Dhol Funk in NY

They have listeners to the left of them,spectators to the right of them and fans squeezed into the front. Their music immediately reminds one of the marriage processions of north India,led by a garnished groom on a reluctant mare. Doli saja ke rakhna is transmogrified into something faster,stronger,bolder. The desis sing along,the New Yorkers pummel the floor as the thump of the dhol and the echo of the horns lay siege. Nicola Shepheard from New Zealand says,“I like Red Baraat’s exuberant,Miami Vice Indian-style music. It can rouse a sleepy bar full of people in spite of themselves.”

Red Baraat is a dhol n’ brass band,which melds bhangra with brass funk. Theirs is an audacious new sound,a blend of dhol,drumset,percussion and five horns. Over the last two years,the band has made clubs in the US dance like the Indians. Sunny Jain,the lead dhol player and founder,feels that they appeal to South Asian and western audiences because they engage with their music at a “visceral level”. He adds,“It’s great to look out into an audience and see the diversity that we bring together. Naturally,we appeal to the South Asian community but people who aren’t familiar with Indian music feel our energy and sincerity in the music we play.”

The band was born on August 27,2005,the day Sunny,a Punjabi Jain,was married. Thirty of his musician friends provided the band baaja to his baraat. Word soon spread about a marching band for Indian weddings. He put together a five-member team and they started playing at baraats in 2006. Since then,they have been performing at close to 30 weddings a year. While the wedding marching band boosted many festivities,Sunny had bigger plans. He wanted to start a band “where the dhol would be the lead Indian instrument,as opposed to the sitar or tabla”. He wanted a big band with a big sound,where all the instruments would be acoustic. More members were added and they started performing professionally as Red Baraat in 2008.

They released their debut album Chaal Baby last year,which received warm reviews for “providing numerous moments of unbridled joy”,and are now raising money for their second album Shruggy Ji.

The band has performed at the Montreal Jazz Festival,Chicago World Music Festival, India Independence Day Parade (NYC) and Lincoln Center. Beside Sunny,the band includes Tomas Fujiwara on drumset,Mike Bomwell on baritone sax,Sonny Singh on trumpet and vocals,MiWi La Lupa on bass trumpet,Smoota on trombone,John Altieri on sousaphone,soprano sax player Arun Luthra and percussionist Rohin Khemani.

Sunny’s musical background resembles a tableau on globalisation. Having grown up in Rochester,NY,he started on percussion at age 10. His musical journey has taken him from bebop jazz to classic rock to Jain bhajans and Bollywood music. While studying jazz performance,he started learning the tabla. He picked up the dhol in 2003 after a tour to India.

It seems natural that New York,the city of many cities,is the birthplace of this sound. Sunny explains,“I wasn’t looking to recreate an Indian brass band,but a band that reflected my complete identity as an Indian-American. The America I was raised in intersected with people of all beliefs. While there is the Punjabi foundation with the dhol,there is also a host of other influences,namely funk,ska (from Jamaica),samba,jazz,rock,etc.”

Shruggy Ji,to be released in February 2011,will include a few Indian covers,like Lal Meri Pat and Chunari Chunari. The main attraction is that band members,who have backgrounds in Indian classical music and Afro-Cuban,R&B and pop,are contributing their own songs to it.

The band is yet to come to India. Sunny has performed with his jazz group Sunny Jain Collective at the Jazz Yatra in Delhi ,and with Pakistani band Junoon in Delhi and Srinagar. We are still awaiting the baraat.