06 October,2009 08:54 AM IST | | Shibani Kashyap
It's incredible how powerful I feel with my guitar!! This string instrument set on a wooden bodyu00a0 with a hollow space typically has six strings, but four, seven, eight, twelve andu00a0 eighteen string guitars also exist!! There are three main types of guitar electric guitar, classical guitar and acoustic. Recognised as the primary instrument in jazz, flamenco, blues, country, mariachi and many forms of popular music.
Played acoustically, which is my forte, the guitar tone is produced by the vibration of the strings and modulated by the hollow body! Well, it's almost half my size, but it truly makes me feel like I'm the witch and it is my magic wand. It helps me create "magic"u00a0 in music! It serves as my very own live band. I've devised a very interesting technique of playing the guitar, where I strum it with my thumb and fingers without using the plectrum, and tap my fingers in such a way that it sounds like a percussion instrument.
Being the only woman in India to endorse a leading guitar brand the GIBSON is thrilling. I play it while at a concert, at radio and TV interviews to promote my music, at close friends' gatherings, jamming sessions on my terrace turning it into a true music haven. Also, when I'm alone, it's my best friend; I compose music with my guitar! Oh and besides this, it also impresses the boys!
On a serious note, I recommend that all singers pick one instrument and master it. It helps accompany a performance; it defines your music. In my opinion, for a singer, the guitar is an ideal accompaniment. My close musician friends Mohit Chauhan, Rabbi Shergill, Bobby Cash, Valentine Shipley, Ali Azmat, Saibal Basu also happen to be guitar fans. When people audio-visualise me with the guitar, they say, "We want to hear Shibani unplugged". On a recent trip to Toronto, where I was performing at Masala Mehndi Masti, (the largest South Asian music and arts festival), I sang to an audience of 8,000 people along with my best friend, my guitar.
Sometime back, Arshad Warsi had commented at a press meet for the film Sunday, for which I had composed and sung... "So you've brought your weapon along?"
Yes, it's my weapon, my axe, my best friend. And I have the power to conquer the world with the music I create with it.
