CHENNAI: How far does your mind tick when someone says fusion music? Well, one of the budding artists from Chennai, Shravan Sridhar, believes it’s a term that has been loosely thrown around for a long time.
“The general public have a misconception that fusion is Indian folk or classical combined with a western form. But there’s more to it than meets the eye,” he begins.
Taking Karsh Kale’s work as an example, he explains what exactly fusion means to him. For the uninitiated, Kale’s work is a massive fusion of Indian classical, electronic, hard rock and blues.
“The kind of fusion I like is blending more than three genres of music and create tunes that sound natural to an audience,” explains Shravan. Wanting to push the boundaries in terms of musicality and soundscape and putting his years of learning in Carnatic Classical (Vocal & Violin), he has tried diversifying himself in various other genres like Blues, country, rock n roll, electronica and metal.
Shravan began exploring while in college where he was introduced to the progressive and electronic music world. “Exploring other forms of music helped me find the directions towards ‘my sound’, which is still an ongoing process. I think the combination of being rooted in Carnatic music, which is very melody-oriented and other genres that maybe more rhythmic or harmony-oriented, is the exact space that I see myself in,” he adds.
With almost every project being fusion-based, he remembers that his stand-out experiences had been with Serbian progressive prodigy David Maxim Micic for his album ECO, and the Russian metal genius Roman (AKA Arsafes of Kartikeya) for his projects Above the Earth and Kartikeya.
Calling Chennai the Mecca of Carnatic Music, he says the development of Carnatic fusion was inevitable. “Fusion music has sparked the curiosity of the youth to explore deeper and somehow attracted attention towards Carnatic classical,” he says. Apart from his involvement in live projects like Hashtag This (pop/classical/electronic act from Bangalore), One Girl Shy (Alternative/Country band from Bangalore), Renaissance (Carnatic/film fusion band from Chennai), he is secretly collaborating with an international host. He couldn’t talk more about it.
Ranging from pop to dubstep and metal, his new debut yet-to-be-titled album is an amalgam of a myriad of genres. With changes happening in the songwriting process over a two years, accompanied by his struggle to find like-minded musicians to achieve that ‘exact sound’, he says, “Finally, there are six to seven songs that are ready to be added in my new album.”