Sawhney Sensations

The Parramasala festival in the city of Parramatta from November 2-8 saw a variety of performers showcase their talent to an enthusiastic and appreciative audience. The festival was a vibrant celebration of arts performed by modern professional contemporary artists from around the world, and Nitin Sawhney was one of the more prolific of talents on show. This versatile Indian-British musician, composer and producer reached out to fans, both Indian and mainstream, through his show Nitin Sawhney Sound System.

Nitin performed at the Roxy in Parramatta on November 7, creating a simply magical aura of music and light. He was accompanied by his regular band members Ashwin Srinivasan on flute/ vocals, Aref Durvesh on tabla/dholak and Tina Grace on vocals. The music was an exclusive blend drawn from flamenco, Indian classical music, Brazilian samba and hip–hop, and the combination set the audience foot-stomping on the dance floor within five minutes of the band coming on stage.

Nitin moved effortlessly from style to style, showing off brilliantly how mixing genres creatively can truly heighten the enjoyment of the individual components.

In the end though, the final product goes above and beyond its disparate constituent elements.

Tina Grace on vocals was amazing, with her beautiful voice rendering shlokas and verses in Sanskrit that one couldn’t imagine coming from a nonIndian. The fact that Tina has been in India only briefly and has not received any professional training to sing these