Mumbai's very own 'School of Rock'

The six students work it out in studio

For a while now, the people over at IndianRaga have been taking deeply-rooted classical music and presenting it in a modern-day format, an exercise that hopes to draw in young talent - considering that most listeners are relatively older - towards Indian ragas and the classical arts.

Best known for their on-loop mix of Ed Sheeran's 'Shape of You', this US-based arts education set-up has now released its Mumbai Raga Labs launch video - one that features six teenagers recreating a jazz cover of the popular pop song 'Faded' by Alan Walker, ahead of its launch this Saturday.

Chosen to feature, play, and record the song were the six youngsters from The Cathedral and John Connon School, mentored by ex-True School of Music teacher Yohan Marshall. The entire song was rehearsed, composed, and recorded within five days, right the day after they had appeared for their final ICSE examinations.

Youngsters from The Cathedral and John Connon School recording in the studio

The School of Rock
"What Raga Labs does is that it takes a talented bunch of youngsters and pushes them a little out of their comfort zone to try and do a song that people have heard before but in a style that is completely new," said Marshall (26), who has been working with the six for quite a while now, individually and as a group. A drummer himself, he has been teaching music for a little over five years now. The six-piece band is made up of Parina Kothari (vocals), Yaashree Himatsingka (vocals), Vikramaditya Dugar (saxophone), Rehan Bhat (piano), Zahan Parekh (drums) and Armaan Nazir (bass), all 16-year-olds who have known each since primary school.

While the boys are a part of a jazz band called 'The Cheese Quartet' for the last two years, Kothari and Himatsingka have been trained in classical singing.

"They had never experienced the studio like this, together, and were running into first-time problems, such as missing cues, something that even studio pros struggle with," said Marshall. "My job was to make sure that the piece was challenging enough for them, because if it wasn't, this talented bunch would've got bored."

Kothari said, "Six hours in the studio seems like a lot of time, but we were setting up most of the time as it is a vital part of recording."

"We couldn't make even the smallest of errors as everything was picked up by the microphone," said Nazir.

All six of them agreed on one thing: that recording in a studio and performing live really not the same thing. "In the studio, you have to be perfect, there is no margin for error," reiterated Kothari.

Parekh said what they have managed to do with the song is really exciting. "I am excited as well as nervous to see how people react to it."

Founderspeak
"Every week from now you will see one really high quality music or dance collaboration by the best upcoming talent from Mumbai, across genres ranging from country music to pop, reggaeton, jazz, and in dance with ballet, Bharatanatyam and Kathak," said Sriram Emani, co-founder and CEO, IndianRaga.

"It was great working with this team; I was particularly inspired by their focus and commitment to bringing out their best. Doing a jazz cover of a pop song is not easy - on one hand, there is the expectation to adhere to the jazz standards and framework, and on the other, it has to be sufficiently different yet similar to the original.

"They worked very hard on adding their creative spin to the structures and frameworks we provided, and thought hard about what would go well and what should be deprioritised. Recording in a studio environment needs a lot of patience, and it was great to see them aspire for perfection in what they do, both for the audio recording and the video shoot."