New Releases category interest

Nils Frahm’s Leiter label is honored to welcome Ganavya with a new single, ‘Draw Something Beautiful’, co-produced by Frahm at his Berlin Funkhaus studio. Described by The Wall Street Journal as “among modern music's most compelling vocalists,” the charismatic New York-born, India-raised singer and transdisciplinarian has won hearts and minds with solo and collaborative projects showcasing her remarkable vocals and a singular style as likely to draw on spiritual jazz as the South Asian music of her youth. Ganavya has worked with Quincy Jones (who wrote her Harvard recommendation letter), opera/theatre director Peter Sellars, esperanza spalding, Shabaka Hutchings, Floating Points, and was seen last December beguiling crowds at SAULT’S debut in London, where, The Guardian wrote, her “voice had a delicate emotive heft that could turn stoics into sobbing wrecks.” 

“Draw Something Beautiful,” released by Leiter today via all digital platforms, is accompanied by the gorgeous 8-minute incantation ‘Ami Pana So'dras.’ Listen to both tracks HERE.

“Draw Something Beautiful” isn’t a new song. Instead, the template for these strikingly tranquil four minutes, in which her voice floats delicately amid Frahm's intuitively minimalist, spacious arrangement, was one of the first Ganavya ever composed. “I wrote it as a child to say, ‘If I die, could you take the life force in me and redistribute it among the remaining humans to make them happier?’ I genuinely believed this was possible because of the stories and mythology I grew up with.” The track represents the first music Frahm and Ganavya ever recorded together, and her vocals were captured so quickly that she, Frahm, and Felix Grimm – Frahm’s long-time manager and Leiter label co-founder – decided to keep going. Ganavya recalls being unsure what to sing next, but Frahm “set up his glass harmonica, using a kalimba to apply sustained pressure to one singular note,” creating a foundational drone for her unforgettable melody in ‘Ami Pana So'dras.’ “It’s an old Kashmiri song I hum to myself all the time when alone,” says Ganavya. “Nils has a matter-of-factness to his presence that feels like the opposite of… excessiveness. It was easy to just be.”

‘Draw Something Beautiful’ follows Ganavya’s album ‘like the sky i’ve been too quiet,’ produced by Shabaka Hutchings, and released earlier this year on his label Native Rebel. Featuring contributions from Floating Points, Tom Herbert, Carlos Niño, Leafcutter John, and others, the album was hailed by The Quietus as “haunting, otherworldly…balancing darkness and light, weaving together intimate stories with thread of cosmic spirituality.” The Guardian added that Ganavya “pushes traditional craft into a newly evocative and atmospheric direction.”

There’s more new music coming from Ganavya later this year, and international tour dates have been announced, with performances in Los Angeles, Chicago, NYC, Paris, Berlin, London and  beyond. See below for a full list of dates.

 

GANAVYA 2024 TOUR DATES 

July 21 - New York, NY - Joe’s Pub

September 22 - San Francisco, CA - Gray Area

September 26 - Seattle, WA - Fremont Abbey

September 29 - Chicago, IL, - Old Town School of Folk Music (Szold Hall)

October 3 - Brooklyn, NY - National Sawdust

October 4 - Philadelphia, PA - Solar Myth

October 9 - Los Angeles, CA - Masonic Lodge at Hollywood Forever Cemetery 

October 12 - Cardiff, UK - Llais Festival

November 6 - Zurich, CH - Johanneskirche

November 8 - Utrecht, - NL - Le Guess Who? Festival 

November 9 - Groningen, NL - Rockit Festival

November 10 - Paris, FR - Café de la Danse

November 14 - Leuven, BE - 30CC

November 15 - Brussels, BE - Fifty Lab Music Festival at AB Club

November 17 - Berlin, DE - Silent Green - Kuppelhalle

November 22 - Dublin, IE - Dublin Unitarian Church

November 23 - London, UK - EFG London Jazz Festival - Union Chapel