Concentratedly rehearsing one of her most loved compositions called Travel, harpist-singer-songwriter Nush Lewis doesn’t lift her eyes even once till the song comes to an end. This is a dedication to everybody who will watch her perform on July 13 at The Piano Man Jazz Club in Safdarjung Enclave, at 9 pm.
The intensity of her musical fervour peaks as her nimble fingers delicately pluck across the column of the harp. With heightening notes, her senses enliven to the resonating sounds emerging from the instrument’s base. Travel talks about how short life is, something she ponders over often. The answer is an ever-evading one, but her music is the best medium to probe its limitations.
In the show, she will present almost her entire repertoire. These are songs that resonate with her life, giving everybody a glimpse into what she’s all about.
As she sits besides the instrument to play for us, the sounds produced are that of an accomplished veteran. She tells us she started young, and then dedicated her youth to polishing her talent, and it all shows beautifully in her work.
In the beginning it was all about vocals for her; she even trained to become a vocal major. Later, she joined the K M Music Conservatory in Chennai in 2009 to study music further. During the first two weeks of the programme, there was an annual day where students and faculty were to perform. “Our music theory teacher, Alison Maggart, was a harpist. That was the first time I ever heard the harp being played. The instrument is massive, and for someone who is seeing it for the first time, it’s quite overwhelming,” says Lewis. She was excited to try her hands at it. One class led to another, and before she knew it, she was practicing the instrument more than vocals. “That was it. I changed my majors and the rest was history,” she remembers.
She was always exposed to singing, and songwriting came much later. She credits her college for the same. She was studying in an institution where the college choir and cappella groups wrote their own music. “That’s where my eyes opened to writing music,” says Lewis, whose favourite songwriter was Alanis Morissette as a child. “There was such honesty and rawness in her writing. That sort of vulnerability is what made her so amazing as an artist,” she says.
Lewis has been performing solo acts, collaborating with bands and artistes since 2012. Despite all the exposure she’s got in music, she is still constantly thinking about where can she pitch a gig. What new things can she do for her art property called OffSet? What can she do with her new music education ideas for True School of Music, where she consults for curriculum development and outreach. “That’s my life for you,” she smiles.
When Lewis is on stage, she is a completely different person as compared to when she’s off stage. The one that people don’t see is all about random laughs (very loud ones too), many jokes, and fondness for food. “The one on stage is laced with awkward banter that hides behind her harp,” she says shyly. The change in her demeanor never once proves a deterrent to the flow of her mellifluous sounds. She harps on like a dream.