Meet Mikey McCleary – a Kiwi music composer who is busy creating all sorts of musical waves from Mumbai, the headquarters for Bollywood film industry. If you ever watch Indian TV shows then you have heard his music for sure. He is the guy behind all those advert jingles for Vodafone, Levis, Titan, Coke and many, many… Continue Reading
Two Indian-American films had their world premiere at Silicon Valley’s Cinequest Film Festival (Feb 24-Mar 8, 2015) this weekend – “Miss India America,” and “For Here or To Go?” The films are made by Indian-American filmmakers from California. “Miss India America,” is set in Southern California, while “For Here or To Go?” is set in… Continue Reading
Actor Omi Vaidya’s film “For Here or To Go?” will have its world premiere at Silicon Valley’s Cinequest Film Festival this evening. We caught up with the actor last night at Cinequest to talk about his new film, working in Bollywood and his future plans. “For Here or To Go?” captures the angst and uncertainties of… Continue Reading
Filmmaker Shlomi Elkabetz’s “Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem,” was Israel’s entry for the 2015 Oscars. This is an intense, heart-wrenching and sometimes difficult to watch film that Elkabetz wrote and directed along with his sister Ronit Elkabetz, who plays the central character Vivian Amsalem. The film revolves around Amsalem’s drawn out court battle to… Continue Reading
For 25 years Kathleen Powell and Halfdan Hussey, co-founders of Cinequest Film Festival have worked hard to bring this unique festival that combines films and technology under one roof in the heart of Silicon Valley. Besides well-known filmmakers and actors, the festival features emerging artists and filmmakers and shines a strong spotlight on the contributions of youth… Continue Reading
Silicon Valley’s Cinequest Film Festival turns 25 this year. The film festival opened tonight with Dana Bachman’s “Batkid Begins” at the historic art deco California Theatre in San Jose. This feel-good and inspirational documentary about a little boy’s wish to be a super hero seemed to have resonated with the audience. The film and the filmmakers got… Continue Reading
Damien Chazelle’s film “Whiplash” won 3 Academy Awards this weekend at the 87th Academy Award for best supporting actor, editing and sound mixing. Chazelle wrote and directed the film. “Whiplash,” is an intense film centered around two ambitious musician – a 19 year old drummer (Miles Teller) and his draconian music instructor (JK Simmons). This tightly… Continue Reading
That language is not a barrier to music is amply illustrated in this track “Thuli Thuliyaai” by Vandana Srinivasan. I got hooked to this Tamil song the first time I heard it. While I don’t completely understand the lyrics of the song, I instantly connected with the music. That is what matters in the end, right?… Continue Reading
LISTEN: Academy Award Winner AR Rahman On His Musical Journey Part-2 In February 2009 I spoke to AR Rahman or AR as he prefers to be called about his musical journey and how it all started in his hometown of Chennai in Tamil Nadu. We spoke on the eve of his big Academy Award night… Continue Reading
Lisa Fruchtman is an Academy Award winning editor (The Right Stuff) and a filmmaker. In Part-2 of our conversation we talk with Fruchtman on how she got started as an editor. What seduced her to continue her career as an editor at at time when there were barely any women editors in the film industry. This… Continue Reading
Lisa and her brother Bob Fruchtman produced and directed “Sweet Dreams,” an unusual film about drumming and ice cream shop. Yes, it sounds implausible, but that is the message of the film too. How to think out of the box and make things happen, especially in a war-torn country like Rwanda. Lisa is a successful… Continue Reading
Shonali Bose’s award-winning film “Margarita With A Straw,” has received praise ever since it was first shown at The Toronto Film Festival in 2014. The film is loosely based on her cousin Malini’s story. This coming-of-age film stars Kalki Koechlin, Revathy, Sayani Gupta, and Hussain Dalal. We caught up with Shonali in San Francisco and in… Continue Reading
Stumbled upon this delightful track “Balma” by Maati Baani and was instantly hooked. This is a wonderful musical collage with elements of Indian classical music, Klezmer music and hot jazz. Musicians from France, New Zealand, Spain and India are featured in this track. Matti Baani bills itself as a global music band and is the… Continue Reading
LISTEN: Sukhi Singh On Building Sukhis, Gourmet Indian Food Meet Sukhi Singh, a tenacious and battle hardened entrepreneur, who went from selling home-made curry pastes at Berkeley Bowl and farmer’s market to founding a multi-million dollar food company in San Francisco bay area. ”We bring Indian food to the mainstream table,” is how she describes her… Continue Reading
This year marks the 25th anniversary of Silicon Valley-based Cinquest film festival that celebrates films along with technology and innovation. This year’s theme is “The Power of Creating,”and nearly 200 films from different parts of the world will screen at the festival. The festival spotlights young filmmakers in multiple ways. There is the Picture The Possibilities (PPT) session that helps connect… Continue Reading
In a few weeks time we will get to see the second season of HBO’s “Silicon Valley.” When the show debuted last year I was a bit skeptical and unsure if I wanted to watch it. But, this was a Mike Judge show and I thoroughly enjoyed his film “Office Space.” I tuned into the… Continue Reading
Pico Iyer is a well-known writer and essayist. He is a prolific writer, who spends most of his time living in Japan. In part-2 of our conversation Iyer talks about growing up in England and California, his writing style, globalism, living in Japan and his favorite author Graham Greene. Iyer often writes about globalism, and yet lives in a… Continue Reading
Pico Iyer is a well-known author and essayist. In 2008 during a hectic book tour schedule Iyer graciously made time for an hour-long interview to talk about his book The Open Road: The Global Journey of the 14th Dalai Lama. He first met the Dalai Lama through his father Prof. Raghavan N. Iyer, who taught at Oxford and University of… Continue Reading
London-based journalist and author Jules Stewart’s second book titled, Spying For The Raj: The Pundits And The Mapping of the Himalayas was released in 2006. Sir Ranulph Fiennes, who is listed as the world’s greatest living explorer by the Guinness Book of Records, has written the forward for the book. I caught up with Stewart in London in 2006 just… Continue Reading
ATMA is a new track by a A.E.S., a San Francisco bay area-based music group. The track fuses American hip-hop style lyrics with Hindustani or North Indian Classical music. A.E.S was formed last year by a trio of musicians. The name is derived from the alphabets of their first name – Alam Khan, Eligh and… Continue Reading
The splendors of an Indian Maharaja’s court is the stuff of legend that you may have heard or read in books. Ever wondered how they lead their lives? What jewels or clothes they bought? Or, who designed their clothes and jewels? Or, what artwork they collected? There is a book that takes you behind the… Continue Reading
Academy Award Winning filmmaker Kevin Macdonald’s “Black Sea” releases today in San Francisco bay area. We spoke to Macdonald about the making of “Black Sea,” and what drew him to this particular story about a group of ragged submariners, who want to salvage gold from a sunken World War Two submarine. What was the real life… Continue Reading
In Part-2 of our conversation Gurcharan Das we continue our conversation about his new book “The Difficulty of Being Good: On The Subtle Art of Dharma.” Das turned to the ancient Indian epic Mahabharata to study the concepts of dharma or doing the right thing. He writes that the Mahabharata “is unique in engaging with the world of politics.” He writes, “The Mahabharata is… Continue Reading
When Gurcharan Das took an early retirement from his corporate job he decided to pursue a “full-time career as a writer.” And that change in direction from a corporate life to a scholarly pursuit was greeted with a fair amount of surprise. How could this be? He was a “box-wallah“ or a corporate executive. Mr.Das was the CEO of Proctor and… Continue Reading
Today is Pongal, a harvest festival celebrated in South India. In other parts of India the festival has different names: Sankranti, Lohri or Bihu. The underlying idea is the same – it is like the American Thanksgiving festival points out Dr. Geeta Vasudevan in the video interview below. Families get together, cook special dishes for… Continue Reading
Ira Pande is an author, editor, translator and teacher. She worked in the publishing industry for many years and was the managing editor of Dorling-Kindersley and chief editor of Roli Books India. She also worked as the chief editor at India International Center. A gifted storyteller with a keen eye for details, Pande has translated the works of Shivani… Continue Reading
Prof. Greg Booth is a musician, author and teacher at University of Auckland, New Zealand. In 2008 Prof. Booth’s book “Behind The curtain: Making Music in Mumbai’s Film Studios,” was published. It highlights the contributions of individual musicians, who were part of a larger Hindi or Bollywood music orchestra. The musicians came from different background spanning British military… Continue Reading
Prof. Greg Booth is a teacher, author & musician. In his book Brass Baja: Stories From The World of Indian Wedding Bands he takes us behind the scene into the world of the Indian brass band musicians, whose rich musical traditions and history has been largely ignored. It was way back back in the 17th century that the first wedding brass band made… Continue Reading
Prof. Greg Booth is a musician, teacher and an author. In his book “Looking Behind The Curtain Making Music In Mumbai’s Film Industry” he takes us behind the silverscreen to show us how music was (is) made in Hindi or Bollywood films. In Part-2 Prof. Booth talks about the process of how songs were created especially… Continue Reading
Bangalore has a long tradition of celebrating Christmas with Christmas cakes, plum puddings and other Christmas goodies. One of the places where you get to see Christmas celebration and goodies is at Taj Vivanta on MG Road in Bangalore. We got to spend our Christmas morning at Cafe Mozaic at Taj Vivant as guests of the… Continue Reading
The Kamla Show 