India Rising

During my one and a half years in India i was constantly inspired. Anyone who has been to India will tell you the same. It’s all in the richness of culture and spiciness of people. It’s not about beauty, order or efficiency. It’s not about being gentle and delicate. Its gritty, chaotic, emotional, frustrating and back-breaking. But amongst all of that there are moments of unexpected warmth and kindness, and small pockets of profound bliss (sitting in an auto mad traffic all around but shuffle plays the perfect song, or unexpected conversations). It all goes together with the adrenaline rush of being in a new exciting place thats morphing every single day. It’s all still under construction, it’s being built. But in that it needs to be built well in an all-rounded manner.

Growing up in Europe and the US I have always been surrounded by vast field of artistic creative energy. Its something I have always taken for granted. Innovations in music, film, art that seeks to push boundaries in different directions. Taking things apart, remixing and reinterpreting them as something new. All of this to express new ideas.

In India I felt this to be missing. There was a slight murmur but it was barely audible. Musicians generally don’t have the balls or ambition to try something different, they keep it safe. This results in a lot of amazing covers or copycats but nothing new can stand on its own two feet. At the same time Clubs that play good music shutdown to be replaced by more lucrative table service venues. Listeners there tend to have lower expectations and are happy with recycled garbage or artists who don’t really feel the need to evolve. The experts say the market isn’t ready for it. The same has been happening in the film industry for a long time. It’s always about quantity rather than quality and no one is put off by bad technique or recycled ideas. In fact its encouraged and applauded, so lets make the sequels!

How do you get people to care about the quality of a product? They seem to do it here. How did that start?

It is something to explore because I maintain that it is important for the healthy Development of India’s emerging society that these things should matter.

But even amongst the clutter there is to be found some small pockets of brilliance. There are a few true Indian Cinema artists who trying to push the boundaries as to what is to be expected. And recently I have been pointed towards a new TV show called The Dewartists that seeks to uncover the passion of real musicians who live, breath and think in sound. Filmed really nicely, it captures the mystical soul of India while uncovering the less known talents. The show brings together different musicians and gets them to collaborate with each other. This is what I have been talking about, I am very excited.

Check out the trailer above. Besides goosebumps it gives me great hope that something like this is aired on prime time television. I just hope it doesn’t get canceled to make way for more mindless serials. If you are intrigued watch the first and second episode in full below, it’s simply incredible.

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check out their weekly episodes online on their youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/DewarsIndia