MUMBAI: One of the most astounding RJs and Red FM fame RJ Devaki from Ahmedabad was chosen as the one, who got an opportunity via Radioandmusic.com, to represent India at the International Radio Festival 2018.
“To be able to perform and stand for your country is one of the lifetime experiences. The experience was crazy, vibrant, wild and unbelievable. Having so many people coming from across the world, this is going to be a lifetime memory,” says RJ Devaki on her IRF Malta 2018 experience, a festival that ended with a big bang.
“While there are 19,500 languages and still everybody is under the complex of English, Radioandmusic.com has been able to tap a talent that speaks all possible languages,” exclaims RJ Devaki.
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On the radio set up, IRF 2018 had put forth, RJ Devaki reveals, “The studio was put up in the middle of the National War Museum. Malta has a significant history and it felt like we were walking into the set of Game of Thrones .”
Mentioning that it was an ecstatic experience Devaki also elaborates, “There was so much of learning involved at IRF 2018, to get to know more about their radio struggle to the kind of radio that they wanted to do, the kind of conviction they had. Here in India most of us have similar music and play them, while their RJ’s curate their own music, they basically stand for their own music, while we take the support of music.”
We all know there is a lot to talk about India and showcase our humongous talent and RJ Devaki portrayed the best of our Mathrubhumi at the foreign land through her show. “It became an even bigger responsibility for me to sample India the way it is and the festivities we have. We used all this as talk points for the show. We thought this shouldn’t be just a radio show, but it should also be a stage show where people can watch experience, learn our culture. The first hour of the show I put it as – Malta experiencing India and the second hour was – India experiencing what’s happening at Malta and IRF 2018. It was the combination of both,” elaborates RJ Devaki.
I brought an ‘Indianess’ connect too. I did 90% of my show in English so that everybody understands what our country is all about. While there were Iranians, Turkishians, who were doing their shows in their own language and not in English. They have a lot of pride in their language, their mother tongue, culture. This is the reason why all the songs that I played were inspired by different regions of India as well as taken by Bollywood. I also did a show in my mother tongue in a folk format called Diaro . I played Dreamum Wakeuppum , Patola ,Laila Majnu O Womaniya (Gangs of Wasseypur) and more.
While this was a special moment for RJ Devaki at IRF 2018, “I remember when Ghoomar was being played, I can’t tell you how I felt about it. It was magical as I really felt, I was on the top of the world. Also, there were discussions, where many radio biggies were discussing whether ‘machine will replace man’.”
She lastly adds, “There was a great cultural exchange of each other’s country, background, culture, music apart from our motive to do what we do.”
International Radio Festival 2018 was held at Malta, one of the gorgeous locations anyone could come across. The event is the idea of its festive director and founder Director Darryl von Däniken.
Check out a glimpse of RJ Devaki at the IRF 2018
