Notes for a Fashion Show

For designer Poonam Bhagat’s show that took its inspiration from American modern art of the 1940s,choreographers Asha Kochhar and Vidyun Singh of Media Makers put together a medley of Elvis Presley’s greatest hits,including Blue Suede Shoes,Let me be your Teddy bear. Models swaggered down the ramp,swinging to the music and generally have a good time. “We work with DJs Gaurav and Madhav and have also worked with Jalebee Cartel to create music for a show,” says the duo.

Music is an emotional experience for models too. “If I cannot relate to the music,it will show on my face,” says model and DJ Ignatius Camilo,who has also been behind the console for some shows this season. “It is important to know about the collection and match it with suitable music. I DJ regularly,I buy a lot of original music,I travel a lot and hear different kinds of music on the move. All these are contributing factors that help in coming up with a good score,” says Camilo. One of the most innovative scores so far has been the one Camilo had worked out for designer Pallavi Mohan’s show on the opening day of the event,along with choreographers Meenu and Meetu Booker Soni of Roots. The theme was Alice in Wonderland and the models walked down to an addictive single-note on loop interspersed with dialogues from an Alice production. Scenes from the original 1903 silent film were screened at the end of the show. “I don’t remix tracks,and for Pallavi’s show I sampled and mixed music from other tracks but it all has to come together as one piece of music,” adds Camilo.

Aparna Bahl of Preferred Professionals has choreographed shows for 13 designers including Tarun Tahiliani,Gaurav Gupta,Anjana Bhargava and others. “We start working on the music much in advance and work with real musicians who compose music specially for the show,” says Bahl. This season she is particularly excited about the finale showcase by Rajesh Pratap Singh. “We’ve worked with Gaurav Raina of Midival Punditz and the score was composed from scratch. It’s abstract and it’s something that we have never done before,” says Bahl.

Of course sometimes silence works just as well. Designers Jenjum and Jasleen of Koga did not want any music for some of the ensembles in their collection. “The entire dress was made of tiny golden ghungroos and it just made sense to let the model walk to the sound of the bells,” says Meenu,the choreographer for the show. “Similarly,the next few outfits were made of shells,so we let the models walk in silence,before we introduced music for the rest of the collection,” adds Soni. Sound decision.