Musically Yours: Shruti Haasan : Bollywood News

My Band

Everybodys first band is mildly embarrassing but I remember during my days in Mumbai, I used to gig with a lot of bands. I also went to Music School in Los Angeles when I was 19. I did a program called VIT that gives specialized training in vocal performance and song writing. Whilst there, I played with 3 different bands and when I came back, I formed the band- The Extramentals. Playing with The Extramentals was really special, because the bass player of the band is also one of my best friends. We had a really great creative connect. We travelled to a lot of places such as Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai and had a blast performing at each of these places. But as they say everyone has to part ways at some point of time or the other, even the members of our band went to pursue our own interests.

Singing in Bollywood and Kollywood

I dont think there is much of a difference singing in Hindi or Tamil because Music has its own universal language. Like, even if you dont know Bengali as a language, youll be able to sing a Bengali song much easily than say a few lines in Bengali. I can sing in English, Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam, Telugu and Kannada.

Getting into acting

Having grown up in a filmy family, I was always influenced by cinema. As a kid I was really obsessed with Kurosawa and Polanski. In fact, singing happened to me by mistake. I always harbored dreams of writing and directing films. However, when my musical journey took off, I was in a dilemma of whether to pursue singing or take up acting. Luckily for me, I didnt have to choose between the two and here I am juggling both my passions.