Desi versions of Western hits

Fans can’t get enough of Mahesh Raghvan’s Indian classical cover of the Game of Thrones theme music. The piece has gone viral and has already hit over a million views. But this is not a first for Mahesh. In a quest to present Carnatic music in a way that will appeal to younger and more modern audiences, Mahesh has been Indianising Western songs for a while now. “I run a project called Flair, where I fuse Carnatic and electronic music. As part of my project, I started Indianising Western songs. I want to promote Indian music and present it in a nice way,” says the 25-year-old, who is based in Dubai.

It all started when Mahesh released the Indian classical version of Adele’s Hello, which got over 3,97,000 views. He followed it up with the desi versions of Star Wars: Imperial March, Game of Thrones theme and Rihanna’s Work. “it started with Adele’s Hello, which went viral and I decided to continue doing this,” he says adding, “The main feedback I get from people is that they find it funny and some of them even like it better than the original. Right now, I have just done four covers, but I am working on more. I have also released an album called Flair Carnatic Music 2.0, which features pure Carnatic music fusion.” Mahesh started learning Carnatic music when he was four. He later got a degree in audio production and pursued his Masters in Music Technology. “I am a singer and a music producer. I compose for games and apps. I also develop iPhone applications. I involve myself with everything that has got to do with music and technology. I use new and advanced technologies like GeoShred on the iPad and Seaboard to compose. These were designed for Western music but I want to work on Indian music with it and bring more focus to this form of music.”

Mahesh also teaches music production part-time and plans to start a course to teach other musicians how to Indianise Western covers. “Right now I am working with Indian Ragas. We want to teach others how to Indianise Western music. We are planning a crowdfunding campaign to cover the cost of production... It’s just to offer the course at a discounted rate and it will be hosted on my website. We plan to teach people how to Indianise the songs on Indian instruments. It’s for musicians to learn basic Indian techniques and go over the basics so if they have a Western song, they can convert the notes to sa re ga ma pa and Indianise it.” So how does he pick his songs “I don’t listen to Western music as much, so I take suggestions from friends. I mostly take advantage of what’s trending.”