At a time when a desi male singer is in the news for all the wrong reasons, it’s good to remember that there’s such a thing as the art of the song, and nice to come across a desi brother who is honing his craft like a devoted apprentice: slowly, steadily, and with growing success.
Sachal Vasandani, 28, has been singing on the New York jazz circuit for a few years now: he’s performed with the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra under the direction of Wynton Marsalis, and he has a regular early-evening gig at Zinc Bar in Greenwich Village. That’s where Manish heard him almost two years ago now, which resulted in this post; and the fact that it’s taken this long for Sachal to drop his first album, which comes out tomorrow, and that the disc features the same core trio (David Wong on bass, Quincy Davis on drums, and Jeb Patton on piano) that Manish heard that night, tells you a lot about the consistency and hard work and constant plugging away that it takes to develop your sound and make your move in the real music world, as opposed to freakshows like American Idol.
The album is called “Eyes Wide Open” and is out on Detroit label Mack Avenue. It’s really an album of songs, by which I mean, songs with lyrics, verses and refrains, melody and exposition — this is not free jazz, in fact it’s not even what most listeners would consider edgy, and that centrist disposition makes it eminently accessible, perhaps more so than some heads would be willing to cop to liking. Three of the compositions are Vasandani’s own; the remainder divide among standards and covers from sources as diverse as Sade and Iron & Wine.
I sat down with the brother recently for a story that you can find here. It will give you the rundown on his life story and all the usual profile elements. Here’s a little excerpt that will give you an idea of his approach and sensibility:
With his first album coming out, Vasandani is in the happy space of enjoying the ride. He bridles, understandably, at the limitations implicit in the “crooner” label with which he is getting tagged, but he says there is plenty of time ahead for him to work in a more abstract or edgy vein.
For now, Vasandani says, his chief concern is to properly serve the song form — to “respect the lyric,” as he puts it several times. Whether it’s his own composition or someone else’s, from the Great American Songbook or a more remote source, matters less to him than the discipline and honesty of delivery.
“You just have to find great songs,” he says. “If they happen to come from your body, great. If they happen to come from keeping your ears open on the street, or listening to records, that’s great, too. ….. As long as I can put them over with honesty, and make first and foremost myself, but ultimately an audience, believe in what I’m saying, then it’ll be relevant, it’ll be poignant, and it’ll be believable. And it’s almost irrelevant whether it came from my pen or somebody else’s.”
It didn’t really make it into my story but of course we took some time to discuss the Desi Angle (TM) as well. I imagine a lot of you will recognize yourselves in aspects of Sachal’s experience; he grew up in an exurb of Chicago, in a desi family that was pretty much not involved in the whole desi cultural hothouse scene, and the key desi influences he credits in his upbringing are his dad’s music collection, which joined jazz and Indian classical music, and the family trips back to India. It was only later, at the University of Michigan and then in New York, that he began to key into an American desi cultural milieu, and you can tell from chatting with him that he considers himself a bit of an outsider to it, though without dismissal or rancor. At the same time, he’s very much aware that second-generation Asian Americans, and desis in particular, are making moves in the creative music scene today, enriching it with the influences of the different traditions and hybrid forms that they carry, in sometimes explicit and sometimes more diffuse ways.
I came away very impressed, not only by the brother’s work but by the craftsman’s thoughtfulness he brings to it, a certain humility and also evidence of accumulating scholarship in the history of American song. Another thing: he’s fine. As a female management rep sitting in on the interview was all too happy to share with me, he has quite the fan base among women, and no wonder — he’s tall and handsome with a winning combination of Midwestern directness and hints of a more complicated inner life. And, like, he can sing.
Sachal Vasandani plays this month across the country: this Wednesday he’s at Scullers in Boston, and he continues to New York, Chicago, Seattle, Oakland and Philadelphia. The schedule is here.
A fine voice, interesting song choices (wouldn’t have expected an Iron & Wine song on a “jazz” album). He’s not letting himself get too bogged down in anyone’s definition of the standards.
I talked to Sachal once at Zinc bar, must have been a couple of years ago. He spoke the hallowed name of Ella Fitzgerald, and right away I knew I liked the brother. And he said, “I’m in New York living the life. I don’t want to do anything else.” Lucky fellow. All success to him.
More samples of his stuff on the Mack Avenue site for those who are interested.
I’m with you, Mr. K. God shine upon anyone who loves Ella. Or Coltrane, or Miles Davis, or Thelonius Monk, or Dennis Sandole, or Wayne Shorter, or…ah, the whole lot of them.
You ever listen to Amos Lee, by the way? Great stuff.
I wish this guy success, and I’m looking forward to checking out more of his music soon. Good stuff, Siddartha.
You gotta love this aspect of desis, including even the artistic ones…they know how to get paid.
Le sigh. Both for Sachal and for your piece.
Hello Administrator:
I am just curious as to why earlier comments in this thread were deleted? One suggestion I had for “Sachal” was not to play a saxophone while wearing a dhoti. I wouldn’t put it below Desis to do a thing like that; seeing as how in Bollywood films, the Sikh guy (with the turban on) is dancing next to the guy with the leather jacket, who in turn is dancing next to the guy with the dhoti. That is fine for a Desi audience, but kindly spare the Americans (and ABCDs) such an injustice. I also remarked that Sachal should not do any singing in his Desi accent. I have not heard him sing. However, if he had a FOB accent, and tried to sing the blues, it wouldn’t work out very well!
These are just random thoughts (not without basis). If you choose to delete them, be so courteous as to give your reasons.
Nice songs. Style a bit cliche for me but that’s a matter of taste – I only wish I could go see him this week at Scullers! Keep up with the music posts, very interesting for us second-gen Desi musicians. I always like to see another succeeding.
Thanks for the heads up, Siddhartha. I will definitely check out this album. It’s especially refreshing to hear jazz vocalists that don’t limit themselves to standards and actually write their own tunes.
I have a couple of girlfriends who think he is fine too;) It’s so nice to see someone like him, a guy who seems to genuinely love his craft and respect it, become successful. I am sure he will do well.
…how can you disagree with that?
Hehe, I agree Ismat.
he looks like Donny Osmond!
set me up, siddhartha!
” tells you a lot about the consistency and hard work and constant plugging away that it takes to develop your sound and make your move in the real music world, as opposed to freakshows like American Idol.”
Siddhartha this line of yours bounced around in my head for a bit. I find the politics and posturing within the jazz world to be quite simmilar to that in American Idol; the crucial difference being exponential skill level. But is skill level music. Yes, maybe, no? One day I might derive satisfaction from listening to Art Tatum, the next day George Michael and the The Killers on the third. Why label American Idol a freakshow when it is fairly indicative of the music industry at large?
Sachal is a very creative vocalist (and composer) and is an extremely gifted improviser/scat singer.
If interested his video (the Iron and Wine song) is up on youtube: http://youtube.com/watch?v=RLTLDaKJDro
Also, you can buy his album on Amazon, itunes and i think most Borders (in the Jazz section).
Show some love!
he released a very limited 4 song CD called “Bring on the Sirens” a few years back. It was only sold in jazz clubs as far as I know, and I guess would be called a demo. It was very raw (in a very good way). i haven’t received the new CD yet from Mack so i can’t comment on it, but if you have the chance to see him live, he blows you away, especially in smaller venues. he gets tremendous props from other jazz musicians including marsalis. can’t say enough good things about the guy personally and his talent. if you go to show, talk to him afterwards, he is unbelievably friendly.
How refreshing! I loves me some cute desi jazz singers.
Well part of the answer is that I disagree with your premise that American Idol is “fairly indicative of the music industry at large.” Of course it depends on what we mean by music industry. If it’s about economic heft — sales volumes, and the amount of investment put into different projects — then yes, you could say that AI represents a driving force in the industry that in one guise or another has always been there. But even then, it’s a caricature. As a form of spectacle AI is about much more than just music: it’s a form of theater too, as well as a public exercise, from the voting aspect to the constant resort to humiliation. So when I refer to AI as a freakshow, I’m not referring to the role it plays in the music biz, as much as I am characterizing it as a spectacle, an entertainment that masquerades as a music talent show when in fact it’s something a lot bigger and weirder.
Well, absolutely, and same for me. The fact that many/most of us have tastes that happily travel up and down the spectrum from high-brow to low-brow, “art” music to pop, etc. etc., doesn’t change anything to what I’m saying about AI versus the small-club circuit as ways to break into the game. And I’m certainly not making any statements about what “skill level” is required for music to be music.
In fact many musicians themselves operate at multiple points of this spectrum at any given time. That’s what it takes to make a living. I know a woman in Los Angeles who is a very brilliant alternative-soul singer who works as a back-up singer for American Idol precisely to earn the money so that she can make her own music on an indie basis. She also does voiceover work, songs for video games, all kinds of stuff that has nothing to do with her own artistic vision, so that she can fund her own work doing what she wants to do under her own name. American Idol is very much part of her life — it’s her most reliable income source — but when it comes to making her own music, putting her own name behind it, there’s no way she’d enter that kind of mass-produced and highly-staged competition.
So getting back to your original question, I have no trouble saying that AI is part of the music industry at large; clearly it is. To call it “indicative” of the industry is a reduction I can’t join you in making.
“I am characterizing it as a spectacle, an entertainment that masquerades as a music talent show when in fact it’s something a lot bigger and weirder.
“it’s a caricature.”
My comment is a tangent and in no way detracts from artists like S Vasandani to do their thing. I do hope that folks like him and Karsh Kale can form the future of a music industry built on emotion and skill.
This guy looks like Rahul Dravid having a bad hair day.