“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” – Nelson Mandela.
And that’s what the brilliant and hardworking people at I Love Music Academy are doing. Transforming the Indian electronic music scenario by providing extremely powerful, extraordinarily impactful and pro-active learning, involving the very best musicians and producers in the indo-global music scene. Started in Bangalore in 2009 by Nakul Vagale (currently the Director of the school) and with support from his DJ/Producer brother Arjun Vagale and present head of faculty GForce, I Love Music (ILM) academy has now become India’s premier Electronic Music School.
In the early days, these three pillars of the academy realized that there was a lack of technical knowledge among a lot of young artists in the country. They found a gap in the market wherein individuals who were passionate towards electronic music were dependent on self-learning, causing a definite struggle with technique and accurate information. Right from the time of its foundation, ILM Academy has focused on bridging this gap. We recently caught-up with Nakul Vagale, the director of I Love Music Academy and the head of faculty, GForce to know more about the academy. This is what Nakul had to say about how it all fell into place:
“We were constantly developing our course. We don’t follow anybody else’s curriculum. You can’t change the basics of music. We’re just taking up an approach that is more professional and been standardizing it over a period of time. Yeah, it’s been a good six year journey and we’re just growing. In April this year, we shut down our Bangalore school, as it was difficult for us to operate on both sides. In Bangalore, we were getting a lot of students from North India and we decided to timely expand. In April 2012 we opened the Delhi NCR academy with Arjun Vagale who had also been helping us for a few years with his experiences and came to do workshops with us..”
ILM’s recent collaboration with the San Francisco based music school Pyramind turned out to be a milestone that they are extremely proud of. The idea was to not only help the current and past students, but to help the electronic music scene as a whole. This tie-up certainly generates opportunities for people who perhaps would think of it as a career. It gives them the ability to get international exposure and open doors for them.
We know of Indian students already going to Pyramind from India, but this alliance between the national and the heavyweights overseas makes it even more convenient for students, as you can develop a foundation here, understand the industry from a local perspective and if you choose to do further studies, take a trip to Pyramind. ILM’s head of faculty GForce detailed to us,
“It’s not just studying something new, it’s also the exposure. Being in Delhi, surrounded by the local scene opens your mind to a certain industry and gives a certain perspective. But when you’re suddenly moved out to San Francisco the music scene is different over there. You’re living alone in a different environment all together. It’s not only what you learn in school that matters but overall development adds a lot to that and it’s very important. Very few people know what they want to do at the onset. It’s like finding yourself.” To which Nakul added, “Pyramind itself is not just a music school, it also has professional studios attached. So they have this advantage of being able to expose the students from a pre-production and post-production point of view because the industry in the US is way bigger than the industry in India. Pyramind opens their minds to the practicalities like – big budget productions and new technologies and equipment being used. So you can graduate here and do your post grad there.”
For ILM Academy it’s not only the scope or growth rate in the electronic music space that accounts for the school’s success, but also the approach that is being followed here. Nakul explains, “India is a very unique market. We’re predominantly dominated by the Bollywood industry so the electronic part of the market is still miniscule. It has gained momentum and is still gaining as well. There is enough space for people to come in and do a lot more. But it has to be the right approach and there has to be a set direction. What makes us different from other institutions is the team we have here at ILM. All our faculty here are practicing and performing musicians. They are teaching because they want to share information.”
Outside of the regular coursework, ILM Academy is known for holding music production workshops with the best in the industry. In past, the school has seen interactive workshops with professionals such as Midival Punditz, Arjun Vagale, Dualist Inquiry, Dreadsquad and DJ Skip and most recently Christian Smith, to name a few. Having partnered with the likes of Native Instruments, Mackie, Tascam, Adam for best in audio equipment and their associate company UnMute Agency, it is evidently non-typical approach that is followed here. On being asked whether Dev Bhatia and his brother Arjun Vagale’s joint venture UnMute Agency acts as a kick-starter for ILM students, Nakul said the following:
Christian Smith
Christian Smith conducting a workshop at ILM Academy
“We have a lot of UnMute artists who do workshops and meet with our students. Yeah, we’re constantly involving UnMute with what we are doing. Having said that, we’re two separate entities. We function in a similar space. We are in the education business and they are in the business of artist management. Luckily, UnMute has really good artists who are willing to share and that’s what makes great teachers for us as well.”
Age is never a barrier in the field of art. What it requires is creativity and a will to produce something outstanding. And when it comes to DJing it absolutely doesn’t stop at the point of just mixing a few tracks. So, is a Pro-DJ course single-handedly sufficient for a student to raise his career in the industry? If not, should one pursue other courses like Audio Engineering/EMP as well? According to GForce, it’s simply up to you where you want to go with it:
“We have 16-year old kids who come in here who want to learn to DJ and we also have 40 plus-year old guys who come here and say ‘Hey! I also want to learn to DJ’. Some people take it as a hobby, may be to play at their house parties; and there are people who really want to consider this as a profession. So considering professionally you should be able to play the music, perform and even produce the music. If you’re just a DJ, great! But after a while you’ll get fed up and would want to learn how to make it as well. On the other hand if you’re producing music you would want to play it as well unless it’s very commercial, then others would be playing it for you and you would earn royalty. In-fact that royalty is not enough for living. That’s where the Electronic Music Production and DJing kind of go hand-in-hand. If you want to take it one step further and have a little bit more curiosity to be in the mega industry, then I think it’s the Audio Engineering course.”
From genres like Deep House to Techno to Minimal and may be even down-tempo Chilled Out as well, with UnMute in close proximity these are the genres that are focused on at ILM. This was our perception before our very own Varun Luthra actually took a course with them. He says, “At first it felt like being in my own genre restriction, but by the time you finish a course at ILM, you know it’s all about being versatile.” When asked about the genre definitions at ILM, Nakul remarked:
“The school is not genre specific at all. There’s a tendency towards these genres that happens because of the people who teach here. We don’t have any particular genre in our classes either. In our DJing course we’re Non-Bollywood but we’re not Anti-Bollywood. The reality of situation is most students who graduate from here, will be required to play what ever style is predominantly ‘pop’. That’s perfectly fine! Having said that, I can without a doubt tell you this that all our faculties, when it comes to classes, look at the student rather than what their own preference is. So the faculty here will give you an example from your comfort genre but they’ll also push you through other genres as well, so that your mind expands.”
With a massive boom in recent times, dance music has instigated an enormous rise in the number of youngsters taking up an interest in learning the ropes of music production and DJing seriously. In the 90s, all kids wanted to grow up and be rock stars. Today, kids want to grow up and be DJs. According to GForce an array of factors are responsible for the growth of interest in learning DJing/production. “Not only because so many artists come here and play; the accessibility is so much more. Now, it’s like the artist is playing somewhere but you can simply download his set or live stream it. That is something which makes a big difference. I think somewhere it’s also the mentality which I don’t think is right –‘Ohh! It’s so tough to learn to play the guitar, but it’s so easy to DJ. Arrey PLAY hi to dabana hai’ (You just have to press PLAY). But it’s totally different and shouldn’t be compared. So I think there are more people getting into it right now.”
In terms of comparison between the current state of EDM in India and what it was 5 years ago, the ILM heads discussed about the acceleration of its commercial nature. “Honestly speaking even EDM has become commercial now. 5 or 8 years ago you wouldn’t have Trance playing in a nightclub here. Today most of them are playing trance. There was a stigma attached to Trance and that’s gone. Now Trance is commercial. If you look at Techno, that’s also starting. So commercialization is important for the underground to exist. What was yesterday’s underground, is today’s commercial. So if you look at it from that perspective it’s going to get bigger. Different styles are going to become underground and the styles that are existing are going to become commercial. And that’s perfectly fine!” says Nakul.
Everyone at the I Love Music Academy is working hard to consolidate a knowledge pool that is accurate and relevant. This should be the first stop for anyone looking to pursue a career or just indulge in a hobby in DJing and/or Electronic Music Production. More so, you get an opportunity to spend some time at the school here in Gurgaon and then make your way to San Francisco to experience an entirely different scene that you won’t regret!
For information about ILM Academy and Pyramind, follow and contact them on the links below:
Pyramind Site
Pyramind Facebook
Pyramind Twitter
I Love Music Academy Site
I Love Music Academy Facebook
I Love Music Academy Twitter
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