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Achievers Asha Srinivasan
- Creating Cross-Cultural Music
By FRANCIS C. ASSISI
Indian American composer Asha Srinivasan is proving that you don't have to
be European and dead for a couple of centuries to succeed as a classical
music composer in the United States.
Born in Logan, Utah, and raised in India till the age of nine, 27-year-old
Srinivasan's recent trajectory has catapulted her to the ranks of the top
young composers in America.
Her composition "By the River near Savathi" for clarinet, violin, viola and
cello premiered June 2 at the Chelsea Art Museum in New York City during the
"Notable Women: A Celebration of Women Composers" music festival. The work
was commissioned for the St. Luke's Chamber Ensemble in New York City after
Srinivasan won a competition among 74 other young composers.
"We picked her because we thought she had a voice," says Joan Tower, 68, the
ensemble's composer-in-residence and the festival's curator. "I heard
something more individual," says Tower, a professor of music at Bard College
in New York.
Srinivasan says the struggle within herself, reflecting a flowering of
multiple consciousnesses, is embedded in her music as much as it is part of
her hybridity. The inspiration for "Savathi," she says, arose from the
Carnatic raga "Shubapantuvarali" as well as her own fascination with German
author Herman Hesse's classic Siddhartha.
"Every time I heard the scale, it evoked a sense of deep sorrow...It
reminded me of a deep world pain or world weariness in a philosophical
manner. This immediately brought up the image of Siddhartha by the
river-staring into it and wishing oblivion."
Srinivasan says that Hesse's book always held a strong sway over her mind
since she first read it in high school. "I seem to keep coming back to the
book and re-reading it at various points in my life and getting much meaning
out of it every time."
A fusion of diverse influences is evident in Srinivasan's earlier
compositions, too. In "Kalpitha," she borrowed tones and concepts from
Carnatic music and harnessed them into a simple yet compelling structure.
Classical guitarist Michael Durek says that the piece can be viewed as a
metaphor of both Srinivasan the person and Srinivasan the composer:
childhood in India, adulthood in America; Carnatic vocal study as a child,
Western classical music as an adult. On the other hand, her "Falling:
Samsaaram," moves, in her own words, "between oppositions of attachment (samsaaram)
and detachment (nirvaanam) to life's pain and pleasures through the
juxtaposition of urgent volatile textures with calm ambient ones."
Srinivasan explains that she is as American as she is Indian. Her musical
training has been predominantly Western but her musical ideas have often
been more Indian, because that was also ingrained in her from early
childhood and from hearing Indian music at home. She spent her early years
in India because her parents had to come back when their work visas expired.
They returned to the United States when her father's former employer rehired
him.
How does she integrate Carnatic music into computer generated Western
classical compositions? She says that it is in the acoustic parts of her
music that the Carnatic influences are strong-especially where there is a
flute. "Generally I compose by singing my melodic lines and I think this is
a strong influence from my limited training in Carnatic music," she says.
Srinivasan admits that there may be other influences as well that are not as
obvious. "…I listen to a lot of Hindi film songs, Tamil film songs and so
on, so influences from those genres might also be there."
During her undergraduate years at Goucher College in Baltimore, Maryland,
she was first introduced to a course in computer music. She liked the idea
of being able to create sounds on her own, and immediately. "This is one
difference between computer music and acoustic music composition. In
computer music composition, the composer works with the actual sound. It
feels more like sculpting where you use audio materials to create a certain
sound object."
Currently working toward her Doctorate of Musical Arts at the University of
Maryland in College Park, Srinivasan participates in a program to teach
basic music to inner-city school children in Baltimore, the state capital.
Besides the "Introduction to Music Technology" course that she will teach
this summer, her upcoming major project is an orchestra piece for her
dissertation.
Francis C. Assisi is a columnist for the California-based portal
indolink.com
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Francis C. Assisi
is a columnist for the California-based portal indolink.com
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