of music, folk, Bollywood, all put together. I decided to the device the show called ‘My Country My Music’. The basic foundation of the show is very contemporary, modern.”
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He also added that he has collaborated with some masters of folk music from different states and he will be presenting them on one stage. There are beautiful languages and singers from Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Punjab, Assam, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu and Kerala.”
“It’s a very highly entertaining, musically, aesthetically, high-level show. People will come to realise how much music is there in our country,” added Mahadevan.
On his collaboration with different artists from different cultural backgrounds, Mahadevan explained that it was ‘less difficult’ for him.
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“The thing is, me, being a multilingual artist, I have always been exposed to these regions, just how I have Hindi popular songs, my songs in Kannada are as popular. My songs in Telegu are even more popular compared to my songs in Hindi. I am already exposed to cultures, the kind of singers and the industry over there. Possibly, I am the only artist who could put all these cultures, all these languages together because I have already done songs in all these states.”
Being a pioneer of global fusion, Mahadevan sees the approach of electronic music and the flourishing Independent music prospect in India as a shift of fashion. “It keeps shifting from how the fashion changes and I love electronic music as it is some kind of melodic content. I need some kind of melodic content on electronic music to relate,” Mahadevan put in plain words.
Sharing his experience with renowned musicians around the world he said, “There are so many musicians that I have worked with, but one person I loved working most with was John Mclaughlin, truly a talented international artist and one of the finest guitarist in the world. Every moment that I spend with him, musically or otherwise makes me feel proud to know him.”
On his upcoming projects, Mahadevan said that he along with Ehsaan and Loy is working on Dharma Production next. Apart from this they are doing an Amazon Television Series and a multilingual film starring Prabhas.
Lastly, He said he is also expanding his online music academy to make it the ‘Harvard of music’.
