Talvin Singh Sets Up Base in Delhi, Set to Release New Album in 2024

The veteran tabla artist and producer/ experimentalist's first full-length in about two decades will feature vocalists including Papon, Hamsika Iyer, Vasundhara Vee and more

-  ANURAG TAGAT

IT’S NOT ACCURATE TO say that British artist Talvin Singh ever left India, even though the tabla artist and producer was away during the last few years due to the pandemic. Singh tells Rolling Stone India over an interview from London that he’s been visiting New Delhi not just to study the sitar-adjacent instrument surbahar from his guru, but also to set up his new studio and prep to release his first album in nearly 20 years. “India today has the most diverse artistic talent and buzzing youth culture. This has been inspiring me and my music,” Singh says.

Singh is a busy man – he’s bringing his instruments down and having master luthiers work on maintenance in New Delhi and Vadodara, he’s sitting down face to face with musicians (“I found lockdown static,” he says) and has plans to set up a mastering studio in Mumbai, all the while collecting more “analog gear and esoteric electronic as well as Indian acoustic instruments.” He says, “India gives me the zeal and perspective on my music today, as I have been touring since a very early age! […] I started touring at the age of 16 and my first real tour was Lollapalooza in the States, I was a percussionist for a punk band and that’s when I conceived my Tablatronics [project] in 1990. I needed the tabla amplified to match the high decibels and amplitude of bass amps and guitar amps.”