As part of the Visible Sessions, Adventures In Sound sees experimental artists Rowan McNaught and Sam Szoke-Burke team up with one of Melbourne’s finest “world” music artists, Indian Bansuri performer, Vinod Prassana. Showcasing an infusion of traditional and contemporary styles interwoven with the assistance of new and old technologies, Adventures In Sound will present something new to the ears of their Melbourne audience.
Now preparing for their first collaborative stage performance, Vinod, Rowan and Sam are nothing less than excited about the prospects of performing live on stage together.
Rowan explains, “I think that we’re all feeling really excited. All of the pieces have a sort of loose structure that we’ve established, but every time we play them, they go off in their own direction a little bit. But we’re sort of looking forward to seeing what happens on the day.”
Vinod continues, “It’s really good! It’s always good with the music…how you express in your art. So however you express your feeling to the music and, the most important thing, playing music with friendship, you know? You’re playing with [other] musicians – how good your friendship is with them…is really important, because it keeps it healthy. Having some jokes, having a giggle, going out to eat food and go outside. The music is like a friendship and, through that, you express your feelings to each other and, once you can do that, you’re on your way to creating good music.”
“We play different types of music. [At the moment] we’re just seeing how it goes, and we’re really enjoying it. It’s really cool!”
An unlikely collaboration to say the least, the efforts of each member of the musical project truly speaks for itself.
Vinod laughs, “I always like to try new things. It’s really good and…it’s a little bit challenging too, because it’s very different to the music that I do – I do classical music. But I like challenging [myself] and trying new things. I’m very open-minded, you know, so I like to [look into] different types of music and go into that and try and learn something.”
“The pieces that I’m playing are based on classical music, but it’s not like in classical music [where] you have a lot of structure and where you’re strict. I’m open to that and whatever’s coming, and whatever music they’re playing and I’m feeling – we’re just playing music.
I can’t play a versatile style because [I’ve learnt] all these little styles, but…we’re making really beautiful music and already have some completed pieces, and it sounds great! I’m sure people will enjoy it when they come [to watch us perform]. It’s going to be very different and very little music that [you never would have heard] anywhere, I don’t think.”
With Rowan continuing, “It’s been really interesting actually because…we’ve always sort of collaborated within our little group, and done different projects, but never sort of outside of the group. We’re really fortunate to have had the opportunity to work with Vinod because he’s very flexible and we’ve…been able to push and pull each other to places that we wouldn’t have – speaking in a musical context – places that we wouldn’t have gone to without each other.”
“From our side, we’re sort of putting together new components of songs by ourselves and putting them together, and Vinod’s working over the top of that. They’re sort of built for this collaboration.”
Speaking of the performance itself, Vinod guarantees that the beauty of the collaboration is what truly sets it apart from anything that anyone has ever seen or heard before, including the artists themselves.
“People will see that this is really amazing and that it’s very beautiful and very prepared. They will see two cultures coming together and meeting, and having a conversation, and the friendship.”
Sam continues, explaining that perhaps the challenge of the project itself is the most rewarding part of the entire collaboration. “I think I would echo what Vinod said…We’ve made music that’s completely different to what we usually do, so I think it’s something more than just a proposition for [being labelled as] cross-cultural. I think it’s something like being in between cultures that we’ve come up with hopefully.”
