Sitar Maestro Purbayan Chatterjee’s Foundation PAAMF Adopts A Digital-First Approach

Traditionally, music education in India has been via the guru-shishya parampara. Sitar maestro Purbayan Chatterjee has taken that ideal to the next step in the 21^st century – combining the classical approach with modern ideas of digital footprint and distribution.

The Purbayan Arts and Artists Music Foundation (PAAMF) was conceptualised by Purbayan to help young and up-and-coming musicians find a voice and place in the global music industry. Having experienced the demands placed on a modern musician today, he realised that educating and training musicians wasn’t enough – it's also important to arm them with skills to build a digital presence.

“In the last decade or so, the world of arts and entertainment has drastically changed, and I realised the value of a potent digital presence when I started to get enquiries for concerts on Instagram messenger,” explains Purbayan.

“I realised the need for younger artists to be able to shoot engaging, 90-seconds-long content with good quality audio/video. I also realised that, to have an effective musical dialogue with other musical cultures, collaborations with artists from other parts of the world were paramount. My own album Unbounded was conceptualised and planned on Zoom with Grammy winners from all over the world. PAAMF plans to create an effective ecosystem where aspiring Indian artistes with talent (who may not have the wherewithal to produce quality content) are able to create on platforms like Meta, Instagram, YouTube, etc. Who knows? Anybody might be listening,” he adds.

PAAMF has a four-fold objective – of helping young musicians collaborate with the best Indian and international talent; giving them a credible digital presence by helping them shoot and create better quality and engaging content; by providing them performance opportunities to play alongside maestros, and streaming these events worldwide on a digital platform.

PAAMF provides students with a state-of-the art recording and performance space in Mumbai where students can learn and play in the exclusive baithaks, the first of which takes place on April 7 featuring maestro flautist Rakesh Chaurasia and tabla player Satyajit Talwalkar, PAAMF students Megha Rawoot (sitar) and Harmeet Singh (tabla).

“This is in essence what I want the foundation to do, highlight and promote young talents like Megha – that is our motto,” he says, adding, “We will record these performances and publish them on YouTube so that they can be enjoyed and discovered by a global audience. This is one way of creating a formidable digital repository of Indian arts and culture, while promoting young talent who may not be able to demand people’s time and attention.”

In addition to promoting quality young talent, PAAMF also wants to preserve and protect an art-form like Indian instrument making by providing better quality raw material, by documenting and archiving and create training programs around instrument making. “We also intend to tie up with musical instrument manufacturing companies, and provide them know-how regarding Indian instruments so that Indian instrument manufacturing can be done on a larger scale,” Purbayan sheds light on the foundation’s plans.

Apart from teaching and training musicians at PAAMF, March and April will also see Purbayan travel across India for shows alongside working on a new album. He plays in Kolkata on March 11 and in Mumbai on April 2 and April 9, and in Chennai on April 16.