Aditya Rao: 'Sheer'ly Carnatic

27-year-old Aditya Rao is someone you could call a ‘global musician’ – he was born in Bengaluru, is now based out of Los Angeles, California, still continues his music lessons via Skype with his Bengaluru-based guru, Shri K Ramesh and counts everyone from Carlos Santana and John Legend to Bhimsen Joshi and AR Rahman amongst his influences. “It makes me who I am today as a musician,” he says, giving us a peek into why a track – a Carnatic mix of Ed Sheeran’s Shape of You, that he and his fellow musicians reimagined, is now stealing hearts on the Internet.

Aditya’s tryst with the popular track began when he was listening to it while cleaning his apartment on a routine Sunday, speakers blazing loud enough for his neighbours to hear. “I caught myself replacing the English lyrics with Carnatic swarams,” he recalls, finally pitching it to Indian Raga, a startup that works to make arts education accessible, relevant to youth through new-age content and videos by young talent. The beauty of Carnatic music, Aditya tells us, is its ability to adapt and enhance every other style and genre. And since he has a strong understanding of its roots, the experiment came quite easily.

Believe it if you will, but this surreal classical interpretation is the result of a  Google Hangout call collaboration between Mahesh Raghavan, Vinod Krishnan and Aditya! “Vinod and I penned the vocal notes, while Mahesh was the brains behind producing and arranging the music. It must be noted that the entire project was worked on remotely. I recorded vocals from my home studio in Los Angeles, Vinod from Minneapolis, and Mahesh worked on the music from Dubai. We recorded the video separately in each of the three cities, and stitched it together to create a music video with a storyline and a natural cadence,” he explains about the production process. Three million views in three days was natural progression after that.  

Aditya’s journey into music has been evolving just as effortlessly too. The Karnataka State Award winner for 2013, he has recorded, toured and performed with AR Rahman while singing multiple songs for his films – Aila Aila from I and Idhu Naal Varavil and Showkali from Achcham Yenbadhu Madamaiyada, for instance. His viral collaborations include Manmohini Morey with Shankar Tucker, Saavira Kiranava Chelli from Kannada film Ball Pen, Hibibi Aava Hai with Jai Matt and Hello’s acoustic cover with Aakash Gandhi. “I’ve been very lucky to have parents who have continually supported my journey that has brought me to where I am today,” he smiles, giving it where it’s due.

At a time when it was either persuing music as a hobby or leaving a full-time job for music, this 27-year-old found a third option by pursuing a Masters in entertainment industry management from Carnegie Mellon University. “I work in business development for a leading entertainment marketing and public relations firm by day, and pursue my passion for music on nights and over weekends,” he says, adding, “Music is also how I unwind – by listening to new songs, recording new tracks or attending concerts.” His resolution is also to try and release one new piece of content on his social media channels every month for the rest of 2017. It’s safe to say, it’s all about music with Aditya, and he would have it no other way.