2006

28/5

Uncategorized

An interview with Prasanna

by | Print
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Abhijit Nath caught up with Prasanna as he was travelling from Bangalore to Chennai.

Hafta: Your new album, Electric Ganesha Land, has a very raw, bluesy guitar tone mingling with traditional Carnatic percussion. Was that a sound you were consciously targetting?

Prasanna: Not really. On my last album, Be The Change, I worked with the cream of Western jazz, although the album was very Carnatic in scope. (Details mentioned in the accompanying article). This album is really just a guitar rock album..I really don’t know what else to call it. I tried to rid myself of these superficial distinctions of East and West and just play what came naturally to me as a musician.

 

H: The track ‘Snakebanger’s Ball’ seems to have a lot of wide-interval, slightly dissonant lines reminiscent of Allan Holdsworth or Shawn Lane. Is the track a tribute to either of them (I know you’ve dedicated a track on your previous album to Lane).


P: That track was just an ‘outside’ sounding experiment, since there was little harmonic structure per se, I decided to freak out. Shawn was a good friend and Allan is one of my big influences, but it wasn’t a ‘tribute’ or anything. Another reason for the sound of that is because I tuned my guitar DADADA, which allowed me to really fly all over the fretboard. (This is how Carnatic instruments such as the violin are typically tuned).

 


H: Your album, Be the Change, features the Who’s Who’s of modern jazz fusion. How did you get together with these guys?

P: Victor (Wooten) and I are good friends. We’d been planning to do something together for a long time, but as you know, he’s one of the world’s busiest bassists, and finally we could find just three days in the whole year when our schedules coincided. The rest of that band were his friends and bandmates (Jeff Coffin and Derico Watson). The other band on the album is people I’ve been playing with for a longer time.

 

H: Did you face a lot of flak initially from purists about possibly devaluing classical music?

P: It was a little tough initially, but you take that in your stride and just keep doing what you believe in and keep going on.

 

H: In that respect, I think Carnatic audiences have accepted change more easily, what with both (mandolin player) U. Srinivas and you now part of the mainstream. In Hindustani classical, people like Debashish Bhattacharya (slide guitar) or Niladri Kumar (experimental sitar player) haven’t managed to gain acceptance from purists to that extent.

P: I really don’t know what the reasons for that are, really. The only difference I can think of is that both Srinivas and I play electric instruments, and the Hindustani players are still doing things with acoustic instruments.

 

H: What about your parents? Were they apprehensive initially about you making unconventional career moves and giving an IIT degree and IT job for uncertainty?

P: Not at all. They’ve been very supportive throughout of my decisions. I don’t believe my time at IIT was wasted. It was an education, and I’ve tried to apply what I learnt there to everything I’ve done in my life.

 

H: You went to the prestigious Berklee School of Music in Boston. What was that experience like?

P: It was amazing. 7,500 people come to Berklee every year to learn music, and just those sheer numbers help you learn so much. From that point on, I think it’s really what you want to make of it and how focused you are. From the very beginning, I wanted to play like noone else. I wanted to be true to where I came from; for my music to be the sum total of all the myriad experiences I had growing up. Before I played Carnatic music, I played a lot of rock music, and everything I play is an amalgation of my influences and evolution.

 

H: In India, it’s very difficult for serious musicians to make a living doing non-mainstream music. Do you see that changing these days to any extent?

P: I don’t know about the making a living aspect, but I see a lot of openness among audiences today. When I played shows recently, there would be these four death metal bands and then us, and people in the 15-25 age group would be perfectly willing to give us a listen and appreciate what we were doing. And about making money-your priorities change when you’re focused on what you love..it’s no longer about driving that fancy car. What I always tell youngsters is to aspire to the moon..the true test of your perseverance is when  you pursue excellence for it’s own sake. As the Bhagwad Gita says “Do your karma without regard for consequences” and the rest will follow.

 

H: So are there any young artists or bands out there in India who you’ve tuned into recently?

P: I’ve been out of touch a little bit, but I think there is an audience for all kinds of music in the country, and the record companies are ignoring a lot of that interest. Some of these great upcoming musicians are going to gget frustrated by that at some point, and that would be a tragedy. Why are we only talking of jazz or rock?- I am sure there are thousands of great Gujarati folk musicians or Tamil folk players who deserve an audience and can’t.

 

H: What about your own work? Your own records are not available in the country yet in stores. Is a record deal in the offing?

P: I think making my own music is more important to me than finding a huge audience out there. If I do what I believe in, the audience will come. I’ve released all my records independently. That being said, I am looking at a couple of offers now.

 

H: So what brings you to India at this point of time? What are you working on at the moment?

P: I’m working on the background score for an English film called ‘Framed’ by a guy called Chetan Shah. The interesting thing is that the soundtrack is only guitar; it’s quite challenging to do a whole score using a single instrument. I’m also working on a Bharatanatyam-based dance ensemble by Aparna Sindoor.

 

H: And what’s next? Any dream projects-A musician you’d love to work with or something you want to do you haven’t done before?

P: I think I’ve only scratched the surface..my career has just begun. I’m continually amazed by the people I get to work with. Let’s see what the future holds.

 

H: Prasanna, thank you so much for the interview. It was lovely.

P: Thanks.

 

(Abhijit Nath is an alumnus of IIM, Ahmedabad and works for a private equity firm. He is a fanatic for any technically challenging music (jazz, classical music, prog-rock and black metal).He knows that this is a terrible bore and that he needs a life, but it seems like he’s living three already (with apologies to Terry Pratchett). He harbours dreams of playing for a jazz-rock band.) 

 

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2006

28/5

Uncategorized

An interview with Prasanna

by | Print
{mosimage}

Abhijit Nath caught up with Prasanna as he was travelling from Bangalore to Chennai.

Hafta: Your new album, Electric Ganesha Land, has a very raw, bluesy guitar tone mingling with traditional Carnatic percussion. Was that a sound you were consciously targetting?

Prasanna: Not really. On my last album, Be The Change, I worked with the cream of Western jazz, although the album was very Carnatic in scope. (Details mentioned in the accompanying article). This album is really just a guitar rock album..I really don’t know what else to call it. I tried to rid myself of these superficial distinctions of East and West and just play what came naturally to me as a musician.

 

H: The track ‘Snakebanger’s Ball’ seems to have a lot of wide-interval, slightly dissonant lines reminiscent of Allan Holdsworth or Shawn Lane. Is the track a tribute to either of them (I know you’ve dedicated a track on your previous album to Lane).


P: That track was just an ‘outside’ sounding experiment, since there was little harmonic structure per se, I decided to freak out. Shawn was a good friend and Allan is one of my big influences, but it wasn’t a ‘tribute’ or anything. Another reason for the sound of that is because I tuned my guitar DADADA, which allowed me to really fly all over the fretboard. (This is how Carnatic instruments such as the violin are typically tuned).

 


H: Your album, Be the Change, features the Who’s Who’s of modern jazz fusion. How did you get together with these guys?

P: Victor (Wooten) and I are good friends. We’d been planning to do something together for a long time, but as you know, he’s one of the world’s busiest bassists, and finally we could find just three days in the whole year when our schedules coincided. The rest of that band were his friends and bandmates (Jeff Coffin and Derico Watson). The other band on the album is people I’ve been playing with for a longer time.

 

H: Did you face a lot of flak initially from purists about possibly devaluing classical music?

P: It was a little tough initially, but you take that in your stride and just keep doing what you believe in and keep going on.

 

H: In that respect, I think Carnatic audiences have accepted change more easily, what with both (mandolin player) U. Srinivas and you now part of the mainstream. In Hindustani classical, people like Debashish Bhattacharya (slide guitar) or Niladri Kumar (experimental sitar player) haven’t managed to gain acceptance from purists to that extent.

P: I really don’t know what the reasons for that are, really. The only difference I can think of is that both Srinivas and I play electric instruments, and the Hindustani players are still doing things with acoustic instruments.

 

H: What about your parents? Were they apprehensive initially about you making unconventional career moves and giving an IIT degree and IT job for uncertainty?

P: Not at all. They’ve been very supportive throughout of my decisions. I don’t believe my time at IIT was wasted. It was an education, and I’ve tried to apply what I learnt there to everything I’ve done in my life.

 

H: You went to the prestigious Berklee School of Music in Boston. What was that experience like?

P: It was amazing. 7,500 people come to Berklee every year to learn music, and just those sheer numbers help you learn so much. From that point on, I think it’s really what you want to make of it and how focused you are. From the very beginning, I wanted to play like noone else. I wanted to be true to where I came from; for my music to be the sum total of all the myriad experiences I had growing up. Before I played Carnatic music, I played a lot of rock music, and everything I play is an amalgation of my influences and evolution.

 

H: In India, it’s very difficult for serious musicians to make a living doing non-mainstream music. Do you see that changing these days to any extent?

P: I don’t know about the making a living aspect, but I see a lot of openness among audiences today. When I played shows recently, there would be these four death metal bands and then us, and people in the 15-25 age group would be perfectly willing to give us a listen and appreciate what we were doing. And about making money-your priorities change when you’re focused on what you love..it’s no longer about driving that fancy car. What I always tell youngsters is to aspire to the moon..the true test of your perseverance is when  you pursue excellence for it’s own sake. As the Bhagwad Gita says “Do your karma without regard for consequences” and the rest will follow.

 

H: So are there any young artists or bands out there in India who you’ve tuned into recently?

P: I’ve been out of touch a little bit, but I think there is an audience for all kinds of music in the country, and the record companies are ignoring a lot of that interest. Some of these great upcoming musicians are going to gget frustrated by that at some point, and that would be a tragedy. Why are we only talking of jazz or rock?- I am sure there are thousands of great Gujarati folk musicians or Tamil folk players who deserve an audience and can’t.

 

H: What about your own work? Your own records are not available in the country yet in stores. Is a record deal in the offing?

P: I think making my own music is more important to me than finding a huge audience out there. If I do what I believe in, the audience will come. I’ve released all my records independently. That being said, I am looking at a couple of offers now.

 

H: So what brings you to India at this point of time? What are you working on at the moment?

P: I’m working on the background score for an English film called ‘Framed’ by a guy called Chetan Shah. The interesting thing is that the soundtrack is only guitar; it’s quite challenging to do a whole score using a single instrument. I’m also working on a Bharatanatyam-based dance ensemble by Aparna Sindoor.

 

H: And what’s next? Any dream projects-A musician you’d love to work with or something you want to do you haven’t done before?

P: I think I’ve only scratched the surface..my career has just begun. I’m continually amazed by the people I get to work with. Let’s see what the future holds.

 

H: Prasanna, thank you so much for the interview. It was lovely.

P: Thanks.

 

(Abhijit Nath is an alumnus of IIM, Ahmedabad and works for a private equity firm. He is a fanatic for any technically challenging music (jazz, classical music, prog-rock and black metal).He knows that this is a terrible bore and that he needs a life, but it seems like he’s living three already (with apologies to Terry Pratchett). He harbours dreams of playing for a jazz-rock band.) 

 

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