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[On 16th-19th January, 2019, Homegrown is throwing a first-of-its-kind music festival in Mumbai designed to celebrate the city’s vast and diverse music culture. Dive deep into a wide variety of dynamic workshops, exhibitions, curated tours, panels, pop-ups, performances and parties that promise to be inclusive of all kinds of tastes and people.
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‘Indie’ is a genre of music that is created independent of large commercial labels. The experience of listening to indie music is vulnerable and personal–– the audience is as closely connected to the original creators of the sound as it could be as there’s no creative hierarchy in between. While indie music culture is usually bursting at the seams in cities like Mumbai and Delhi where creatives like to experiment with melodies, Kolkata is known for its old-school, classic jazz and rock and roll tracks. Whether musicians creating music or listeners jamming to the Arctic Monkeys in house parties, in the past few years, the young, urban youth of Kolkata has taken to independent music like a moth to a flame and continued Kolkata’s legacy of being at the forefront of cultural revolutions.
Here is a list of five voices you must know charting the course of indie music in the city:
Fondly nicknamed “Kolkata’s Adele” by her friends, Paloma has a powerhouse personality and tone. After studying Comparative Literature in Jadavpur University and making her mark as a dancer and choreographer in Kolkata’s performance art circles, Paloma decided to explore more of her passion for music. Her musical artistry knows no bounds and you can often find her velvet-smooth, sultry voice singing original compositions accompanied by her ukulele on Facebook or belting out on the stage, her second home. Paloma is one half of the duo, Paloma and Adil, that released a haunting single titled “Monkey Mind.” Paloma is on her way to change the Indian music industry and is an artist to watch.
A resident of Kolkata and student of St. Xavier’s College, Deep is a musician and music teacher. After experimenting on a keyboard, he changed hands to a guitar and has not looked back. He has been an independent artist for about two years, after an association with a professional cover bands. Deep is also Shireen Ghosh’s bandmate in Whale in the Pond and is playing a set at Bacardi NH7 Weekender this November in Meghalaya. In “Rush,” a track on an EP “The Infinite Monkey Theorem,” his acoustic guitar piece is fluid, polished, and uniquely played. On August 17, 2018, he released another fingerstyle EP titled “Things Will Get Better,” which can be bought for ₹ 100.
III. Shireen Ghosh
Always having a connection to music, Shireen was a known pianist and vocalist at her school, La Martiniere For Girls. On how her affinity to music developed, she told Humans of Kolkata, “The incredible momentous life-changing event that happened was watching a new music teacher sit at my school’s upright piano, decide it wasn’t loud enough, and take off the front panel. That’s it. That was literally all it took.” Shireen was always actively involved in her school’s theatre and musical productions, inter school festivals, and choir performances. In 2016, further honing her talent, she became a member of Whale in the Pond, an “indie dreamfolk band.” In the next year, Shireen and her bandmates released their first EP, “Marbles,” on June 29 and have been regulars on the indie music scene of Kolkata. Shireen’s voice is confident, engaging, and delicate; and fans of her sound say she is underrated.
“My musical journey began when my mother taught me to sing my first notes. It was she who introduced me to the world of music, especially Rabindrasangeet,” Pronoy recalls in Humans Of Kolkata Facebook post. After being trained in Rabindrasangeet, like any budding Bengali musician, Pronoy Chakroborty tried his hand at the bass guitar, an instrument he fell in love with. He is now the Bassist for a band named Folk Mantra that he formed during his college days at Jadavpur University. Celebrating the genres of Bengali folk, Hindi sufi, Qawali, and English Reggae, Pronoy told Humans of Kolkata that he also dabbles as a music composer and lyricist. “Music for me has become a story. A story I cannot express through any language but the language of music,” he says.
Rivu, a musician, producer, and educator, tells the Humans of Kolkata that his journey with music began as with dance. Soon, he moved on to learning how to play the guitar from a local teacher in Kolkata after being inspired by Carlos Santana’s work at the age of 7 or 8. Although his family survived death, illness, and financial instability, Rivu’s connection to music persisted and remained stronger than ever. After performing with his school bands, he began teaching himself how to read music, produce musical tracks, and train other vocalists for various musical productions held by well-known schools in Kolkata. As writer and co-producer of the experimental electro-pop band Preying Mantis, he debuted an album titled, ‘I Eat You Eat Me,’ which was acclaimed as one of the best albums of 2016 by OKListen.com. In 2017, his own debut album, ‘The Journey Of Light,’ was named one of the year’s top indie releases by The Hindu.
Feature image by: The Humans of Kolkata, The Music Series
Pictured in feature image: Paloma Majumder & Pronoy Chakroborty
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