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Niraj Chag - Have you heard him yet?
I recently chanced upon Niraj Chag's latest album - The Lost Souls and was blown away by his music. If you haven't heard him yet, you must!
Read on if you haven't discovered this genius yet.
BBC Radio 1 DJ Nihal recently described Niraj Chag as an artist whose music 'resembles a prayer in it's power' adding that "some of the most beautiful British-Asian music ever created has come from this man."
Niraj created his first musical (Baiju Bawra) aged 25. His work since then has included Mahabharata (BBC Radio 4) the Bafta nominated Simon Schama's 'Power of Art' series (BBC2) and the 2008 TV series 'The Age of Terror'. In 2009 he created and produced the score for the BBC series of programmes Darwin's Dangerous Ideas, presented by Andrew Marr. He has worked on more than twenty dance productions including ‘Awaz’, 'Bells' and 'Daredevas' (Akademi) He has also produced a wide variety of original work for TV and radio such as HBO’s ‘Sex and the City’ and for plays, including the recent Olivier Award winning ‘Rafta, Rafta’ (Royal National Theatre). With the 'Reel Bollywood' project Niraj toured the country running workshops for young people and in 2008 he put together an eclectic score for the official Olympic Torch event on London's South Bank featuring 600 vocalists, opera singers and a 40-piece brass band.
Today Niraj is one of the key modern interpreters of Asian classical and folk styles but that journey began when he had his first job making tea in Mark Hill's music studios in Southampton! From there Niraj began experimenting by mixing modern production with western and eastern classical styles. His work was spotted by Nitin Sawhney leading to his first record deal with the Outcaste label in its heyday. Self-taught in music, Niraj continued developing his style over a number of years while working on musicals, scores and dance productions. All this culminated in 2006 with the release of his critically acclaimed debut album 'Along the Dusty Road'.
'Along the Dusty Road' took Niraj three years to complete, and the painstaking detail was appreciated by both critics and fans. Featuring six languages, the album was championed by the BBC, leading to an atmospheric live set at the Roundhouse as part of the Electric Proms and also resulted in Niraj picking up the 'Best Underground Act' award at the UK Asian Music Awards, 2006.
In 2009 he released The Lost Souls, which has been greatly appreciated and well received throughout the world.
And Ethno Techno has nothing but praise for him - 'Like Sergeant Pepper's, Kind of Blue or Dark Side of the Moon, Lost Souls is one of those rare, fully realized records that will send involuntary shivers running down your spine the first time you hear it... Lost Souls is a benchmark album from an emerging giant. It simply must be heard.'
You can find out more about Niraj on his website www.nirajchag.com
Niraj also collaborates on http://www.easternsoul.net which according to him is a blog about heartfelt, soulful music and ideas. Every month there are new podcast featuring tracks (based around a monthly theme) from artists that he admires.
Go ahead guys - get his music. It is one thing you won't regret.
