Believe it or not, there is a place where three cities — Mumbai, Chennai and London meet. It’s in the latest album 3 Cities by the Bombay Dub Orchestra. The band travelled to each of the cities and worked with several local musicians and recorded at the local studios. While it was AR Rahman’s studio in Chennai, it was the Yash Raj Studios in Mumbai.
Andrew T Macklay and Garry Hughes of the Bombay Dub Orchestra have worked with 75 artists including flute player Ashwin Shrinivasan, santoor maestro Ulhas Bapat, vocalists like Menaka Das, and Rakesh Pandit to come out with this amalgamation of Indian classical, folk, western classical and electronic music.
“We have pushed the semi-classical genre further with stronger beats. I have been in Mumbai for 11 years, so it has influenced me. Chennai was a little different. They put in seven to nine hours every day. Musicians in the South are amazingly dedicated,” says Macklay who has earlier put together Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and Bhimsen Joshi’s voice in one raaga.
Macklay got initiated into Indian music after he heard the soundtrack of Raj Kapoor’s Ram Teri Ganga Maili. “I recently met the music composer of the film Ravindra Jain and told him about this. I loved the sarangi and the grand orchestration in the soundtracks. I’m also influenced by Satyajit Ray’s film music.”
