Shilpa Rao on her Bengali song Jete Dao from the film Madam Sengupta and more
We are definitely a fan of her mesmerising songs… the slightly husky timbre of her voice, when paired with heartfelt emotions, sums up the songs that Shilpa Rao sings. The artiste was recently in Kolkata for an event and spoke to us about her latest Bengali song Jete Dao, from the movie Madam Sengupta. Excerpts:
This is your first collaboration with Anupam Roy. What made you say yes to this song?
Choosing it was a no-brainer. This song is so beautiful, that the first time I heard it, I knew that I wanted to be a part of it. The lyrics, the melody, everything just stood out for me, and I had to lend my voice to it.
What do you find exciting in the music space?
I think we are heading towards another paradigm shift in terms of music genres, which I think are very young in terms of thought processes that come in—I mean your ways of thinking and newer ways of expressing music. The poetry has a paradigm shift, the compositions, the way of thinking, that’s something I’m really looking forward to.
What kind of genres do you want to explore?
I listen to all kinds of music. I don’t have a favourite genre. I keep myself open. Most of the time, when I get into a recording, I keep my mind blank so that I can at least absorb what I want to learn from the composition. It’s better to go into the recording without having pre-assumptions. So that way I’m very open to different genres and adapting to it.
Are you also into songwriting or creating music/tunes?
Well, I won’t say that because, being someone who makes music and who writes music, that’s a very different way of life and I don’t take it lightly to say that I can do it. But yeah, I love the collaborative process. So, when I’m called in to work on a song, I like to do it as a collaborator but I won’t take that designation that I can make a song and all that.
If you assess yourself, what are your weakest points?
I have a lot of patience when it comes to recording a song again and again. I think music and doing music has never been an issue. The issue is always making business or money with music. That is where I am still trying to gather my patience. My patience is zero when it comes to the music business. I really try hard to do things that make my music reach more people.
You mentioned you listened to a lot of different genres of music and that you enjoy all kinds of music. Does your playlist reflect your current mood or a particular artiste?
Your playlist should depend on your mood! There is no one song that will work for you every single time. There’s no one song or music that will keep working for you. The whole point of music is that it comes to you at different points of time. Even when we talk about Indian classical music, the seven ragas are sung at different times.
Stage performances often stand out to be hectic, both for your voice and body. How do you take care of yourself when you have back-to-back stage performances?
One needs to curate one’s own stage performances in a way that it gives them comfort on stage. My entire team, including my musicians, my tech team and I, have created the set in a way that it doesn’t make me push my vocals to an extent where I will self-sabotage it. When it comes to my tech team, in terms of soundcheck and everything, they have it on point so that I don’t have to spend too much time doing my soundcheck. I can just go check something and the soundcheck is done. I also make it a point to conserve my energy as much as possible when I’m doing back-to-back shows. If I have two hours on a flight, I go to sleep; if I have two hours in the hotel, I take a nap. As much as you can rest your body, themore rested your vocals will be.
You can be strenuous about your riyaaz. Your practice keeps your vocals to figure out more techniques, so that your voice is agile.
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