‘Definitely not Bollywood’: Old meets old for carnatic-jazz fusion show

Harmonizing Cultures musicians from left: Andrew Hall (sax), Paul Naveen (drums), Avinash Jeyashankar (mridangam percussionist), Ben Fernandez (piano), Joel Griffin (bass) Seyorn Arunagirinathan (violinist), Gopal Nair (carnatic vocalist).
Carnatic music is a South Indian treasure. Classical and ancient, it focuses heavily on vocal delivery. In the Bay of Plenty and Waikato, new migrants from South India use it to teach migrant children their culture and language. Reporter Aleyna Martinez meets some of the passionate local performers ahead of Saturday’s Harmonizing Cultures jazz-fusion concept show at the Sir Howard Morrison Centre in Rotorua.
Anjali Krishnan, a singer in Rotorua- and Hamilton-based band Moksha Base and a carnatic music teacher, moved to New Zealand from Kerala, India three years ago.
As a teacher in Hamilton, she valued having the skills to pass down her culture and share the cognitive benefits of teaching children the genre.
“It helps children multi-task and at the end of the day they’ll be a perfect singer as well,” she said.
“If you learn carnatic music, it’s easy to sing any other song because carnatic music helps train the throat to be flexible.”
Taking classes on weekends, she taught about 18 students in person and online.
“It is a never-ending journey, teaching helps me to improvise [as a performer] and at the same time the kids are learning as well,” Krishnan said.
Logging over 100 live shows including concerts, music festivals, and community gatherings, band co-founder Siva Kumar said he couldn’t wait to share the Harmonizing Cultures jazz-fusion concept at the Sir Howard Morrison Centre on Saturday.
The event was not the first time the multi-cultural music champion had overseen efforts to generate opportunities to share culture and music in Rotorua.
Kumar was part of the Winter Music Festival in 2022, which showcased Nepali Vibes, Charu Chutani (a Kathak dancer), Lo-Fi Lizard, Kunwari (a Filipino band) and Moksha Base.
“It’s been in the making for the past three years,” Kumar said.
Kumar described the band as a group of passionate people with “fulltime jobs”.
“There are nurses, IT professionals, tax guys, so we’ve all come together and we’ve been really, a tight family together so far.”
Kiwi band Sweet As would be opening the evening and the second half would be internationally-renowned jazz musicians.
“The Asian diaspora listens to this music but we want to bring other genres of Indian music to Western audiences, using jazz,” Kumar said.
“It’s definitely not Bollywood. No offence to Bollywood, it’s still a good kind of music, but just like jazz is old, carnatic is old.
“And complex,” Siva said.
Kiwi jazz musicians in the Harmonizing Cultures event included pianist Ben Fernandez, drummer Paul Naveen, bass guitarist Joel Griffin and saxophonist Andrew Hall.
On the carnatic music side, mridangam [instrument] percussionist Avinash Jeyashankar, vocalist Gopal Nair and violinist Seyorn Arunagirinathan would perform too.
“We are just trying to perform both together on the same stage for carnatic audiences to pick up jazz and for jazz audience to pick up carnatic”.
The band wanted to “set a new local standard” for carnatic music when they decided to fuse jazz with it for the Sir Howard Morrison Centre show, Siva said.
“You have that saying that music is a universal language, so we are proving that yes, music can come together and gel together and give one kind of output,” said band manager Abhishek Raj.
“We wanted to focus on the regions, people who don’t have access to this kind of music are in small towns. The very fact that we are bringing this concert to Rotorua and Hamilton is for that purpose,” Raj said.
Supported by Creative NZ, Moksha Base said they chose the Sir Howard Morrison Centre as a venue because of its reputation for sound quality and audio-visual capabilities.
Intending to host a “cultural event” for the Rotorua community Moksha Base priced the tickets at $5 for students and $15 for adults to make the event accessible.
“We’re making a statement there, it’s new, it’s experimental and exciting,” Raj said.
“It’s about exposure.”
Aleyna Martinez is a multimedia journalist based in the Bay of Plenty. She moved to the region in 2024 and has previously reported in Wairarapa and at Pacific Media Network.
Correction
The caption on the lead image has been amended to include Joel Griffin on bass and Ben Fernandez on piano, and the spelling of Seyorn Arunagirinathan’s name has been corrected.