Jatayu and Tamil Jazz Collective take Chennai's Carnatic sounds to the third season of Soundscapes of India

Carnatic music has, for a very long time, had a home in Chennai’s sabhas. However, increasingly, its rhythms are travelling further, slipping into jazz, rock and other musical languages along the way. At Soundscapes of India Season 3 — India’s premier showcase music festival and global conference, launched by the Indian Performing Right Society (IPRS) — Jatayu and Tamil Jazz Collective are taking their own versions of this musical fusion to New Delhi. We catch up with the two Chennai acts as they gear up to join artistes from across India and beyond at a festival built around discovering, presenting and taking Indian music to the world.

When Carnatic music decides to wander

For Jatayu guitarist and musical director Sahib Singh, the band's sound grew simply from musicians following their ears. “Being from Chennai, Carnatic music is part of the larger cultural and musical environment around us, while we have also grown up listening to and performing jazz, rock and several other forms of music,” he says. “Rather than consciously trying to fuse genres, we began exploring what would happen when these influences met naturally through composition and improvisation,” he tells us.

This resulted in music that knew where it came from but had no particular interest in standing still. And when Jatayu takes the stage at Soundscapes, Sahib promises a set that gets straight to the point. “The set will be raw, energetic and very focused,” he promises. For a showcase slot, there is little room for musical window shopping. “We tend to be quite ruthless with the setlist. Because the window is short, we want every song to earn its place,” he says.

The bigger question is whether music born in one cultural vocabulary can speak to someone who does not know the language. Jatayu's experiences suggest it can. “Rhythm, energy and emotion are universal, and those elements often become the entry point,” Sahib shares. “You do not need to dilute where you come from to connect with audiences elsewhere,” he smiles.

Finding a way back through jazz

Founder and artistic director Harini Iyer’s Tamil Jazz Collective takes a slightly more winding route. Harini has spent a decade exploring the meeting point between Carnatic music and jazz. “I am trained in Carnatic music and I have studied Jazz for a few years and these two forms together made sense to me,” she says. 

There is a more personal reason Tamil sits at the centre of that experiment. Harini grew up in Mumbai and moved around frequently, eventually losing touch with the language she now sings in. “This is my way of connecting with my mother tongue,” she shares. 

So jazz standards get another life in Tamil, with Carnatic textures finding their way into the arrangements. At Soundscapes, the collective will play familiar material alongside “a couple of unreleased, original songs”, with newer instruments and arrangements in the mix. 

Perhaps that is what makes the Chennai contingent at Soundscapes interesting. Jatayu lets Carnatic music stretch its legs through rock and jazz while the Tamil Jazz Collective lets it find another home in language. Neither asks tradition to stay where it was found. They simply give it somewhere new to go.

Entry through registration. August 29 to 31. At Dr. Ambedkar International Centre, Janpath.

Email: anoushkakundu@newindianexpress.com

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