A world of quiet music

The newest experience of live performances is in the form of intimate concerts, which aim to bring a small group of music lovers together in cosy, informal settings.

We often turn to music to heal the mind and body, enrich our soul and simply tune in. Digital media platforms to pulsating live concerts, if there's good music, there's an audience. The newest experience of live performances is in the form of intimate concerts, which aim to bring a small group of music lovers together in informal settings for a shared experience in music with the artiste. It has been around for a few years now but is gaining popularity among all age groups as the musicians are as varied as the audiences.

The Madras Commune (TMC), a Chennai-based group, started organising intimate music concerts about a year ago, where they handle all the logistics, partner with a host for a small informal venue, and invite musicians to perform for 60 minutes.

Its co-founder, singer Maalavika Sundar, explained that they started this platform to support independent artistes in Chennai a year ago. “We wanted to form a community for independent musicians of all genres and audiences. We keep the artiste's name a secret so we get audiences who are genuinely there for a night of music and not because of the musician's name. In Chennai, we've had among others, folk rock, qawwali and acoustic trance music in our events. This is an exciting field.”

When Maalavika came up with this idea to host gigs for small audiences not exceeding 150 people, her husband Ashwin Kashyap Raghuraman and three of their friends supported her. And in December 2021, they held their first music event with Maalavika herself performing. The response was encouraging and thus began their foray into what she calls “an intimate experience with music”. After a year of hosting such experiences in Chennai, the TMC decided to open their Karnataka Chapter with a solo gig by Raghu Dixit in December last year.

Held at an upscale vegan cafe in Sadashivanagar, the event opened with a sound healing session by Ms Nidhi Nahata, which saw the use of specially sourced instruments to demonstrate the sounds of nature. Ms Nahata explained that sounds drawn from nature create vibrations inside the body to bring a person to a state of deep relaxation and help to heal stress, insomnia and even trauma.

Then Raghu took centre stage, regaling the audience with stories about his journey as a musician and also narrated anecdotes about all the songs he presented, including Ambar, Mysore se aayi, Gudugudiya sedhi nodo, Munjane manjalli, etc. For Lokada kaalaji, he got the audience on its feet, coaxing and cajoling them to sing along.

Raghu later said of the experience, “Many mainstream artistes are doing independent and film music and such events will give them a platform to connect with newer audiences. For me, this experience was as raw as it could get — it was just me and my guitar in front of an appreciative audience. No other distractions.” He added that while this was his first brush with intimate concerts, his brother Vasu Dixit has been doing them for a while now.

The second TMC concert in Bengaluru was held in late February. The artiste was Vishnu R, creator of the nine-string Navtar instrument that can be used to play both Carnatic and Western notes. Vishnu, with Sunaad Anoor (khanjira) and Vivek Santosh (keys) held the audience in rapture from their very first song Manavyala Kinchara, a well-known Tyagaraja kriti, followed by their own compositions Moksha and Paradox, moving seamlessly to their rendition of Varaharoopam, Purandara Dasa's Jagadhodhaarana and more.

Vishnu described the experience as “an immersive, experiential platform that allows for shared energy exchanges between artiste and the audience, unlike regular concerts where the audience sits below receiving the music and the artiste builds his/her personality and stature on the stage above. We were definitely playing for a completely new audience here. It was pretty interesting.”

Said Ashwin Kashyap, “Our goal at TMC is to introduce a new form of music to our guests so even if they don't usually listen to it, they may end up discovering something new and exciting.” Maalavika added that TMC hopes to host one such event every month in Bengaluru. “Ultimately, music is the showstopper in our curated events.”