Here's the journey of composing hindustani vocal music tracks for an experimental theatre film investigating natural and built environments through movement, mood and metaphor.

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Letters to the Space was a site-inspired experimental theatre performance directed by Arpita Dhagat and commissioned by M/s Prabhakar B. Bhagwat Landscape Design Firm. My brief was to create musical tracks that reflected its atmospheric and emotional core. The film featured whimsically masked creatures as nature spirits, Mother Nature, and a man with a quest to understand the dichotomy of interior and exterior.

As music composer and singer, I drew from my ten years’ training in Hindustani classical music and built on Arpita’s vision through a discursive, moodboard–led process rooted in the Navarasas (nine prime affective states in the Indian classical arts). Working iteratively with her through the concept, scripting, performance and edit stages, I conceptualised and produced five original layered a cappella tracks—Shringaar, Hasya, Shantam, Lullaby to Mother Nature and Another Lullaby. The project attuned me further to my voice as an emotive aesthetic conduit.​

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It's now been fourteen years learning hindustani, and counting :)