Aki Kumar with Curtis Salgado - "Back To Bombay" - Hardly Strictly Bluegrass 2016

Описание: www.akikumar.com

Aki Kumar performs his original song "Back to Bombay" with help from renowned Soul blues singer and blues harp master, Curtis Salgado!

AKI GOES TO BOLLYWOOD
An unprecedented mashup of Retro Bollywood Music & American Blues

Aki Kumar is no stranger to living double lives. The now professional harmonica player grew up in Mumbai, India and studied traditional Hindustani music at the age of 9 years old. The pursuit of a college degree in the USA landed him at San Jose State in California in 1999, followed by a steady “day job” as a software engineer. But, by night, Aki had begun exploring and hanging out at blues clubs in the SF Bay Area, and was especially drawn to the wailing, toneful sound of the blues harmonica. He soon began performing his own brand of Chicago blues at local venues and is now hailed as one of the top rising stars of the West Coast Blues scene. 2016 marks a milestone for Aki as he’s spent half his life in India and half in the United States. His debut album for Little Village Foundation, Aki Goes To Bollywood, is a true representation of his musical DNA — classic 1950s/60s Bollywood and down-home American blues.

Though some instrumental albums and DJs have attempted to rearrange Bollywood music mixed with other genres, never before has an Indian blues musician so triumphantly recorded songs by the film industry’s biggest stars such as Mohammad Rafi, Kishore Kumar, R.D. Burman, and S.D. Burman. Aki Kumar notes, “I realized that many of the Indian songs I loved had, in fact, been influenced by American blues music and I wanted to bring them together.” Aki Goes To Bollywood blends sitars with Delta blues jams, Hindi vocals with ferocious harp playing. Aki has single-handedly created Mumbai Meets Muddy, his own blues movement. For the album’s cover, Aki emulates his childhood hero and mega-star, Amitabh Bachchan.