Paddy Fields

CELEBRATING THE WOMEN OF FOLK AND FUSION MUSIC
Yet, we can’t be different just for the sake of being different. There has to be some logic to it.

If it is true that folk music is an oral tradition, that it is about stories being passed down generations in song, stop to think. Whom does a child hear it’s first story from? It’s mother, isn’t it?

So if we intend to celebrate folk music, don’t we need to celebrate the women behind the stories?

Thus the concept of Paddy Fields 2017 was born. Celebrating the women of folk and fusion music.

Paddy Fields 2017 topped 2016 in terms of the wow factor as its theme was ‘Women Take Centre Stage’. Paying tribute to the true originators of folk music, Paddy Fields had an all woman line up for its second edition, the first and only Indian music festival to do so. So in 2017:

• Paddy Fields became the first Indian music festival to have an all woman line up of artistes
• Shubha Mudgal performed a one hour set of UP folk songs, something she had never done before and especially curated for the festival
• Violinist Sunita Bhuyan performed with a set of Assamese folk musicians, especially flown down for the event, a first for her
• UK based Susheela Raman performed in Mumbai after about four years
• Sona Mohapatra performed a set of Oriya folk songs, a first for her in Mumbai
• Tipriti Kharbangar and her band Soulmate performed a set of Khasi songs, a first for them, with Khasi musicians flown in from Meghalaya