A-live in New York
Grammy Best New Age nominee Priya Darshini tells Subhadra Devan the experience of recording live in a church and how the album is a healing process for her as someone on the ‘periphery’ of society
F IRST-time Grammy Best New Age nominee Priya Darshini recorded her album, Periphery, “live” in an unused church in Brooklyn, New York.
“Yes, live albums are not common. These days, most music is recorded and produced in studios, which allows one to overdub, edit, mix and change any sound to achieve a ‘perfect’ track. A live album is an entirely different beast,” said the 37-year-old Mumbai-born artiste.
“The most challenging part about recording this album live was the fact that this music wasn’t lived in. We wrote the music in the 12 days leading up to the recording and recorded the entire album in 12 hours.
“We weren’t recording with headphones or to a click. So we really had to trust, listen intently, respond to each other, stay in the moment and make confident musical choices. Some parts of the album were also improvised.
“Being a musician with a lot of experience, playing live becomes essential as you don’t have the ability to edit or modify anything in post-production.”
Priya, who is trained in Hindustani classical music, collaborated with her husband and hammered dulcimer player Max ZT, percussionist Chuck Palmer, cellist Dave Eggar and drummer Will Calhoun for this album. The venue was chosen by the record label Chesky Records.
“Their recording style aims at bringing the three-dimensional space into the recording. The architecture of this church is perfect! You can hear the space in the recording, especially if you listen using headphones.”
Priya has collaborated with Pearl Jam and virtuoso ukulele player Jake Shimabukuro, among others. Her album is a musical mix with Carnatic vocals and American pop.
Songs include Sanware Sanware, a Lata Mangeshkar number composed by Ravi Shankar in 1999, Home, Jahaan and The Banyan Tree.
The choices in Periphery, she said, came about organically.
“Once I learnt the nature of Chesky’s recording process and that this would be live, I knew we had to keep the instrumental arrangements minimal and focus on the compositions.
“Considering I had 12 days to write a whole album’s worth of music, it was a daunting task. But I trusted myself and stayed true to my own voice and story. I was going through an emotionally difficult time and this album was my healing process.
“I, of course, love all the songs on the record (but) I have a special relationship with the songs Home; and The Banyan
Tree which was an emotionally challenging song to write for me in that moment.”
According to her website https://priyadarshini.com/music/, Periphery explores the various connotations of what “home” means to her. It’s an introspection on her cultural identity as a South Indian growing up in Mumbai and transplanted to New York City.
“I was born in Chennai and grew up in Mumbai. As a child, my interests and my personality were always a little different from all my friends.
“I’d be made fun of for looking and acting like a boy, for the clothes I wore, for being weird and for being South Indian. All these were not meant to harm but the rhetoric that other people were different from us was evident to me from the start.
“As I got older and started travelling, and living in different parts of the world, all of these cultures and lifestyles became a part of me. When I moved to America, I was asked almost every other day: ‘Where are you from?’
“The anti-immigrant rhetoric in the past few years aggravated that need to understand my identity even more. I wasn’ American enough for America, and I wasn’t Indian enough for India.
“This constant seeing people in society as ‘others’ — whether based on religion, caste, colour, gender or sexual orientation — forms the basis of this album. I wanted to give people on the ‘periphery’ something to connect to.”
She is filled with gratitude that her album has been nominated.
“I couldn’t have imagined in my wildest dreams that my debut album, a live album no less, would be recognised by my peers and by such a prestigious organisation.
“Considering the very challenging year we’ve had because of the pandemic and that this album came from my own process of healing, I’m grateful (and) hope it brings healing to anyone who listens to it.”
nstent@nst.com.my
For her performances, you can follow Priya on Facebook and other social media platforms. The 63rd Annual Grammy Awards will be held on Monday in Los Angeles.