Indo American News

Tag: Krishna Sounds

  • To Make Good Sound, You Have to Get Up Early in the Morning!

    To Make Good Sound, You Have to Get Up Early in the Morning!

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    Darshak Thacker of Krishna Sounds in front of the luminous stage at the Janamashtami celebrations this past weekend.

    By Jawahar Malhotra

    HOUSTON: When there is a huge show to produce, he likes to get there early in the morning and start the speaker layouts, spreading the monster cables and making sure there are plenty of mics and other backup equipment. But when there is lighting and backdrops involved, it makes him get going even earlier.

    “For this past weekend’s Janamashtami show, I got to the George Brown Convention Center at 5am,” said Darshak Thacker two days later, having completed another marathon weekend. His Krishna Sounds (which he runs with his wife Mona, who is usually by his side) has its own sound and lighting equipment in his warehouses. Come Saturday morning, September 10, he, Mona and 6 other helpers loaded up and then set up at the GRB. “After the event, we didn’t get back to the house till 3am the next morning!” he added with his characteristic grin.

    Houston’s celebrity sound engineer Darshak Thacker is also a high-powered drummer – nicknamed Killer D by this reporter – and watching him play is a treat by itself. For Janamashtami, Darshak provided very high quality, crystal clear Live Sound. “We used very bright stage lights to make sure the stage looked clear and added color par lighting to make the backdrop look 3D so that it seemed like the giant Baby Krishna was popping out of the screen.” This year, he also set two remote screens with live feed on both by cameraman Paresh Shah.

    After the cultural and religious events, Darshak and his live band of Kamal Haji (on keyboards) and singers Kashmira Nayak and Hardik Jani played devotional songs in praise of Lord Krishna’s. Darshak’s high energy drumbeats made everybody dance the raas garba till way past midnight … and as he jumped along, he looked even more energized!

  • The Geetanjali Hit Parade Keeps Rolling till Midnight!

    The Geetanjali Hit Parade Keeps Rolling till Midnight!

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    Click here for Photo Collage

    By Jawahar Malhotra

    HOUSTON: If you ever doubted that you could hold a huge party on a Sunday evening and get a full house, you haven’t encountered the charm and persistency of Shoba Joshi, the popular host of the Geetanjali radio program. She not only brought in so many well-wishers to her second annual fundraiser this past Sunday, February 21, many of them were still dancing away till the wee hours of Monday morning, work be damned!!

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    “This was our second time to put the fundraiser together after last year,” said Hiren Joshi, Shoba’s son and co-host of his own radio segment “and we’re still learning a lot about organizing it.” But apparently, the Joshi’s – Shoba’s husband Rakesh, who works just as hard behind the scenes, included – knew they could count on their loyal listeners and advertisers to come out on what turned out to be a drizzly Sunday evening to the Sterling Hall on Beltway 8 near Tanner. By their own count, almost 300 people came to the event that started at 6pm.

    Once the party got started, Shoba showed why she has earned her spot on the radio dial for the past 23 years. “Last year, we had so many people who wanted to perform during the event,” gushed Shoba as she relaxed two days later. “And this year it was no different. They approached us on their own but we had to turn several people down.” The rising costs of the radio show has prompted Shoba to try a different approach to funding Geetanjali, she explained to her guests.

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    The appetizers and dinner for the evening was catered by Madras Pavilion, whose co-owner, Mahesh Shah ran around though he was suffering from jet lag after a trip to India. The music and sound system was coordinated by Darshak and Mona Thacker of Krishna Sounds and the photographer of the evening was Asit Patel, newly arrived from India.

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    Shoba opened up the program by honoring her biggest advertisers and sponsors of the evening, and a lighting of the traditional diyas by community leaders. The “show” started with the self-confessed amateur Dr. Vivek Sharad Kavadi, an oncologist who tried his hand at a bit of humor.  He said he grew up here and learnt all his Hindi from watching desi movies and made his point by asking the audience to identify the character, actor or director from the dialogues he laced into his commentary. Winners shouted out the answers and were rewarded with small prizes. A raffle was held for other items that were donated by local jewelers and merchants.

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    Then the night rolled through with performances by Dolly, a two-year transplant to the Bayou City doing a Kathak dance; Leena and Swati doing a Bollywood dance to “Jhumka gira reh”; Ashish and Taruna doing an energetic pop dance, Suresh Shenoy singing a melodious number, Sharda singing a delightful song and other local artists performing onstage. Shoba’s older brother Bansi Chabria (who came to town with his wife Sarla), much admired for his voice, serenaded the audience with a medley of songs. And all of this was before dinner!! There was much more later!