Guitar legend Prasanna’s academy is looking to transform the way music is taught in the country. Vinay Aravind finds out if it really is the Berklee of India
Mention “music school” and “Chennai” and A R Rahman’s KM Music Conservatory is what comes to mind. But there’s another equally ambitious music venture that has come up 75 km outside the city, the Swarnabhoomi Academy of Music (SAM). Located on the scenic East Coast Road, the school is looking to transform the way contemporary music is taught in the country — a welcome change for Indian musicians who previously had few options beyond the friendly neighbourhood guitar or drum teacher.
The school is the brainchild of guitar virtuoso Prasanna (who has played with legends like Steve Smith and Victor Wooten). His idea is to offer world-class instruction in a variety of styles spanning Western and Indian music right here in India. This he is able to do with the faculty he has assembled, using his networks as a performer and artiste of international repute. Acclaimed performers from as far as USA and Suriname have chosen to live in India and work full-time at SAM, teaching the students the finer aspects of musicianship. The current faculty includes bass player Steve Zerlin, guitarist Ed DeGenaro, singer Natalie John, drummer Lyndon Rochelle, keyboard player James Carson and ghatam exponent S Karthik (go ahead, Google the names). Renowned drummer Benny Greb has just wrapped up a three-week stint at SAM.
The faculty and students of SAM are already revolutionising the live music scene in Chennai with regular concerts of a standard rarely seen elsewhere in the country. From contemporary jazz to pop, rock and reggae these performances, typically in pubs, have opened the ears of Chennai music aficionados — hitherto accustomed to such a standard only when it comes to Carnatic music — to the pleasures that “Western music” holds. DeGenaro has assembled The Ed DeGenaro Group, which has found a faithful following among music-lovers in Chennai as well as in cities like Kolkata and Bangalore where they have toured.
Prasanna has partnered with real estate developer MARG for the venture, and the school is thus situated on a four-acre space in the latter’s sprawling mixed-use development. SAM inducted its first batch of students in 2010, and at the moment offers six-month diplomas in a wide range of music styles on a variety of instruments and voice, with plans to offer courses of a longer duration.
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Conversations with faculty and students paint a picture of a free-spirited school where teachers, staff and students live in the same block, and instruction, interaction and jam-sessions go on into the wee hours of the morning. Current student Homi Rustomji describes SAM as “wonderful, life-changing... we don’t want it to ever end”. This is a sentiment echoed by every student spoken to, and one of them, Gokul Ramdas, has even stayed on as a teaching intern.
Ramdas is an engineering dropout from Kozhikode who, after dabbling in sound engineering, saved up money to pay the Rs 2.5-lakh fee for the six-month course at SAM, specialising in voice. Ramdas describes the education at SAM as a “spiritual experience.” He insists that his stint at SAM has led to a profound improvement in his abilities as a singer.
The academy’s operations are headed by Shyam Rao, a stalwart on the Chennai music scene, who has played the drums for many bands. When Prasanna was setting up SAM, he asked Rao to come on board as vice-president. It didn’t take Rao long to decide to drop his IT career of decades to take up what he thought was an “exciting project”. He says the idea was to make SAM the “IIT of music”.
Prasanna himself is a combination of driving force and brand ambassador for SAM, promoting the school and inviting faculty while touring the world as a performing musician. He insists that SAM is not merely a school where musicians come to improve their skills. “SAM is in between an ashram, a gurukul and a college. It is a very Indian concept, reflecting the global Indian outlook. Musicians come here to absorb a truly global musical experience,” he says.
The student pool at SAM is drawn from all over the country and abroad. Rustomji maintains that “there is no place like this in India, or anywhere in Asia. For a comparable education, students would have to go to the US.” Rao also claims that SAM is a venture that can stand on its feet financially, and that the break-even horizon is not very far.
But Bruce Lee Mani, frontman of popular Bangalore band Thermal and a Quarter, sounds a note of caution about the utility the school can deliver. “The fees are on the higher side, and professional musicians may not be able to afford to take six months off, even if it is to learn from such brilliant faculty.” However, he adds that “when you look at the cost of SAM versus say Berklee, and the fact that there simply exists the opportunity to learn from these musicians right here in India, it’s a tremendously positive development”.
There is no denying that SAM is a bold, unprecedented experiment in Indian music education. But for all the excitement and enthusiasm from different quarters, these are still early days. It remains to be seen whether these standards can be maintained over the long term, and whether the products of SAM can find enough of a market for their newly-acquired skills. For the sake of quality and diversity in Indian music, one cannot help but hope this experiment succeeds.
Vinay Aravind is a lawyer-turned-photographer based in Chennai
