Indo-Canadian popularises ‘the blues of India’ music

TORONTO: An Indo-Canadian singer in Toronto is bringing several generations together with her music that combines ghazals, Punjabi folk songs and African blues, apart from other musical strains. Many of India-born Kiran Ahluwalia’s fans identify her as a singer of the “blues of India”. Kiran, raised in Toronto and now living in New York, is just back from performing in Marseilles, France, where she was a big hit though people didn’t understand her songs.

“It’s such a global world now that many tastes are similar,” said Kiran, a Juno award winner. The 40-year-old added that typically 80 per cent of her audience, even South Asians, can’t understand the lyrics.” My own friends don’t understand the language because so many young South Asians never learnt the language. English is their mother tongue. They don’t understand the poetry. The melody however communicates the poetry to them. So they can enjoy the essence of the song and get the same emotional release from hearing it even if they don’t understand the words,” Kiran said.

Most of her songs are based on lyrics of South Asian poets. “I’m always looking for poets and Toronto has a dearth of them. It’s so exciting to compose something that was written right here in Mississauga or Brampton. The Toronto scene for Indian and Pakistani poets is pretty active,” said the ghazal singer, who is presently busy with her next album “Wanderlust”. The new album is a fusion of Portuguese music, jazz and Saharan African blues with ghazals. Kiran, however, refuses to call it fusion music.