India’s Grammy winner Ricky Kej describes his award-winning album Divine Tides as a product born out of love for Mother Earth, passion for music, and the pandemic.
Kej made India proud by bringing home another Grammy this time in the Best New Album category — his second in seven years. He shares the award with the rock legend and drummer from British rock band The Police, Stewart Copeland.
Speaking exclusively to News18, a thrilled Kej gushed about how his music was received very well globally. He spoke of how with the challenges during the Covid-19 pandemic, travel restrictions, and the global lockdown, both artistes were forced to remain confined to their studios and record their music.
Structured around the idea of “Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam” (the world is one family), the album Divine Tides brought two talented musicians, located in two cities across the globe, closer through music and technology. Kej in his Bengaluru studio and Copeland in Los Angeles worked and recorded the album ‘remotely’, communicating over thousands of texts and Zoom calls.
“The album itself was a year’s work. We got a lot of work done as we were confined in our studios without travelling or touring due to the pandemic. Unlike the year 2019, when I had travelled across 13 countries for 70 concerts, the pandemic proved very fruitful. If the pandemic had not stopped all travel, our album would have taken much longer,” Kej added.
Kej had been a fan of Copeland since his young days. “We were nominated for the Grammy but we had not met each other in person. I met Copeland for the first time in Vegas. It was such a beautiful experience getting to hug him for the first time. We spent a lot of quality time together later,” the musician said while describing how Copeland has been his inspiration and how till today he has wall posters of the legend in his room.
Talking about how he always knew he wanted to be a musician, Kej said his parents were furious when he informed them that it was going to be his career. “I had never known a day when I did not play a musical instrument. In class 12, I had made up my mind that music would be my passion, career, and life,” the award winner recalled.
“My father and I struck a deal that I would complete my degree in dentistry and then he would never question me for the rest of my life. I did my five years in dentistry but never left my music. I would compose and play music after classes and end in the wee hours of the morning. Once I completed my degree, I immersed myself day and night into my passion,” he recalled.
Kej won his first Grammy in 2015 for the album Winds of Samsara along with South African flautist Wouter Kellerman in the Best New Age Album category. The Bengaluru-based musician was reminded of the day Prime Minister Modi invited him to Delhi to felicitate him. Calling the hour-long discussion with the PM a “powerful meeting on music, musical careers, environment, and climate change”, Kej said it made a lasting impact on him.
“I am a passionate environmentalist and the PM saw that in me. During my discussion with the Prime Minister we spoke about how strongly I felt about the environment, sustainability, and the impact on our society. When I was leaving the PMO, I made up my mind that I will make music only on issues I feel strongly about. Seven years later, I won a Grammy for an album that covered these very issues — environment and the concept of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam,” he said
Knowing well that his genre of music is not mainstream, Kej is happy that it is appreciated by a niche audience globally. Having strived to ensure that his music brings people closer, he also feels that the onus is on musicians like him to “find their space and audience”.
“If you look at music like that of Pt Ravi Shankar, it is not just appreciated by the Indian diaspora, but also a good mix of music aficionados from that country attend his concerts,” he said.
Kej feels that as musicians who work in a very specific genre catering to a niche audience, they have a responsibility to find their audience and build a musical rapport — not push it down the throats of those who don’t understand our music.
When asked how different was his first Grammy-winning album Winds of Samsara from Divine Tides, Kej felt he has matured as a musician in the time between the making of both albums.
“I matured as a musician and as a person. Every album will give you a glimpse of who I was when I created the album. During the making of Winds of Samsara, I had a very different approach to the world and my place on this planet. My idea is quite different now. Divine Tides has changed me and my music with the changes that our world has undergone. I have a better understanding of our species, what we need to do to mitigate the effects of climate change and what it would take for our people to make our world more sustainable,” Kej said.
Explaining the changes in his perception, the Grammy awardee described how the narrative of pollution has itself changed in the last six decades. One would believe that if the air is polluted, it would go away, or if a plastic bag is thrown away, it would pollute another place. But now there is more awareness that the earth’s resources are finite, water is finite, the carbon content in the atmosphere is alarming and people need to come together as one world, one family to save the planet, he said.
“All this is reflected in my music, and people can be part of my learning curve,” said the musician.
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