Jonita Gandhi on collaborating with Ed Sheeran and becoming India’s new pop headliner

At this point, Gandhi’s live shows, with full-scale pop spectacle and choreographed dance moves, have turned her into one of India’s latest pop headliners — the classic kind, where vocal prowess, physical presence and glamour are intertwined. “For me, the stage is where I feel the most alive. The studio is about precision but the stage is pure connection,” says Gandhi.

The singer, known for songs like Mere dil ka telephone, The breakup song, Vida karo and Sajan aayo ri among others, is amazed with how the live music scene in India has exploded. Her performance at the Nykkaland Festival in the Capital last November had people come out in droves, with her song What jhumka from Karan Johar’s Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani, emerging as the undisputed high point.“People are craving real experiences again, that shared energy of singing and dancing together,” says Gandhi, who also opened for Enrique Iglesias recently. “I grew up listening to his songs, so opening for his concert was quite a moment,” says Gandhi.

Jonita Gandhi Saudi Arabia 2.

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In an industry where artistes are neatly compartmentalised, stepping out only occasionally with much push and pull, what makes Gandhi unusual in the current music landscape is how she moves between film and indie music, English ditties and global collaborations effortlessly. “I grew up between cultures. I was raised on both Bollywood and Western pop, so switching styles feels instinctive. Each genre brings out a different side of me and I love that versatility,” says Gandhi.

Originally from Delhi, the musician was raised in Brampton, a space dominated by South Asian Punjabi diaspora in Canada’s Ontario. While her dad, an engineer, sang Hindi songs at home, she was listening to Beyonce and Whitney Houston on tapes and CDs besides songs by AR Rahman. Her father also led a local band in Ontario and she soon began singing in it. “Singing in English gave me a beautiful way to express myself and eventually led me into songwriting too… Performing with my dad made me realise how much I loved being on stage,” says Gandhi.

But what really altered the trajectory of her career were her home YouTube videos, which not only helped her find her voice but also her first audience. “The videos taught me consistency and authenticity and changed my life,” says Gandhi, who was discovered by playback singer Sonu Nigam and Rahman online. She won a tribute to Michael Jackson Facebook contest that Nigam organised and went on to tour with him in North America. Rahman was impressed by her rendition of the hymn, Silent night, online and asked her to record Kahan hoon main in Imtiaz Ali’s Highway (2014), an inward-looking ballad that was her real breakthrough in Hindi cinema after a Vishal-Shekhar piece in Chennai Express (2013).

She sang a few tracks after but what introduced her to the mainstream audiences was The breakup song, a glossy pop track with enough bite in Ae Dil Hai Mushkil in 2016 under Pritam’s baton. But even as her playback career gathered momentum, Gandhi was also building a parallel career as an independent artiste. She was a visual pop act writing new songs, singing for composers like Salim-Sulaiman and Pritam for their non-film projects and continuing to reinvent golden oldies, still making her home videos and putting her music online. “Playback lets me interpret someone else’s vision while indie music is all me,” says Gandhi.

At a time when there is anxiety in the music world about AI and how it can create melodies and generate exact timbres, Gandhi believes technology won’t replicate everything. “Technology will evolve but emotions will always matter most. People connect to honesty, not algorithms,” says Gandhi, who is busy with songwriting and a few new international collaborations.