Kathmandu:

With well-known names in it, Dr Dhurvesh Chandra Regmi (sitar), Pramod Upadhyaya (tabla) and Shyam Nepali (sarangi) Sukarma of course does not require any introduction. The classical music band Sukarma has come a long way and has established itself as one of the pioneers in the classical music industry. Moving ahead with the

time Sukarma too has tried different styles and themes and come out as a winner every time. And this time they have broadened their horizons and collaborated with an Italian artiste Giuseppe Brotto and come up with a new fusion album ‘Eastern Bridge’.

Brotto who is a rock musician started playing music from the age of 17. Highly influenced by Led Zeppelin he was deeply into rock music during the 70’s and 80’s. But he never liked hard rock as he felt it never touched your soul. He got hooked to classical music when he first experimented his music with tabala. His curiosity to know more about the eastern classical music brought him to Nepal and to Sukarma. “When my friend Graeme Cutting told me about Sukarma I decided to mail them and Dhurvesh too replied with much enthusiasm,” said Brotto. Then he came to Nepal and when they met the musicians in them just clicked with each other and soon they were practicing, arranging, composing and recording for the album. Apart from Sukarma and Brotto, Manoj Gautam (tabla) and Umesh (flute) have included their music for the classical tunes and western tunes are infused by Beppe Donadio (piano), Nina Leonards (violin) and Cutting (guitar). After recording the classical tunes Brotto took the raw material to Italy and there he rearranged the music with western musicians, “without overshadowing the eastern music I have used the western music just to enhance the sound,” Brotto added.

Talking about the experience of working together Dr Regmi said, “He is very much into eastern philosophy and Buddhism so he could easily relate to our music and the best part was that we got to develop our music without any pressure. We always give each other creative freedom and if there is any issue we talk things out.” Agreeing with Dr Regmi Brotto said, “I had a dream of creating such music but things does not always turn out the way they are planned but when I met them and made music with them my dream got its shape and colours.”

They have lots of memories of the time when they started the album. “I remember Dhurvesh had taught me a Raaga and one fine morning I came to his place and started to play it for him to listen, he got all serious and told me that it was meant for the evening and I liked that because I respect his music as much as he does,” said Brotto. On the other hand Dr Regmi remembers the time when they had an argument over the rhythm of eastern and western music. “In one composition we had an argument over the beat and we were not ready to hear each other out but in the end some how we convinced each other,” he shared.

The album ‘Eastern Bridge’ is set to be out in the market soon.