Strings of Hope

Riding high on her 6th Grammy nomination, Anousha Shankar, discusses with Prashanth Vidyasagar her attempts at activism through music, and getting through some tough times.

The strings of Anoushka Shankar’s sitar weave not just melodies, but stories too. There are mellifluous tales in her sounds – of sadness, heartbreak, calm and hope – inspiring a range of emotions in the listener. Her latest 10 track album Land of Gold does just that. Inspired by stories of war, refugees, oppression and hardship, it has also earned Shankar her sixth Grammy nomination in the Best World Music Album category for the 59th Grammy Awards. Currently in India on the Land of Gold tour, the sitar player and composer holds forth on her desire for peace, the meaning of music in these times, and her creation process.

Can all of us ordinary citizens work towards bringing about peace?

I’d rather try than not try. I can’t control over the outcome of things but I can control my contribution. The protests over the Dakota Access Pipeline (earlier this year, protestors began opposing the construction of Energy Transfer Partners' Dakota Access Pipeline from the Bakken oil fields in western North Dakota to southern Illinois on the grounds that it would cause environmental, historical and cultural degradation to the area) is a perfect example of what can happen if so many rise up together and try to make a difference.

Fear and hatred can often be emotions as powerful as love. Can they be transformed?

It’s my belief and it has been said before that the opposite of love isn’t hatred, it is fear. Converting fear involves an element of faith and trust and that can only come through feeling safe. Fear can always be manipulated; fear is always turned into fear of the other, whatever the other is. And it’s done by people in power, because it suits them. It happens on global level, it’s happened historically and happens now. To step out of that fear and know that we’re all the same – that connection and empathy can help heal the fear what we’re told to feel.

US President-elect Donald Trump’s unprecedented victory had stirred violent emotions across the world. Your thoughts on it?

I’m heartbroken, horrified, angry, sad and scared, but at the same time I’m not shocked. It feels like his victory is following a trajectory in these last couple of years – just look at Brexit. Across the world there seems to be a movement towards the right as people feel more and more scared and are told that being nationalistic is somehow greater than anything else.

How have you dealt with the darkest times in your life?

I have spoken earlier about being abused as a child – it’s up there in the list of the darkest things I have ever been through. How is a difficult question to answer, because I was a child. As an adult I had to work a lot on myself to move on from it. Often, you carry such pain with you for a long time without healing or even knowing it’s there. Therapy helped, as did support and starting to give back.

 My latest album also comes from a place of watching vulnerable children – such as the millions crossing borders and falling prey to traffickers because they are not taken care of. I especially feel for these children. And when you can connect to the community at large in such a manner through the pain, and be a part of something bigger, you can heal as well.

 How does a tune make it to the audience – from an idea in your mind to the instrument and eventually to the audience? Could you explain using the track Say Your Prayers?

Say Your Prayers was written collaboratively like all the songs on the album. I had had an idea for a simple melody in my head for a while – it was light and gentle, something I felt an album with so many dark themes needed. I wanted it to be like a lullaby. So I took that to my main collaborator Manu Delago and he started playing around my sitar melody and we worked around it trying to give a form. Then we played it live. That’s one thing I wanted to do on this record – capture live energy even on a produced record. Once we had that live core recording, we dressed it up with electronica. It was important to me to not lose the soul of live musicians playing and listening to one another.

How are you feeling about your 6th Grammy nomination?

(Laughs) What’s going on in my mind is trying to stay grateful and not get greedy. The two-month period between the nomination and the awards is dangerous, right? First you get nominated and are so happy about that by the time the awards come around you want to win (laughs). Also, there’s a loss of perspective that happens when everyone around starts staying you’ll win. Each time I try and stay great that it’s happened and feel that something’s been given to me out of nowhere and that’s lovely and leave it at that.