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When Ladakh’s Original Hero Dared to Take the Plunge Into Bollywood in the 1970s
Ladakh officially opened itself to the world in 1974 when the Government of India first allowed tourists into this strategically sensitive high-altitude region. However, in 1972, a young and ambitious...
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Students by Day, Rappers by Night: Dharavi’s Passionate Bantai Will Blow Your...
Savera hote hi nikal jaate ghar se Suljhane woh apne mehnat ki paheli Wakai mein mehnati hai ye Dharavi Karte hai sab hi yaha kal ki tayari Bachpan se atrangi sab hai yaha Mehnat karenge par jhukenge...
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Exclusive: India’s 1st All-Women Rock Band Will Have You Grooving to Gender...
The clock struck 5, and the doorbell rang. She peeked from the kitchen and called out to wait. Securing the lid, she placed the pressure cooker on the gas stove and ran to open the door. Instantly, a...
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Ekla Chalo Re: This ‘One-Man Army’ is Saving India’s Pre-Radio Gramophone...
At the crack of dawn, Vikram Sampath made his way through the crowd behind the Red Fort. He walked past the colourful roadside stalls selling everything from clothes, shoes, to the best of wrist...
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These Talented Siblings Are Using Music to Transform the Lives of 25,000 Kids!
SaPa, the Subramaniam Academy of Performing Arts, is the brainchild of Bindu and Ambi Subramaniam. The sibling duo has been using the power of music to empower young lives, generate optimism and level...
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Smashing Stereotypes: At 14, She Was India’s Youngest Female Dhol Player!
The 12-year-old girl standing in the middle of the green field was oblivious to the beauty around her. Her stance upright, her face focussed on the task at hand, her shoulders too slender to bear the...
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Lost Tales: How Mysore’s Maharaja Created History in Western Classical Music
‘The human voice is the most beautiful instrument of all, but it is the most difficult to play.’ This was an observation by Richard Strauss, the iconic German composer, who dedicated his life towards...
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End Of An Era: Music Legends On What Working With The Amazing Khayyam Was Like
The camera pans the sand dunes in Jaisalmer, Rajasthan, in the night’s whitish-blue light with the silhouette of Hema Malini in diaphanous pink attire in one corner. The soft silken voice of Lata...
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Paris to Calcutta In a Milk Van: A 19,000 km Road Trip That Captured the...
In the summer of 1955, three men—Deben Bhattacharya, Colin Glennie and Henri Anneville—embarked on an iconic journey that would change their lives forever. While Henri was a Frenchman, Colin was...
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Ravi Shankar to The Beatles: The Tiny Kolkata Store Where Legends Bought Sitars!
The moment you step into this tiny shop located at the corner of Rash Behari Avenue, the dust and noise of the main road settles down into a serene silence. The charming quiet of the run-down shop is...
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Begum Akhtar, The Queen of Ghazals Who Turned Her Pain Into Soul-Stirring Music
For Begum Akhtar, also known as the Mallika-e-Ghazal (The Queen Ghazals), it was a series of personal tragedies that formed the basis of her legendary vocal performances. Her magic lay in not merely...
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Overcoming Stammering, 35-YO Mumbaikar Becomes an Acclaimed Opera Singer!
For Mumbai-born Amar Muchhala, life was on the bitter side growing up in a society where stammering garners mockery and discrimination. During school days, Amar was the boy who took ‘forever’ to...
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80,000 Songs, Many Languages, 60 Years: Here is Why KJ Yesudas is Known as...
Eight national awards, over 80,000 songs recorded in languages ranging from Malayalam, Tamil, and Hindi to Latin and Arabic, and three Padma awards—KJ Yesudas is an inspiration to millions of singers...
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Who are The BTS Fans Who Raised Rs 5.9 Lakh In a Day for Assam Flood Relief?
Floods in Assam are a yearly occurrence that threaten the lives of humans and wildlife alike. Seeing the devastation of the rains, Bhavana Barman reached out to the online community for help on 15 July...
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Credit De Do Yaar: 5 Songs Where Credit Wasn’t Given to Lyricists
In a video published earlier today, 15 lyricists from the Hindi film industry demanded that they receive proper credit for their work on music streaming platforms and YouTube channels. Titled ‘Credit...
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#DarrKeAageJeetHai: Celebrate Heroes This I-Day with an Anthem Saluting...
This article has been published in partnership with Mountain Dew What defines India’s resilient spirit? It’s people. And what makes these people so heroic? Some may say it is the zeal to do great...
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Mumbai’s Priya Darshini Bags Grammy Nomination For Debut Album: 5 Things to Know
Known for her fusion of different genres and cultures to create soulful music, Mumbai-born and New York-based singer, Priya Darshini, has been nominated for the 63rd edition of the annual Grammy...
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40,000 Songs, 5 Decades, One Voice: The Magic of Padma Vibhushan SP...
Before I knew what music meant to me, I had heard the timeless voice of Sripathi Panditaradhyula Balasubrahmanyam, popularly known as SPB. It was on AR Rahman’s debut soundtrack album, Roja (1992), and...
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Remembering the Legendary Music Director Who Discovered Kishore Kumar, Lata...
Barely a year after India’s Independence, the iconic Bombay Talkies Studios released a film called Ziddi (1948), which gave the legendary actor Dev Anand his first big break in the Hindi Film Industry....
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Arunachal Cop Inspires Son to Pursue Music. He Will Now Rap in a Varun Dhawan...
It has been an eventful month for 25-year-old Kekho Thiamkho, the Hip Hop artist from Arunachal Pradesh, who is popularly known by the moniker ‘K4 Kekho’. After confirmation on 4 March that he will...
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For Decades, Varanasi Family Teaches Indian Classical Music To 10000 Across...
Not too far from the ghat, sprawled along the River Ganga are the famous gullies and pedestrian alleys of Dashashwamedh area in Varanasi. No more than 6 feet wide, these ever tangling maze-like lanes...
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Dangal To Baahubali: Mumbai Artist Uses Mundane Items To Create Magic in 3000...
Amidst the backdrop of World War II, two individuals are putting their lives at stake to support the Indian National Army (INA) by transporting a gem-encrusted sword to its members, to be used as...
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Pt Ravi Shankar Held His 1st Western Performance In This Unknown Indian’s Centre
Perhaps one of the greatest unions in the history of music is that of Pandit Ravi Shankar and former Beatle George Harrison. Their meeting in 1966 birthed an instant yet unlikely connection and albums...
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In the 1970s, India’s First Rock Band Was Born In The Backyard of A Kolkata Home
From the ’50s till the ’70s, Kolkata (then Calcutta) witnessed a surge of refugees after the Partition of India. These were decades of chaos but also of a social and cultural awakening, where different...
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Fourth-Generation Doc Quits UK Job To Form An Orchestra Of Underprivileged Kids
Growing up in Goa, Dr Luis Dias (55) always found solace in music. It was a big part of his life, he recalls, right from his visits to church. But without the presence of the internet, he notes, it was...
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Must Listen: The Songs of These 4 Sisters Are One of Nagaland’s Finest Exports
The Tetseo Sisters rank among Nagaland’s greatest cultural exports. Celebrating songs of life, the richness of their natural surroundings, and storytelling through the language of Li or folk singing in...
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How Shillong’s ‘Dr Dre’ Went From Painting Houses to Pioneering Hip Hop in...
Lamonte Pakyntein, a 30-year-old Hip Hop and R&B producer from Shillong popularly known as D-Mon, is the man behind the music that preserved my sanity during the COVID-19 pandemic. Growing weary of...
View ArticleIndia’s First Bamboo Band Is Taking the Sound of Nature to the World
“Culture nourishes in nature. Without nature, culture can’t exist. Without culture, society can’t [either],” said Kerala-based Vinod Nambiar of the Vayali Folklore Group, the first bamboo band in the...
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Why I’ll Remember Bappi Lahiri as The Influencer Whose Music Touched Generations
When I first heard about the unfortunate demise of singer-composer Alokesh (aka Bappi) Lahiri earlier this morning, it didn’t strike me how much his music influenced my taste in music. (Image above...
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When Madhubala & Nargis Inspired Greek Songs That Brought Solace to Refugees
During the closing ceremony at the 2004 Athens Olympics, recording artists Antonis Remos and Anna Vissi sang a rendition of a popular Greek song called ‘Mandoubala’. Originally sung in 1959 by the...
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Indian Who Hitchhiked Through Middle East, Landed in England & Transformed...
What do the songs ‘Kung Fu Fighting’, ‘Aap Jaisa Koi’, ‘Disco Deewane’ and ‘Made in India’ have in common? Apart from selling millions of copies worldwide, these records serenaded audiences from Russia...
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Sriya Lenka: 8 Things You Didn’t Known About India’s 1st K-Pop Star From Odisha
India finally has its own Korean-Pop (K-Pop) star. Sriya Lenka, an 18-year-old from Jharsuguda, Odisha, was earlier this week announced as the latest member of the all-girl K-Pop group Blackswan,...
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When the Women of Rural Bengal Challenged the British With Swadeshi Songs
In the early 1900s, as the Indian independence movement grew and the Swadeshi Movement gained momentum, the music of the land, too, began reflecting its response to the changing socio-political...
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The Historic Day that Popularised Pandit Ravi Shankar as ‘Godfather of World...
On a cloudy Sunday afternoon in July 1967, sitar maestro Pandit Ravi Shankar played a mesmeric four-hour set at the Monterey International Pop Music Festival in California, accompanied by Ustad Allah...
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The Caribbean Artist Who Inspired Amitabh Bachchan & Bollywood to Sing His Songs
In 1969, Sundar Popo released his debut song ‘Nana and Nani’, a monster hit which left an indelible mark on the cultural fabric of Trinidad & Tobago, a dual island nation in the Caribbean. Sung...
View ArticleReigning Queer Icon & Dandiya Queen, Falguni Pathak Enthralls Millions Beyond...
For us 90s kids, it wasn’t just Falguni Pathak’s songs — from the sweet melody of Maine Payal Hai Chhankai to Meri Chunar Udd Udd Jaye, which gave our generation that peculiar signature step — that...
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The Forgotten Shankar: Sitar Maestro Who Jammed With Hendrix, Pioneered...
In the late 60s, a young musician from Calcutta (Kolkata) proficient in the sitar, visited San Diego, a city situated on the west coast of the United States, to visit his father who had been taken...
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How Hindi Cinema’s ‘Go-To-Guy’ Accidentally Invented A Global Music Genre
How many of you have heard of Charanjit Singh, the multi-instrumentalist session musician coveted by legendary Hindi film music composers like RD Burman, Laxmikant-Pyarelal and Naushad? Did you know...
View ArticleHow 7 Generations of Sitarmakers Started Making Instruments for India’s Top...
Miraj is India’s ancient city of musical instruments. Located in the southern part of Maharashtra, the historic town has been the centre of classical music for over 150 years. Watch this video know...
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When an Immigrant’s Son’s Tribute to Asha Bhosle Replaced Celine Dion at Top...
During my school summer holidays in 2001, I saw a music video of ‘Brimful of Asha’ (Norman Cook Remix), a song originally composed by the British indie rock band Cornershop on MTV. Besides the song...
View ArticleChennai’s ‘Sound Mani’ Takes India’s Rare, Native Instruments Across The Globe
Chennai’s Manikandan can play 18 different types of instruments, some of which you may have never even heard of. Fondly known as ‘Sound Mani’, he is on a mission to preserve ancient, rare, and native...
View ArticleThe Voice Behind Trending ‘Qala’ Songs & Sireesha Bhagavatula’s Melodious...
The quirky golden age tune of the song ‘Ghodey pe sawaar’ seems to have made a permanent home in listeners’ hearts. It already has more than five million views on YouTube and has been trending among...
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Ricky Kej Takes His Third Grammy: Who Was the First Indian To Win at the Awards?
At the 2022 Grammy Awards announced earlier today, India’s Ricky Kej made history by winning his third one for Best Immersive Audio Album for his album Divine Tides with rock legend Stewart Copeland....
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‘Discovering Hip Hop Helped Me Break National Records & Escape Life of Crime...
Rahul Khadtare first discovered hip-hop at age 13, when his friend found a phone lying around inside an auto rickshaw. “We just took the phone someone had left behind inside the auto rickshaw and...
View Article‘I Lost 40% Lung Capacity, But Play 45 Instruments’: Meet Mumbai’s ‘One Man...
Having never been a part of a musical group, Gladson Peter decided to be his own band! Today, he calls himself a ‘One Man Band’ and entertains thousands of people worldwide by singing and playing 14...
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Inside India’s Only Interactive Music Museum Studded With History & Nostalgia
A brightly painted auto rickshaw, with no driver, has two visitors seated inside, listening to Indie pop from the early years of contemporary rock music. Adjacent to it is a space dimly lit and...
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Rare Pics from India’s Musical Past: A Raga Reaches Outer Space, Nation’s...
If one were to chronicle all the music genres that India has given to the world, it is safe to assume the list would be endless. What is fascinating is that the role of Indian music has always gone...
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Nagaland’s Biggest Rapper Moko Koza Chose Hip Hop Over MBBS To Speak for His...
Mvüko Koza, a Kohima-based multilingual recording artist and songwriter, who popularly goes by Moko Koza, has never been afraid to express his Naga identity and represent his people. Standing at the...
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Dhanush Biopic on Isaignani Ilaiyaraaja: The Real Story of India’s ‘Musical...
The name Ilaiyaraaja evokes a certain magic for his fans, who span across generations and countries. Everyone in my family has a favourite song, and a memory associated with the musician. Late nights...
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‘Gehraiyaan’ Composer Wanted to Be a Physicist Before Music Took him To...
On 3 December, 2023, 34-year-old composer and producer Kabeer Kathpalia fulfilled a dream he had since college of performing at the NH7 Weekender music festival in Pune. Accompanied by his friend and...
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