The music album ‘Winds of Samsara’ by Ricky Kej and Wouter Kellerman won the Grammy Award 2015 under the ‘New Age Music’ category, the echo of which is resonating in Belagavi.
Originally from Kochi (Kerala), Keerthy Narayan, the music arranger for the album, settled here seven years back, since his marriage to a girl from Belagavi.
Proficient in keyboard, Keerthy Narayan played as well as made music arrangements for ‘Winds of Samsara’ which was the coordinated effort of 120 musicians from five continents. Herald Anthony, Francis T.S, Francis Xavier and Josekutty formed the strings section for the album, Krishna Kumar performed the Sitar, Biju was on the Veena, Gopi played Nadaswaram and Gayathri Suresh and Gopi Krishnan were the classical vocalists.
“My role in this was of a multi-instrumentalist and arranger”, said Mr. Keerthy while speaking to The Hindu on Monday.
He said that the ‘Winds of Samsara’ entered in the Bilboard charts to become No.1 in two weeks. This was mainly because of the sales of the album and user reviews. “It is a dream coming true, over ten years of hard work has been rewarded so wonderfully”, he said.
He recalled his association with Ricky for the opening ceremony music for the Cricket World Cup 2012, which was heard in 200 countries and was widely appreciated. The other albums where he has worked on with Ricky are: Fiery Drums, Indian Zen, Café Goa, Chillout Flute, Fuson, Indian Spirit, Krishna Lounge, Urban Grooves, Fusion Ganesha, Kamasutra Lounge, Mesmerising Santoor, Party Drums, Punjabi In the Club, Communicative art, Incredible India – North and South.
The instruments that Mr. Keerthy is familiar with are the Piano, Guitar, Bass and the Drums and the hardware and recording equipments.
“When it comes to music production, I arrange and programme every single instrument that can come to mind. I take time to understand every new instrument, research it and then use it in my music. I am familiar with all of the commercial DAWs that are used in music production right from music to post-production”, said Mr. Keerthy.
The multi-talented Keerthy Narayan has been a music composer/arranger with Hindi, Kannada, Tamil and Malayalam movies for over ten years now.
