MUSIC PREVIEW – The musical journey of Anjali Ray
Anjali Ray launches her album, “Indigo,” with a performance at Saint Rocke Saturday night. Photo by Ishani Gowri
“I knew…if I could embrace my Hindu classical voice training with my first love, piano, then I had an opportunity to really do something different.”
In Hindustani classical music, a raga is a particular arrangement of notes and melodic movements that make a song’s simple one-line melody erupt with sonic variation. The raga not only stands as the framework for a song, but also allows endless variation — through improvisation — endowing it with the power to evoke emotions that enthrall its listeners.
Each raga may call upon the same flairs of vocal ornamentation, but each also has its own distinctive qualities. Redondo Beach musician Anjali Ray has not only perfected this ancient art over years of training, but has seamlessly integrated it into her own style of sophisticated pop music.
She grew up surrounded by the authentic and deeply historic musical sounds of India’s bustling capital city, New Delhi, and later attended the prestigious British School of Music for classical piano. Ray thus inhabited and embraced two largely contrasting musical cultures from a particularly young age. It’s from these early musical foundations that Ray can now so naturally mix together old and new musical arrangements like those found on her upcoming debut album, “Indigo.”
“When I first started working on this album, I had two songs that were solid, but after listening to them, realized that they could be sung by just about anyone,” says Ray. “I knew I didn’t want to get lost in the vast crowd of aspiring singer-songwriters and that if I could embrace my Hindu classical voice training with my first love, piano, then I had an opportunity to really do something different.”
Over the past four years, Ray wrote forty to fifty songs with hindi lyrics; some that she says were horrendous, but ultimately some that she and her passionate producer, Chris Bolden, hand-picked for the new album.
“I’ve often said that it’s really good that we can’t see the future, because we might not do anything at all,” says Ray jokingly. “I didn’t know what all the songwriting and recording was going to turn into. In the beginning we were just trying a few songs out, but the project gained momentum, and I became determined to track a full album.”
From album standouts, “Indigo Boy,” and “Float,” to the more thoughtful ballad, “The best Is Yet To Come,” Ray has masterfully crafted songs that integrate the perfect amount of Hindu vocals and melodies, to not overwhelm the record, but rather accent those sounds and make the ten-song collection stand out as a really unique album.
“Putting this album together was such a huge endeavor, and incredibly rewarding,” says Ray. “I’m so grateful and privileged to have the musicians I did, play on this album. I know that when people take the time to not only listen to the musical aspect of each song, but also the lyrical, they will be able to tell that the album is truly a reflection of my musical evolution and personal journey while creating it.”
Listen to Anjali Ray’s new album, “Indigo,” at www.anjaliray.com. The offical CD release party is this Saturday, 7 p.m., at Saint Rocke; 142 Pacific Coast Hwy, Hermosa Beach. $10.