collaborative. Even when I sing songs with my daughter
sometimes, I see that as a collaboration. It is always
interesting to see what each musician has to bring to the
table. For me, social media is in interesting monster.
As an individual, I am not very comfortable sharing
personal details on social media. For example, I kept
Mahati (my daughter) off social media for many years.
As an artist, I find it to be a beautiful way to interact
with people who like your music or art. Like Ambi
said, it is an interesting landscape to present or engage
with other people. You can get real-time feedback. It
is nice because it is a reality check in many ways.
In 2018, we released a song called Stargazer – in light of
the #MeToo movement. It was darker than the songs we
usually write, and we were overwhelmed by the honest
and powerful messages we received in response.
We released a fun song called Superheroes Without Capes –
exploring the small ways in which we can make a difference
– with The Thayir Sadam Project. We shared a version
of the track with children and asked them to explore the
ways that they would change the world. We got responses
from hundreds of kids around the world, writing their own
lyrics and explaining how they would be a superhero.
Social media has been a wonderful way to see different people
come together through the power of one idea. For us, it has
been a great way to engage with our different audiences.
About SaPa
Dr. L Subramaniam -
I wanted to impart music education to everyone – I wanted to
share whatever my father taught me with the world. At this
time, we had already established the Lakshminarayana Global
Music Festival in my father’s memory. My son Narayana
came up with the name SaPa; we rented out a small place and
taught students there.
After Bindu and Ambi took over, the institute was no longer
looking at music education as an option. It is very important
for every child to have the benefits of learning music. It helps
them grow creatively, build the capacity to focus, and impacts
them in all areas of life.
In 2014, Bindu and Ambi took SaPa to thousands of children
through the SaPa in Schools initiative. SaPa in Schools aims
to integrate music into the mainstream academic curriculum
and use music as a gateway to building 21st century skills like
teamwork, empathy and communication.
Bindu Subramaniam -
We are third-generation music educators – something which
was central to our grandfather’s vision. It was extremely
important to him to keep music education alive and impart
knowledge in a meaningful way.
SaPa now has six centres in Bangalore and Chennai, and it’s
our vision to nurture the next generation of musicians. What I
really like is that our students are taking an interdisciplinary
approach to learning music – we have children who learn
songwriting from me, violin from Ambi, and singing from
someone else. It’s great to see them learning to draw parallels
between different elements of music early on in their lives.
I like to think of our SaPa centres as homes for the next
generation of musicians. This is a space for them to learn,
perform, and interact with great musicians from all parts of
the world.
General Questions
How do each of you retain your individuality as musicians, while being a
family?
Bindu: I think that is a very tricky question because for the
longest time and even now to an extent, we are perceived as
L.Subramaniam’s children. It is a great honour, but also a
huge responsibility. We are extremely grateful for the legacy
we come from, and are always exploring which parts of it we
can build on.
Ambi: There has always been a focus on each of us finding
our own voice. Growing up, it was important to develop and
build on our skills but over a period of time, we found our own
phrases. That process takes time.
Kavita ji: I had to leave my city and the world of Bollywood,
which was my entire life; suddenly, I was the mother of three
children after being a confirmed bachelor. I was now looking
at how I could merge into his line of music and performances.
All of a sudden, I moved from recording spaces to the world of
concert stages. There was a lot to adjust to but the best thing
was that my husband always supported whatever I was doing
unconditionally. He gave me total musical freedom.
The children also were independent in their thinking.
My husband had been a father and a mother. I was able to
continue as a singer for a long time even after moving out.
I also think the children got their forward-thinking outlook
from both their dad and mother Viji.
Is it necessary for classical music forms to evolve with time? What is your
opinion about this pending debate?
Dr. L Subramaniam : It is extremely important. If you watch
recordings from the greatest performers of the previous
generations, you will see that they changed the direction and
set a new tradition; this generation probably wouldn’t even
know their names. In my father’s time, there were many
artists who were responsible for bringing their art forms to
the limelight.
In my generation, it was all about making music accessible to
global audiences. It started with the cassette, EP, LP, CDs and
more. Today, everything is available on digital media. It is
important to adapt to what society needs at that time.
In any system, it is important to have a solid foundation and
strong roots, which you can go on building and improving
over time.
Ambi: Like my dad said, it’s a myth to say that classical
music has stayed the same for several years, just because
the classical music that we follow now is what the amazing
musicians did back then. It is always evolving. The best thing
is that it has both structure as well as freedom to grow and
improvise. What classical music will be in twenty years is
what the amazing musicians of today decide, and hopefully
that will inspire people learning classical music now.
Kavita ji: Also when it comes to instrumental music,
techniques have been changing continuously. What people
played on the violin two hundred years ago has changed a lot
now. .
The
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