“When live venues tell artists or bands not to play original music, they are in fact negating all the music they have themselves grown-up listening to – as all the bands that they idolize, and whose music they love, are original.”
The Invaluable Value of Originality
What’s common between these famous artists from different genres of music –
The Beatles
Mozart
Beethoven
Chopin
Jethro Tull
Abba
Queen
Elton John
Led Zeppelin
Pink Floyd
Jagjit Singh
Naushad
O.P.Nayyar
And many others …
… you wouldn’t have even heard of them, if people had discouraged their originality and had avoided listening to their music. The world would be a very poor place without it.
That’s what original music is all about – respect it, because every tune that you have enjoyed in your life is original to the artist who composed it.
Imagine telling Abba to only perform songs of The Beatles and other artists, or telling Elton John to only perform songs of Led Zeppelin or others. No one would dare to – and that’s the privilege that fame brings with it.
“Value original work – Change yourself and the world will change”
~ Music UnLtd.
Noted music critic Parag Kamani’s reviews of Music UnLtd.’s latest albums [‘Jilted’ & ‘Humnasheena’], and songs of Shankar Mahadevan, Coke Studio and Alobo Naga –
@ArtistAloud:
https://www.facebook.com/artistaloud/videos/10155388020101072/
#Live
Artist Aloud Blog –
Humnasheena & Jilted – Music UnLtd.
When we enjoy music for its own merits – and not because it’s associated with a famous person – it’s genuine.
When we enjoy music because we think we SHOULD be enjoying it as it’s by some famous person – that’s hype, and we do great injustice to a huge number of very talented lesser-known musicians.
Just because some music is composed by a famous person doesn’t make it great automatically – listen to it and then decide independently of the artist’s previous releases.
Many famous names are one-hit wonders, and don’t consistently come up with good music – especially in these times of ‘Singles’. Most of the songs on their albums are ‘fillers’ – they’re there only to fill-up the space on the album.
In the days when albums were important, one would come across several musicians who consistently came up with great work. Almost none of their songs were fillers. There are few artists like that today – and they’re the great musicians.
Imagine an event organizer or patron telling a painter – “We like your paintings. Let’s hold your exhibition, but don’t display any of your own – make good copies of paintings by famous artists and put them up in the exhibition”.
Sounds absurd, doesn’t it?
Well, that’s what happens to original Independent musicians in India – creativity is discouraged. People actually go to music concerts to listen to good musicians play someone else’s music! That would be fine if it’s a dedicated cover band – but not otherwise.
Equally, it is the music-loving public who have to realize this and evolve – for ultimately their sensibility will decide whether art in their country will flourish or not.
Indie Music in any language faces a huge challenge in India – what with the commercial power of ‘Bollywood’ – and the majority of the population not being able to think beyond film music. Unlike the rest of the world, there is virtually no independent modern music industry (of commercially viable music) in the country, that is not connected to films.
Even extremely talented Indian classical artists are made to prostitute themselves at opulent weddings by playing instrumental versions of film songs. Many people can’t differentiate between different genres of music – which is fine, because it’s not their forte – but then they should leave the choice of music to the people with the requisite knowledge i.e. the musicians.
World over, band managers scout new artists & bands with great music, and help them grow and get their music to the public – in India they only look for stars to manage. Not exactly what one could call an artistic or culturally rich approach.
Indie Music has to be nurtured and promoted.
If commercial success is always equated with artistic excellence, it lowers our standards of excellence.
A lot of people unfortunately limit their experience of music to their own language. They mentally shut themselves out from making any effort to listen to music in other languages. I have discovered great songs in languages I don’t speak – Bengali, French, German etc., where the melody alone carried the songs to another solar system. My message to them – “Loosen-up, and enjoy everything!
Independent Music needs to hold its own against the money-power of Bollywood. That change can be brought about by the public – and by the producers & sponsors who pump-in huge sums of money into the film industry, while starving the music industry outside of it. This is because the average producer/director (as against a genuine & dedicated filmmaker) are not film or music lovers who are in it to produce good cinema or music – but merely concerned with the profits. I’ve enjoyed many Hindi film songs – mostly of the melodic era, but the industry’s all-pervading & over-powering reach – along with the public’s obsession with almost all things filmy – has aesthetically corrupted the world of music in India. The Indian public’s almost universal presumption that ‘if-there-is-a-song-it’s-in-a-film’, has taken them away from the purity of music – which ideally should be an auditory experience.
Too many people and companies are supporting too many ‘stars’ who don’t need the support – whether Bollywood or cricket or music or art – by eagerly spending money on expensive events etc, but not supporting shows or purchasing quality music or books/paintings etc of newcomers or lesser known artists .. bargaining to get their products cheap or free. My policy – if you like it and can afford it easily, buy it …don’t haggle if the artist is genuine and the product is great!
Official song downloads enable musicians to keep making music for you … Piracy kills musicians … the choice is clear! Try before you buy – by streaming the music. We’re sure you respect the musicians whose songs you enjoy – enable them to make more music for you 🙂
When live venues tell artists or bands not to play original music, they are infact negating all the music they have themselves grown-up listening to.
Hi Milin,
Great thoughts on music. Exploitation of music for profit or money-making is a jarring idea, particularly for a true lover of music. However agree that a musician needs to survive and to get out the best music from him/her, he/she has to be free from commercial considerations to fully immerse into quality music. Thus the onus is on us listeners to ensure we encourage such musicians by paying what we believe he/she deserves.
Thanks for writing-in, Raj.
Do come for our next show – which will be announced on social media and on this website.
Cheers,
Milin