Padma Shri and Grammy Award winner Shankar Mahadevan has as soon as once more underlined the necessity for honesty and artistic freedom in Indian music, this time by backing it with motion. The celebrated musician has introduced the launch of Goongoonalo, an artist-owned platform set to go dwell on January 16, geared toward giving musicians an area to create with out business strain or artistic compromise.Mahadevan, who has constantly spoken in regards to the pressure of speed-driven codecs and market-led expectations on musicians, mentioned the platform was born out of the absence of areas the place music might be created with out urgency or worry.
‘Music can’t be manufactured like a product’
Reiterating his long-held perception, Mahadevan mentioned, “Music can’t be manufactured like a product. The second you begin calculating success earlier than emotion, one thing important is misplaced.”Whereas acknowledging that cinema has given Indian music its scale and attain, he additionally identified the invisible constraints that include it—deadlines, briefs, and narrative calls for—which regularly go away little room for intuitive or reflection-led compositions. Songs that evolve slowly, he famous, hardly ever discover a platform in such programs.“There are songs we supply for years,” he mentioned. “Not as a result of they aren’t good, however as a result of there was no place for them. That is that place.”
Addressing imbalance between artists and possession
Goongoonalo’s artist-owned construction instantly addresses what Mahadevan has described as a persistent imbalance within the trade, the place creators are anticipated to function like entrepreneurs with out actual possession or management.“Artists aren’t businessmen by coaching,” he mentioned. “But we’re always requested to suppose like one—with out being given management.”In response to Mahadevan, the platform is designed to revive that steadiness by placing creators on the centre of decision-making, possession, and worth creation.
A platform designed round artists, not algorithms
Sherley Singh, CEO of Goongoonalo, echoed this philosophy, stating that the platform was constructed to serve artists somewhat than power them into pre-existing digital moulds.“We didn’t need artists to suit right into a platform. We wished to construct a platform that matches the artist—the place creation shouldn’t be rushed, rights aren’t diluted, and collaboration shouldn’t be transactional,” he mentioned.
Bringing audiences nearer to the artistic course of
Mahadevan additionally burdened that audiences haven’t misplaced curiosity in significant music, however have as an alternative been distanced from the tales behind it.“Individuals don’t simply love songs,” he mentioned. “They love tales—how a tune got here into being, what it struggled by, what it survived.”Past completed tracks, Goongoonalo will characteristic conversations, workshops, masterclasses, and dwell classes, permitting listeners to have interaction with music as a residing, evolving course of somewhat than only a remaining product.
‘Artistic work shouldn’t really feel like survival’
Talking on to youthful musicians, Mahadevan supplied a be aware of warning towards decreasing creativity to a survival train.“If an artist is barely attempting to remain afloat, one thing valuable is misplaced,” he mentioned, including that music doesn’t want validation—solely house. With its January 16 launch, Goongoonalo positions itself instead mannequin within the Indian music ecosystem—one which prioritises freedom, possession, and long-form artistic worth over velocity and algorithms.