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Arindam: a Lead Singer from Band Kaya – Exclusive Interview
By gaanmela | May 14, 2009
Arindam: a Lead Singer from Band Kaya – Exclusive Interview
Arindam - a Lead Vocalist from Band Kaya
Gaanmela: How did you all think of forming the Band ‘Kaya’?
Arindam: Kaya was founded at the end of 2002 and our first public performance was in December that year. We had been in the music industry for quite some time and had experience in the fields of recording, accompanying, etc. Then we thought of starting something of our own. That was how Kaya started. When we were playing music for the others, we did not have enough freedom for experimentation. Starting the band fulfilled our desire to experiment with music.
Gaanmela: When accompanying another musician, did you not have the freedom to work the way you wanted?
Arindam: No, an accompanist does not have enough freedom to create music the way he wants to. As a co-musician, I had to yield to the wants of the musician I am playing for. Even if I came up with something new or different, it was not totally accepted. Under certain circumstances, we may have come to a point in between, but I did not always get the total acceptance.
Gaanmela: Kaya was formed in the end of 2002. Did you all compose songs before that ?
Arindam: No, we did not do much compositional works before that. Most of the time we accompanied in the recording sessions for both film music and non-film albums. All such recording sessions had their own music directors. We had to play music arranged by the other composers. We had also played with numerous artists.
Gaanmela: There are numerous bands in Kolkata now. How is Kaya different from the other bands in your views?
Arindam: We have many Bengali bands now, who are all singing Bengali songs, as far as the lyrics are concerned. But the numbers put in the lyrics are not always what should go with the Bengali language. And there are also many instances of the Bengali pronunciation being distorted by the band singers. Unlike many other bands, the treatment of our Bengali songs are much more authentic. A Bengali song originally had a prelude, an interlude, a couple of ’antara’s, and sometimes a ’sanchari’, which we try to maintain in our songs. We have also worked with a lot of Bengali folk songs. In 2008, the music album “Kayalok” was released, the theme of which was folk songs. We have worked on the folks that were sung in Bengal 200 – 300 years back, and also many folk songs that are from Bangladesh. We have put a lot of time and effort in collecting these songs and doing research in them. We have just made these folk songs sound a little bit more Western so that the younger generation finds it musically more appealing. The songs are a few countries old, and are not much acceptable in their original form. The audience of this time may not find a folk song very appealing if sung with just a simple instrument like the ‘ektara’ or the ‘dotara’. That is why we though of bringing in the fusion, keeping the original tunes intact. We wanted to modernize the songs to an extent where they become more acceptable by the audience. It is also a great way to preserve and reach out to the current generation with our musical heritage, may be in a slightly modernized form. Otherwise, the upcoming generation would have never listened to these songs. I think that is how Kaya is different from the other bands.
Gaanmela: I was reading it in our website that Kaya works with fusion between the folk and the rock. Fusion can be between any two disciplines of music. Why just folk and rock? Have you all worked with different kinds of fusion?
Arindam: Fusion can be between any different types of music. We try to be very versatile about our tunes. We do not deal with hard rock kind of music, nor we are a metal band. We try to do soft rock music and keep the melody in our songs.
Gaanmela: How do you bring fusion in the songs? I was trying to study some of your songs, and noticed that in different songs you have used different kinds of fusion.
Arindam: Yes, we have worked with different kinds of fusion. In a music album we have eight songs, and we try to make each song different from the other. For example one may be folk, another a reggae, the third one a soft rock, like that. Now in a rock, you have an intro, a base guitar or a distortion guitar with some other instruments. In our fusion works, we try to bring in a totally different kind of an instrument; using a ‘dugdugi’ with a distortion guitar, for example. In another song we may use a ‘ganjira’ with a distortion guitar, base guitar, and drums. We also use flutes in our songs.
Gaanmela: ……In the song, “Kori Mana Kaam Chhare Na” (Album: Kayalok), the flute was strikingly used with a very traditional ‘boithoki’ kind of melody. Or in the song, “Suddha Prem Roshik Bine Ke Taare Paay” (Album: Kayalok), the music was very modern compared to its philosophical verses. I could tell where the fusion was implemented into these songs.
Arindam: You are right. The song “Sudhdha Prem Roshik Bine Ke Taare Paay” is a Lalan Geeti, and hence very old. It was sung almost 250 years back. Songs that old are lost in time and the current generation does not like listening to these kind of songs in their original rustic format. So, when we implement some modern music and present these songs to the young generation, they listen. Otherwise, they would have never listened to these songs. They initially take the songs because of its music, and then with time the songs become a part of them. They start humming the verses and that us our achievement. In the same album (Kayalok), we have another song, which is ‘kirtan’ style song. It is called the “Aadi Jhumur”.
Gaanmela: ……Yes, the song “Kokil Gaahe Gaan Shono Shojoni Re” (Album: Kayalok), was sung in perfect kirtan style, but the music was very different. It is a “Basanti Jhumur”.
Arindam: It is ‘jhumur’ song, which was sung almost 350 years back in Bengal. Before the jhumur songs were popular and came to limelight, they were sung only in the royal courts or the ‘darbaar’. Since the songs were sung in the courts or ‘darbars’, it is also called ‘darbaari jhumur”. But the song is a kirtan in style. If you notice, you will see that we have used instruments like guitar, drums, base guitar, keyboard, which are unconventional for a kirtan song and in contrast to these instruments we have used the acoustic ‘khol’. But the original form of the song was kept intact, nor was the treatment of the song distorted. That is how the fusion was implemented.
Gaanmela: “Jori Naa, Aami Ki Tor Aapon Chhilam Naa”(Album: Kayalok) is another song that I think is very different. The intro music appeared to me as a rock and roll type, but the tune of the song startled me. It was very different than what I guessed from the intro music. The intro was very western and the song was totally of an eastern tune.
Arindam: “Jorina” is a Bangladeshi song. In West Bengal, we do not have much of the Jorina population elsewhere, except in the Sundarban region. When we went to the Sundarbans for a show, we heard this song from them. The song is very simple and down to the earth. There is no complexity in its theme. The song has the ability to get into a listener’s heart very easily. When we thought of singing this song, we had to westernize the tune to reach the young audience. So, keeping the original tune of the song intact, we brought the fusion in the accompanying music. We have used the western reggae beat and an eastern instrument like the ‘khol’ at the same time.
Gaanmela: I was studying some more of our songs. The songs “Piyal Shakhar Bon-er Thekke”, “Ami Tomar Aashay Boshe Achhi Bondhu Re”, “Sujon Elo Ghore” all have very simple and down to the earth verses, and the music used with them are very jazzy in compared to the folk theme.
Arindam: In “Piyal Shakahr Boner Thekke” (Jigi Jagi Jang), we have used a totally western humming in the ‘antara’. The song is originally a folk from the Bankura district, West Bengal. Since it is a folk and an aboriginal song from here, we have used the western humming in the second stanza.
Gaanmela: You all treat every song individually and the fusion implementation of each song is different from another. How do you decide on the fusion for each song?
Arindam: The first and foremost thing that we have to keep in mind is the theme of the song, its lyrics and the original tune. This is true for any song, the folks or the ones that we penned. We always keep in mind the sentiment of the song when we are musically working with it. It is a trial process. Whatever the audience listens to is the final product and does not happen overnight. We have to work with the songs for a long time prior to coming up with the final version. It takes a lot of experiments and we have to keep on trying till we find out what is musically best for the song..
Gaanmela: …….. So, it is an iterative process.
Arindam: It sure is. There is no end to experiments. You can always come up with better things. Even after recording a song if we come up with something much better, we sing the modified versions in the live shows. Hence, some of our songs that we sing in live shows may be different from the recorded versions.
Gaanmela: What is your goal when experimenting with a song? Do you want to reach the point where it satisfies you or do you have to think about the audience and their preferences?
Arindam: When we are working on a new song, especially, the one that we have composed, we make a presentable version of the song and sing that in different shows to get the audience reaction. We try to find out what the audience is enjoying about the song, what not, and why not. We try to improve on the portions that the audience is not being able to enjoy. As I have already told you, it is a long term process and we have to keep on experimenting and get the feedback on our works from the audience. Our last album, “Kayalok” was a big challenge to us, because it was the first time we were experimenting with folk songs. All our previous albums were our own compositions. Since, we wanted to do something new with the folk songs, we have been constantly working on it for the last four years.
Gaanmela: Who is the audience of all our works? Do you have a particular target audience in mind, that you want to reach?
Arindam: No, we do not have any particular target audience. We have a very versatile audience for our songs. The older generation aged 65- 70 years dance with our songs just like the teenagers and the younger folks do. The year before last we went to the UK for shows, and we noticed that the second generation who cannot even speak Bengali enjoyed our music. They may not understand the Bengali lyrics, but that did not restrain them from enjoying our overall musical performance. Their parents told us that the kids were humming the numbers all the way home, and wanted to listen to our songs. So the language was not a barrier to them. They reacted musically……
Gaanmela: ………Music has its own langage and you are reaching out to the audience in the musical language.
Arindam: Exactly. And different audience reacts to the music differently. Some may like the lyrics, some the tune, some just the music used. Different people get attracted towards the songs differently. And when we are composing the songs, we do not have any prior knowledge of how an audience is going to react to the songs. They come back to listen to the songs for various reasons. A same song can touch different people differently.
Gaanmela: How do you get the audience feed back?
Arindam: It is not possible to get a detailed feedback from the audience for all the songs. Sometimes an audience may come up and say what he/she liked about a particular song. When someone tells us that he/she has enjoyed the lyrics of a song, or a tune of a song, we get the idea where the song has been able to touch him.
Gaanmela: …..So, you have to be in touch with the audience all the time.
Arindam: Yes, it is very important to be in touch with the audience. If we do not get the audience reaction, it is impossible to know what they want. And when we are making music for the audience, we have to have their reaction. If we just compose all our works according to our own preferences, then they may be not in accordance with the audience’s choice. The audience is always our main concern, since they are the ones who will have to accept our works. When we are composing new music, we keep a few songs the way we want to experiment, but we also have to compose some of our works for the audience. That is how things work. Some of the works can be according to what we want, and the others are for the audience satisfaction.
Gaanmela: How do you collect the songs that were song 200- 300 years back, and are not sung now?
Arindam: The songs are still sung, but they are sung in their raw format. Like the Jorina song, it is still sung in the Sundarban areas in chorus around a campfire, accompanied with khol, mandira, etc. They sing these songs for their own pleasure, after a long day’s work. The songs of Lalan Fakir are sung too in their original tune, in certain parts of Bengal. “Sudhha Prem Roshik Bine” is still sung today. They are not sung in the urban areas, and the urban population does not get to hear them. We are modifying these songs to reach out to the audience who have not heard these songs befoere.
Gaanmela: In context of the urban population, let me ask you something. Some of the songs “Anamika”, “Ek Poshla Brishti”, “Toke Chhunte Chai” are very sophisticated. They are very urban in their themes. They reminded me of another favorite singer of mine, Pratik Chowdhury.
Arindam: These songs are for the college goers and have been composed keeping the urban population in mind. We do stage shows not only in the rural areas, at urban places too. We have to keep the college audience in mind for the shows we do at the college fest. Pratik da does the same kind of works.
Gaanmela: Who composes the songs for your band and write the lyrics?
Arindam: I have written the lyrics for most of our songs. The lyrics are mostly done by Pulak, and some by me too. Once the lyrics are put into tune, we all sit together to practice. It is a long term process that we keep on doing unless every minute detail comes out perfect. It takes a long time for every single song to come up in its final form. It does not happen overnight. There is a lot of hard work and constant experimentation behind every song, and we have keep in mind every single detail about each song.
Gaanmela: Till now, you have four albums………….
Arindam: We have five albums till now: “Kaya”, “Sha-Naa-Naa”, “DhukPuk”, “Hasnuhana”, and “Kayalok” respectively.
Gaanmela: What is your next album?
Arindam: We have not decided about our next album yet, since we are busy making music for a couple of films right now. We are pretty much occupied till the end of June. We will think of our next album after that.
Gaanmela: Arindam da, plaese share your experience working in Bengali films.
Arindam: We are working in a couple of films right now. One of them is “House Full” by Bappaditya Banerjee. Our overall experience is satisfactory and I would say that Bengali movies are in a recovering situation. Things are not the same as they were a few years back. And many Bengali other bands like the ChandraBindu, have already started directing music in the Bengali films. A lot of newcomers are also entering the film industry as music directors. The music of the Bengali films is not the same as it was some time back. New innovations are coming in. In “House Full” one the songs we have composed is a pure jazz, the other is a totally Sufi style folk song. The other film we are working in is by Nihal Dutta. It is his second film. We have completed making five songs for the film and each of them is different in forms form the other. We have used romantic, folk style songs. We have sung a couple of the songs, and some are to be sung by different artists like Shubhomita, Raghab, Jojo.
Gaanmela: How much freedom do you have when working as a music director in a film?
Arindam: We do not have the ultimate freedom when working as a music director. The reason behind it is that songs used in a film are made only or the film itself. The songs in a film are made to enrich the film, it does not work the other way round. So when we are making music for a film, we always have to keep the story and its requirements in mind. We have to create the songs and music according to the demand of the story and the situations in it. So there always exist some bounds on our works. But we are working with more freedom than usual. Since, we are working as a band, we are getting more liberty in our works. The director explains us all the situations in the films, and we have to make songs accordingly.
Gaanmela: Please tell us something about band “Parchhaiyn”.
Arindam: We are trying to make some Hindi compositions from Kolkata. There are national sector bands from every big city, except Kolkata. That is what we are trying to do. We want to reach out to a larger audience in the national level with the Bengali heritage. If a Punjabi folk like Bhangra, can be so much appreciated and popular all over India, then why not Bengali folk. R D Burman and S D burman have worked a lot with our folk songs, which have been widely accpeted both in the national and international levels. But after that, no one else have worked much with folk songs. We want to experiment some Bengali folk tunes on the Hindi lyrics, just as the way we have done the fusion between the with the Bengali folk tune and the Bengali lyrics, to reach a larger audience.
Gaanmela: Kaya has performed in more than 600 stage shows both in India and abroad. The audience likes your works. What is key to your success?
Arindam: It is very difficult to say. When we started our journey, we did not have any idea how things were going to come out. It is hard to describe any reasons behind our success in words. We really do not understand why song is hit, and why not. It is difficult to capture it in words. It may be that our musical thoughts have been identifiable with the audience’s, and that is why they have admired our songs. That may be our key to success. When the thoughts of the audience does not match with the performers’ musical thoughts, they flop. Our thoughts may have matched with the audience’s, and that is why things turned out the way they are now.
Gaanmela: Do you listen to the other bands? If so, which are the other bands that you enjoy listening to?
Arindam: Among the Bangla bands, I specially like the lyrics of ChandraBindu. It is a very good band. I also like Cactus very much. All the other bands work with very hard and metallic rocks which I personally do not enjoy much. Since, the lyrics are in Bengali, the hard rock does not go well with the language, and the audience is also not very used to and prepared for such hard rock implementations. There is another thing that I would like to mention here is the distortion of the Bengali language. The langage and its pronunciation should be kept natural. I am proud of our linguistics. There is nothing good in changing the sounds of a language. Since most the Bengali bands do not do justice with their language, which I strong contradict, I do not listen to their songs. I simply do not enjoy their music.
Listen to the Exclusive Interview with Band Kaya Online
Gaanmela: Do you listen to the other kinds of songs, than the bands?
Arindam: Yes, I am a versatile listener.We listen to every kinds of songs. Some of my favorite singers are Manna Dey, Hemanta Mukhopadhyay, Srikanta Acharya, Monomoy Bhattacharya, Rupankar. I also listen to English songs.
Gaanmela: You and all the other singers of Kaya are experienced musicians. You all have worked with different musicians and have played different instruments and learnt Jazz, Blues, and all different kinds of Western music. Please tell us how much training one has to have when forming a band.
Arindam: Yes, we do have rather good experience. But there is no end of learning. We are still learning all the time, though the form of learning is rather different. We do not go to a music teacher any more, but we are still students of music and learning from multiple sources. It may be from a live show or a video or an album or from the internet or just picking up things by ears or some other incidents in our daily lives, that can enrich us. There are numerous bands in Kolkata now; in every street and neighborhood, you will find a band, and this number is going up so fast. Every fraction of a time gives birth to a new band. But to sing presentably in band, one has to have a minimum level of education. Music is just like any other discipline. Unless you learn how to play the instruments or how to sing, you cannot perform gracefully. Just like one cannot be a doctor without going to a medical school.
Gaanmela: I often see common people have a notion that building a band is quite an easy job. It is not quite so I guess.
Arindam: No, it is not. The common people have that kind of a notion because a lot of times they see a young group of people coming up with a band out of nowhere. These folks form a band before anything else, and then go to buy the musical instruments and the very next day go to perform in live musical performances. Unfortunately they have never learn how to play the instruments. And when the audience watches such a novice band perform, they get the impression that building up a band is as easy as that.
Gaanmela: Or may be since band is a source of entertainment for the common audience, and is why it is thought as something that does not require seriousness.
Arindam: No, that is not true. Singing in a band requires immense seriousness and there is no chance to act carefree about it. In bands, we do music and it takes a lot of hard work and perseverance as any other disciplines. It is not an easy job as most people think it is. I think if you want to be good at anything, it is hard. I do not blame the common people for having these funny ideas. They think what appears to be true. And these days everyone is coming up with a band. Bands do not form on a natural course any more, people just come up with one whenever they feel like.
Gaanmela: What will be your suggestion for the newcomers who are trying to form a band?
Arindam: One has to have a proper and minimum level of education in music to form a band, just as with any other things. We often have newcomers who come to us for guidance. We advise them the same way. There is no alternative to learning.
Gaanmela: Playing in a band requires a lot of application of your musical training. So, what is important in a band: having theoretical knowledge in music or its application side and working experience?
Arindam: Both of them are equally important. If you do not have some basic training in an instrument or music, you cannot do anything just being with a musician. Learing is an endless process- we still learn a lot of new things. And it always very important to listen to a very wide variety of music. Listening to different kind of music makes you more matured and experience.
Gaanmela: In the USA, I often see that they emphasize more on the notations than on playing by ears.
Arindam: In the US things happen a bit differently. The musical groups prepare for a concert for several months, and everything they have to perform in the musical piece are all written down methodically. So they have to play by the notations written out.
Gaanmela: …….Even the dynamics have to followed strictly. A musician playing a piece does not have much freedom in that sense.
Arindam: Well, I contradict here. I would not say that the performer does not have any freedom. When a band writes their music, they can improvise it any time they want to – they have the freedom to do that with their own works. But if someone plays a piece on the piano that is some other musician’s composition, they cannot play it differently or improvise it. It is not always right to change a composition of another composer. Sometimes, a performer still improvises a piece, but it depends on that person’s experience. The more experienced you are, they better you are at improvising things.
Gaanmela: So when you all started learning Western music, Jazz, Blues, whatever it is, you had to learn how to read the western notations.
Arindam: Definitely. We had to learn how to read notations and play things correctly as per notations. You cannot play by ear at an initial stage of learning music, because you do not develop an ear for music at a basic level, and hence cannot pick music by ears. It takes some experience to play things by ears. It does not happen overnight. When we first started, we had to learn how to read notations and now after almost 15 – 16 years, we can play music from a notation. It also takes a long time to learn to read notations. We could not play from the notations the first day we started.
Gaanmela: You all are so much experienced and can play several instruments. So what kind of instruments do you play with your numbers?
Arindam: We use a lot of different varieties in our own songs. Some of them are folk instruments and some are the usual instruments played with Bengali music like guitar, base guitar, drums, keyboard, flute, dugdugi, ektara, dotara, flute, ganjira, and different percussion instruments.
Gaanmela: How do you maintain the versatility in your songs? Some of your songs are folk, some old Bengali, some very urban, again the song “Missed Call” is very rhythmical. How do you maintain this variety in the numbers? Sometimes we can tell from a song, which band it is, since they have a pattern. How do you break this pattern in your songs?
Arindam: We target to make all the eight songs in an album of eight kinds. If the first one is a western soft rock, then we would try to make the second one a folk, the third one a reggae, the fourth a classical based or an ‘adhunik’. We try to bring difference in all our songs. So far, we have been able to maintain this format. Though, I am not sure how long we can keep on doing this.
Gaanmela: How do you all practice to put everything together?
Arindam: We get to practice only when we do not have any stage shows. We used to practice more regularly in the initial days when Kaya was formed. We do not get much chance to practice regularly any more. When we do not have any shows, we sit and practise all day.
Gaanmela: Arindam da, Please sing a few lines from any of your songs.
Arindam: ‘ Jigi Jagi Jang, Jigi Jagi Jang, Jijang Jijang Re / Jigi Jagi Jang, Jigi Jagi Jang, Jijang Jijang Re / Ei Piyal Shaaler Boner Theke SonaJhuri Bandhe-te / Tuke Niye Polai Jabo Re’
Band Kaya Photogallery
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Topics: Interviews | 1 Comment »
May 17th, 2009 at 12:22 pm
pleasurable read…but Supratik’s name isn’t featured here.He was once a part of ”Kaaya”,A VERY GIFTED SINGER.