GANAVYA – Not In An Anthropological Mood (2024)

Ganavya Doraiswamy is a distinctive and multifaceted artist whose work spans music, performance, and education. She is known for her unique ability to bridge diverse musical traditions, blending Indian classical music with jazz, gospel, and contemporary styles. Ganavya’s music is deeply influenced by her South Indian heritage. She is well-versed in Carnatic music, a classical tradition from southern India.

She has studied and performed across various cultures and genres, which adds depth and breadth to her artistry. Ganavya holds a Master’s degree from Berklee College of Music’s Global Jazz Institute, where she worked with legendary musicians like Danilo Pérez, John Patitucci, and Terri Lyne Carrington. Her work integrates Indian classical elements with contemporary forms, including jazz and gospel. She has a unique ability to interpret traditional songs in innovative ways.

Ganavya’s art is characterized by a deep emotional resonance and a commitment to storytelling. She often uses music to address themes of identity, spirituality, and social justice. Her performances are immersive and aim to create a sense of connection and introspection among her audience.

“Not in an anthropological mood” is a phrase taken from an essay by Marwa Belghazi. This elegiac song explores her yearning to witness humanity and be witnessed in return, but not through the lens of otherness or as a measure of comparison.

Ganavya’s music has significant Sufi influences, in the syncretistic intersection between Islam and Hinduism, reflecting her deep engagement with spirituality, philosophy and mysticism. Sufism, with its emphasis on divine love and unity, aligns closely with her artistic ethos. Ganavya’s approach to Sufi elements is not confined to traditional forms but integrates them into a broader musical and cultural dialogue, weaving them with her background in Carnatic music, jazz, and other genres. This synthesis creates a space for Sufi influences to resonate in fresh and innovative ways.

The trans-disciplinary artist and scholar on her enchanting musical practice

The thinnai is an integral element of South India’s architectural heritage, specifically within the Tamil Nadu region. Fashioned from marble and red oxide, the shaded veranda coils around the front entrance of the home, beckoning neighbours, strangers and family members to escape the heat. For most people it is a space to rest and gather, but for Ganavya it’s also a sentiment that flickers at the core of her compositional practices, the latest iteration being her album ‘like the sky I’ve been too quiet’. “So much of our village can now live in the virtual world, so what if we can use this strange magic technology to invite more people to our house?” she asks. The NYC-born, Tamil Nadu-raised composer, multi-instrumentalist and vocalist likens the album’s foundation to that of a thinnai; it is not the final destination on one’s journey but rather a temporary fortress where her poetic lyrics, at times borrowed from an array of literature, are a warm blanket she pulls over our shoulders.

Today nestled in her home in California, Ganavya holds a light towards an incense stick, spreading a trail of smoke across her sun-dappled study. Her voice croaks from fatigue having spent the previous evening working through a list of household tasks with a friend. Yet moments like these are a fulfilment of her desire to abide with loved ones, answering the call to surrender entirely to presence. It’s this same posture that led gavaya and a handful of collaborators through hours of improvisation to create the album, produced by Shabaka Hutchings in his London home. “When I arrived, Shabaka had invited many different people to the conversation. For three days we were in the studio making music non-stop,” she recalls of the sessions where she was joined by Floating Points, Tom Herbert, Carlos Niño and Leafcutter John. On the third day of recording, they stepped outside and into the rain to record the track ‘we made it to the underpass’. Sounds of the day turning, distant bird calls and car tyres against gravel create the canvas that Shabaka decorates with the wispy notes of his flute in response to Ganavya’s croons.

“There is a way of life where we transcend language and be together, sing together or be quiet together”

‘Like the sky I’ve been too quiet’ drifts through the spectrum of soft prayers and stirring invocations delivered in Tamil, English and Spanish and often trails into wordless chants. The opening act ‘not in an anthropological mood’, a phrase taken from an essay by Marwa Belghazi, explores her yearning to witness humanity and be witnessed in return, but not through the lens of otherness or as a measure of comparison. Laced with suspense, the post-humanist score sets precedent for the journey through Ganavya’s sensitivities. Shifting deeper into a dystopian overcast, we arrive at the ‘first notebook of songs’ which trembles with oscillating synths and flutes that imitate the softness of a breeze. And accompanied by Alina Bzhezhinska on the harp, third song ‘forgive me my’ lends from writer Teju Cole’s reflection on death and what it means to carry the weight of loss in its aftermath. Bzhezhinska controls the dynamic of the composition alternating between accentuated plucks and shimmering glissando techniques to which ganavya delivers the line, ‘forgive me my forgetfulness, no one can forget gentleness’. Moulded by her robust training in Carnatic music, a practice often rooted in the observance of ritual and ceremony, ganavya negotiates her palette of sound and texture to deliver a spirit-baring performance. Her uses of melisma, traditional ragas and other vocal ornaments are a medium through which she dances with the heaviness of her emotions, leading to moments of illuminating release… [+]