Sean
Roldan
Breaking Ice in the independent scene while simultaneously pursuing a career in Carnatic music is no easy task, the audience expectation is vastly different and so is the playing style needed. But Sean somehow has managed to do this all and much more! You’ve been successful as a Carnatic musician, independent musician and now you’re also composing. How do you differentiate between the three considering the different categories? And what are the advantages and limitations?
Coming from a place that is filled with art I think we should take pride in it and we should be more human about treating artists. The moral of the story is that, western classical is a very decent community that does a lot of good things.
There is a different angle to this actually. I was born as a traditional classical musician, I learnt very quickly because both my parents are musicians. And fortunately, if I had to meet someone famous it was easy for me. So, when you observe some things practically, they are much useful. Actually, the problem with academics is that it’s always a Holy Grail in a way. You will never call yourself an expert because they never really teach you anything. The only takeaway is that you get to be more civilized, and that’s only why school education is necessary. It doesn’t really change you or anything. It just gets you ready for some big race that you’re in, pointlessly. So, I wanted to break that. My Carnatic leaning came at a very early age and I didn’t want to stop that, I wanted that. I’ve always wanted to get a vantage point from the other side of things that I don’t understand. So, however crappy I was I’d try my best get to the other side and see the world and that’s what I try to do with my music. When I got excited about something, I’d practice, and when the process became more rigorous and when the comfort sets in, saying ‘this is what you want to do,’ at that time I’ll do something else. That’s how I started going into many genres. Fundamentally everything is the same, people are the same, love is the same, but the way they express is different. It’s like learning many languages. When you learn English, Hindi, Malayalam and Telugu, you understand the concept of languages better rather than just knowing one language. That’s the way I make music, I want to try and understand every kind of music and I have no discrimination about music. So, I differentiate all these three things by the virtue of the uses they have in the world. Like, film music has more reach. You put more good things in a medium, it reaches more people. You out more bad things, it’ll have a bad impact on the society. It’s very direct, actually. We were in the times where women were portrayed in a very bad way, with item numbers and shizz! I did one item number and I still call it shizz! Which is a very bad way to describe it. But then, we’ve come a long way from that, a young revolution has come. Many filmmakers are really good artists, painters. Like, Prabhu B Doss is one of the upcoming filmmakers, he has a very good name in the industry and he hasn’t even made one film. But there’s such a good word going about his work and he’s an awesome photographer. He photographed something in Ladakh and they used it in a Wes Anderson’s film and he’s not advertising it. There are people like that. So, art should be a personal thing for an artist and cannot be a professional thing. Film music is very personal to me, I’m very serious about it. Also, there is a point where you need to let loose and just take it easy. So, of all these things Carnatic music had a very clear peripheral, so practicing independently will give the opposite vantage point that you need. So, I think everyone should do the opposite to understand this better.
36
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Score Magazine
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