Composer Vipin Mishra rides to Zanskar Valley with friends to record nomadic music

Composer Vipin Mishra always dreamt of combining his two passions — music and adventure activity. Though he grew up on classic rock bands, over the years, he developed a liking for Indian music. It led him to come up with the docu-series Folkroad, which has Vipin and his team travel to Zanskar Valley in Ladakh in search of nomadic music. Riding his Honda Africa Twin Adventure motorcycles, the composer is joined by actor Satyadeep Mishra and professional photographer Abhay Singh, as they travel on bumpy dirt tracks, stay in freezing tents, visit remote monasteries, witness flashy wedding functions and discover new sounds.

Folkroad was recently premiered at the Red Lorry Film Festival in Mumbai. Says Vipin, “ Two episodes, which represent the basic theme of the series were screened. I plan to release it on YouTube.”

Artistes playing the Surna and the tabla-like percussion instrument

The team chose to travel to Zanskar Valley, which is located at a high altitude as they wanted to do something challenging. “We had not drawn any schedule. We took things as they came. The terrain was rough, and the music, raw,” says Vipin about the experience.

The series was shot by two cameramen, Prabhdeep Singh and Ashish Sasane. The actual journey began at Manali in Himachal Pradesh, where friends helped them with the logistics. “There were people who helped us with tents and food. From the musical point of view, we went there truly as seekers, with the hope that we’d eventually find something. I didn’t want to create content set up earlier. One of the recordings came from a wedding party, which we came across during our travel. So we just recorded music as we discovered it.”

According to Vipin, two kinds of instruments are prominent in the region. “One is the Surna, a piped instrument like the shehnai. The other is a percussion instrument called Daman. It resembles the tabla, but is played with sticks. They often wet the drum to get the right tone. It is made of yak skin and copper.”

The challenge was to use these sounds and make them accessible to listeners. “Nomadic music is free-flowing. They don’t play in large ensembles, at least in Zanskar. The music doesn’t have a consistent tempo or structure. The singer may sing in one pitch but the Surna or Daman may be on another. But there are some brilliant compositions in these recordings. In the studio, I had to pull out those parts and place them in such a way that they came across like a song.”

Without tweaking the sound much, Vipin added some synthesisers in the studio. He says, “I didn’t want to use acoustic instruments, which is what often happens with folk music. I wanted to give a fresh flavour. It isn’t entirely electronic, but has a fair amount of synths. The music will be released on streaming platforms.”

For recording, Vipin carried his MacBook Pro, Shure microphones, cables, microphone stands and some hard drives, but it was the Zoom H6 portable recorder which came in really handy. The Manali logistics company looked after their food and stay, carrying rations, tent material, thermal wear and other necessities in a jeep.

Vipin with Satyadeep.

Satyadeep enjoyed the experience thoroughly. He recalls, “I was the last man to be part of this series. Vipin and Abhay had put things in place. I was just looking for a window when I was not occupied with my regular work, and this suited me. Any trip that involves riding motorcycles is fun. And this was Zanskar and there was the added element of discovering new music.”

Naturally, such an adventure would involve some interesting anecdotes. Satyadeep talks of Lingshed, which has a monastery. “We reached there before sunset and realised there was no place to stay. Finally we found a house with an open space outside. There was nobody there. Later, the owner came with her kids and was shocked to find our motorcycles. She allowed us to stay. The next day, her brother-in-law, who was a monk at the monastery, found us a place.”

Vipin mentions another incident when they trekked five to six kilometres to the Phuktal monastery, hoping they would find some musicians. “The entire place was deserted. There were just two boys, who said an annual holiday happens at that time, and people would return only after 10 days. But we were happy just to be in that beautiful monastery all on our own.”

Sounds of the Himalayas

Having finished Season 1 of Folkroad in Zanskar, Vipin plans to head to Arunachal Pradesh for the next round of musical discovery. He says that may take time, as it requires funding. At the moment, music lovers can discover some fabulous sounds from the Himalayas, with scenic mountain locales adding to the atmosphere.