Exclusive Interview with Singer Shalmali Kholgade About Singing and Her Journey

IANS INDIA

Mumbai: In an interview with well-known Bollywood vocalist Shalmali Kholgade, she gave advice to aspiring musicians and then talked about her own experience. She talks about how Amit Trivedi knew she had a gift and offered to let her sing a song in the final.   #ShalmaliKholgade #Singer #Trending #2025 #BollywoodCountry #BollywoodNews #BollywoodGossips #BollywoodUpdates #BollywoodNews #Bollywood #Bollywoodcelebrity #BollywoodHindiNews #ians

Transcript

00:00If you're just starting out, being a musician of any kind, whether you play an instrument

00:09or you sing or you produce, you have to first ask yourself how much you love it.

00:15Because it's the love that will stand the test of time.

00:18If you love it enough, the next thing I think you have to do is not look at its frills,

00:25not think about how much you'll get to travel and the number of people you'll be able to

00:29play in front of, but how you're going to work on your craft.

00:33Not so much about how much you'll post about it, but how much you're willing to spend time

00:38with your craft.

00:40And after spending that much time doing, say for a musician, like a singer, just doing

00:45sa for a really long time, if you still love it that much, then you know that you're in

00:50for a long run.

00:53And I'd say that to have a strong foundation of any kind, I will not say that it has to

01:03be in Indian classical or Western classical.

01:08Whatever you choose, whatever path you choose, having a strong foundation is very, very important.

01:14And to build that foundation, repetition is key.

01:16So be prepared for the repetition, which could get boring and uninteresting, but that

01:24will make you soar in future.

01:32My journey, which has begun now a good 13 years back, I did not think that it would

01:41run this course, because when I started doing music, I had a very different idea of what

01:47I will be doing as a musician.

01:50And that was always that I will sit and write my music, I'll play at a small cafe or a bar

01:55or like hard rock cafe, Blue Frog used to be there.

01:58So that were my, those were my dreams.

02:00And then I got to sing in a film and I was like, oh, this is how you sing in a film.

02:06And I just started doing more of that.

02:08And the opportunities that came my way paved the path to my career.

02:15And today where I stand in hindsight, I feel like had it not been for one, the opportunities

02:21and to seize those opportunities in that moment, I would not have learned many things that

02:28I didn't know I needed to learn, like how to take direction from someone.

02:33When you sing a film song, you have to completely surrender yourself to the music composer

02:39and his vision.

02:42And then if he allows you to do something of your own, if he needs that in his song,

02:46then to do and to be able to do that.

02:49So I learned that because of film music, to emote is something I realized is so important

02:55in music.

02:56And now when I write my own independent music, I use the tricks that I've learned in playback

03:01to emote in my own independent music.

03:04So I think my journey has been a very, very delightful one, in which at every corner,

03:11I found something very, very new and fresh and interesting to learn.

03:17And I met so many amazing people, because I feel like without the people, without having

03:26people who you can learn from, yes, and people who you can be absolutely yourself around

03:32and to express yourself that this is what I want to do.

03:35Is it okay?

03:36Is it going to look foolish?

03:37Or am I going to be doing good, making this decision?

03:41Having those kind of people around has been very important for me, now that I look back.

03:46And it's just the last 13 years has been the most eventful 13 years.

03:53And I hope that this is just the beginning of everything that I'm going to do for the

03:57rest of my life in music.

04:03He was, Amit Ravedi at the time was looking for a fresh voice.

04:11And his producer slash engineer in his studio at the time, Anjo John was a college friend's

04:19boyfriend.

04:20So he called me because we knew each other also and said that Amit Ravedi is looking

04:25for a fresh voice.

04:26Do you have any demos?

04:27Just send me anything, even like sing into your phone and send it to me.

04:30And I was applying to colleges abroad at that time, and I didn't have enough funds to actually

04:36go in person and audition for those admission interviews.

04:42So I was sending demos to them on video.

04:44So I said, I have like two English demos.

04:46Should I send those?

04:47He's like, whatever.

04:49So I sent it fast because he's looking for a voice now.

04:51So sent those, which were two English songs.

04:54One was Valerie by Amy Winehouse and Mark Ronson.

04:58And one was Summertime, which is like your jazz standard.

05:02And he liked those and he also sings it was so many people have sung Summertime.

05:10So I sent those two demos, Amit Ravedi thought there was something in my voice that he called

05:16me to sing Main Pareshan.

05:19And he literally made me stand right outside the staircase and the elevator.

05:25We just stood there and he made me sing Main Pareshan, Pareshan, Pareshan, Pareshan, Kinaare

05:33pe khadi.

05:34Yeh chaar baar gaao.

05:35And I was like, oh, okay.

05:36And I sang it.

05:37He's like, achha, kal free ho.

05:41I just finished my TY at that time.

05:44I had nothing to do.

05:45Matlo, meko pata nahi abhi kya karna kya hai life mein.

05:48So I was like, haan, haan, bilkul I'm free.

05:50So I landed up coming to a studio the next day and we did not record Pareshan on that

05:55day.

05:56We recorded the Red FM jingle on that day.

05:58So it just, that was the day or that was the time in my life when I was like, kya ho raha

06:05mere saath?

06:06Yeh kya hota hai?

06:07Aise kaam hota hai?

06:08This is how people work, you know, and yeah, that was the beginning.

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