I joined the Madras Christian College but dropped out after three months. Telugu music director Ramesh Naidu asked me to assist him, and I did so for over a year. I did think of rejoining college, but by then, I was discovering the musician in me. I worked with Illaya Raja and Raj Koti and soon shifted to commercials. This led to movie offers.
I am a friend when I need to be a friend, a father when I need to be a father, a musician when music calls. I switch roles accordingly.
While my mother wanted me to be a musician, I wanted to become an electronic engineer.
I basically love classical music. I love a lot of musicians playing together and the whole culture of that, whether it's Indian or it's Western.
A good film demands its own score, and if you are a musician, your conscience will never allow you to do something mediocre for a good film.
A musician is a professional, whether he or she is successful or not. The profession itself must be regarded as a stable job.
My grandfather, Arthur Baskerville, he played and still plays a little bit piano and trombone, and so when I was a kid, I always heard jazz around the house, but I also went to his gigs, whether it be a Saturday brunch in my hometown Columbus, Ohio. We'd go and hear him play with some of the local musicians.
I'm not saying that in order to be a great jazz musician you have to be a great classical pianist first. But I am saying that it makes things easier when you can get around the instrument, and you have some idea of how to approach the various hurdles.
Big Red Machine is really a community effort: I guess it involves almost 30 musicians. It does come out of our friendship, but it's really something that is deeply collaborative.
The National's favorite experiences as musicians are when we are collaborating with people a little outside of our world as a band.
