The Sheer Adrenaline Rush You Get Performing on a Stage is The Best Feeling as an Artist

People would remember him from his performance at the Indian Premier League (IPL) awards show with AR Rahman.

Meet Thomson Andrews, an Indian contemporary Pop, RnB, Soul singer, entertainer and TV host. Thomson trained in Indian Classical music and Gwalior Gharana Music culture. Besides lending his voice to Ad jingles, Thomson has also crooned songs in movies.  Dhoom 3, D-Day, Bhaag Milkha Bhaag, Bang Bang, Happy New Year, Hasee Toh Phasee, Byomkesh Bakshi, and Bombay Velvet are a few of the many tracks he's worked on. Besides 3 Netflix films—Jingle Jangle: A Christmas Journey, The Christmas Chronicles 2, Ludo—the Pop singer is also working on the BGM for Ayan Mukerji's next, Brahmastra. He has also lent his voice for brands like Nestlé, HCL, and Volkswagen.

In an exclusive interview with Sakshi Post Thomson Andrews tells Reshmi AR about his journey so far...

1. Do you think anybody with a good voice can sing or some formal training is essential to become a professional singer? 

A person, who can naturally sing in pitch, whether they do it purely for recreation, can professionally sing after a certain amount of Vocal training aka Riyaaz. Singers who wish to pursue making music as full-time professionals must be trained to sing in the studio and live performance environments as both are very different and have their challenges. A person needs tons of patience, practice, drive, passion, and courage to take up music as a profession as it's a lot of hard work mixed with determination and pressure to do their best.

2. Did singing in a Church choir in earlier years help you gain interest in music?

It sure did, as it has been the foundation of my singing journey and love for music. I started my musical journey with Gospel Music and over the years built up a vast musical diet of various genres and styles that have inspired me and still do; RnB, Funk, Soul, Blues, Jazz, Hip-Hop, Pop and soft rock. I have also been inspired by Bollywood Film Music, Indie Music, and Indi-pop Singers.

3. You have also taught western music. How different is teaching from performing?

The art of imparting knowledge to anyone begins when one strives to educate themselves and feed their curiosity about music and its influences, learning about the roots of music, the nuances, influences, and detailed techniques of how to sing western vocal styles. I've always had the urge to learn and explore my singing styles and through this process I reached a stage of self-discovery, knowing my forte was RnB Soul Funk, Blues, and Jazz of the several genres I heard and enjoyed over the years. Performing to a live audience is way more demanding and fun as it requires your full focus physically, vocally, mentally to be in the moment to engage your audience and the sheer adrenaline rush you get performing on a stage is the best feeling as an artist. If I were asked to choose between the two, I would pick performing as I was born to be onstage, any day!

4. What was the turning point in your singing career?

My turning point as a singer was when Maestro A R Rahman’s team called me to sing with him on stage at an Awards ceremony! This was the biggest break I could ever imagine as the start of my career with India’s musical icon. This opened for me an opportunity for a permanent shift into music, a dream come true, and also a wake-up call for me to make a headstrong decision to follow my passion and pursue my dreams, for which I am extremely glad, blessed, and grateful today.
 

5. How was it working with AR Rahman during IPL? How did you land the opportunity?

A dream come true, overwhelming, exciting, fun, nerve-wracking and so many feelings altogether. 

I never imagined that I would start my career singing with the legend A R RAHMAN, and the sheer opportunity to for him on his films, Live concerts; and is the best thing any singer can ask for. It happened so that I was singing in a choir ensemble in Bandra where Clinton and Dominique Cerejo happened to request for a few solo good singers to join A R RAHMAN’s troupe of singers to perform at the IPL 2010 and my name was suggested. Soon I was called to empire studio to dub some vocal harmonies and additional vocal parts and following that was asked to also perform live with an ensemble of singers onstage at the IPL Awards 2010 with RAHMAN sir himself, with all my favorite celebrities and cricketers in the audience. Post this experience we have worked on several projects to date, Robo, Superheavy Album, Jootha hi Sahi, Rockstar, and the list goes on.

6. Tell us about your work for Ad Jingles?

At the start of my career, I got the opportunity to sing for many established Jingle composers, Rupert Fernandes, Clinton Cerejo, Dhruv Ghanekar, Mikey McCleary, Leslie Lewis, Ashu, and later also worked with newer composers Sameerudin, Justin-Uday, Shubojit, Hanif, and more. It was a different world for me as each brand and advertising agency/client would have a different set of requirements from me as a singer in the studio, with less than 30 mins on the microphone and the pressure of being extremely versatile, quick, and flexible in singing in various tones, styles, languages, and emotions as per the Ad film required. Fortunately, my voice was liked, approved and now I’ve sung 150+ Ad jingles for the nations TOP brands like Nestle, Volkswagen, Maruti, Samsung mobiles, Phillips, Reliance Trends, OLA electric, Hero motorcycles, Mahindra, Amul Icecreams, Raymonds, Van Heusen, Gatorade, Coca Cola, Indian Oil, Shell, ITC and more. 

7. You have worked with south Indian filmmakers and Bollywood directors. Do you think there is a difference in the way people consume music in North and South?

Well for me, music has no boundaries of language, style, genre, culture, and more. Being a south Indian born in Mumbai, exposed to western music influences, and trained in Hindustani Classical from the Gwalior Gharana, I feel the taste in music can differ between regions and states in India, however, dance music resonates across languages and borders. On all my live shows across the country, I perform for audiences from the north, south, east, and west, and as per my observation, audiences like the music they can dance to, beyond language, though the south audiences are more sentimental towards soulful music and their own language songs and are open to western genre influences musically and production-wise and north audiences love ghazals, soulful music and dance music that resonates traditionally to their music tastes. Both regions prefer their own musical styles and culture-driven music and are each heavily rhythm and beat-driven, with their iconic regional styles, like the south like more 6-8 kind of arrangements and North very Punjabi driven influences.

8. How hard is it to break into the industry if you did not have any references?

Well, I would say influence or not, it is surely a path of handwork, patience, positivity, humility, and constant learning. Without a reference as well, there have been so many artists who due to digital platforms like youtube and social media, have been able to get noticed by the professionals due to their talents and skills. Today, an artist does not need an established name to launch him or her, they can make waves in the music industry by the power of social media and digital music platforms that are open to a wider audience and when they get their acknowledgment from these platforms, mainstream composers have taken notice via recommendations from industry musicians or people as per trends and seek these talents out. Hence, all I would like to convey is that each artist must keep putting their music out there, and slowly but surely, they will be noticed if they are good at their craft.

9. Did recommendations from AR Rahman help you reach where you are today?

I surely am grateful to Maestro A R RAHMAN for being my Idol and the best starting point in my music career, as it all started for me as a professional singing career since the day I performed with him on the IPL Awards 2010. However, for me, it has been a sheer blessing of goodwill and positive recommendations by people who have worked with me on studio dubbings, Ad Jingle / TVC work, or on live shows; that helped me build my credibility of being excellent at my craft and that has landed me further opportunities to work with every Music Director in the country, through hard work, drive, passion, self-belief, and utter professionalism. Through word of mouth and by overall industry colleague recommendations, I began working with namely Vishal Bhardwaj, Vishal Shekhar, Salim Sulaiman, Shankar Ehsaan Loy, Pritam, Amit Trivedi, Anu Malik, Mira Nair, Imtiaz Ali, Hitesh Sonik, Dhruv Ghanekar, Rupert Fernandes, of the many. It was a domino effect of landing great films to sing on, doing big project films, and progressing to doing entire vocal arrangements on playback songs, BGM’s, and even Music Reality TV shows like MTV Coke Studio, MTV Unplugged, and more. The Rest is history and I am blessed That I’ve been able to make a mark in the industry as a playback singer in Bollywood films, TV shows, and also regional language projects, singing for Tamil, Telugu, Tulu, Kannada, Bengali, Marathi, and Malayalam Films and Ad Jingles. Today I’ve sung in as many as 12 Indian Languages, sang on multiple Iconic Disney films, Netflix, Amazon & Apple TV web series, and a list of singles released on every major label in India.

10. You have worked in movies and worked on your own single. Which one was more challenging and which one did you enjoy the most?

I enjoy music, be it Film, Non-Film, TVC’s or Live Performances. As a singer-songwriter, the process of ideating, creating, conceptualizing, and putting a song together from melody to lyrics to a scratch recording to the final music production, vocal arrangement, and mix and mastering the track, the entire journey is enthralling and memorable.  Essentially the creative process of making a tune, singing, and writing lyrics is similar in both kinds of musical content creation. However, in a movie, the music and song have to be in sync with the character and story portrayed on screen by the actors, hence a definite theme, vision, script, and character are pre-locked when singing a playback song in a movie. Whereas when making your own singles, an artist has the complete creative liberty & freedom to explore genres, various themes, feel, and emotion of the song he/she wants to communicate to the listeners and also create a unique storyboard for the music video is an artistic interpretation that suits their own personality & brand.

11. How did you use the pandemic lockdown?

I am a workaholic and working from home is something I’m used to, as a freelancer, for 12 years, hence there is already a set discipline and routine I follow with my time each day. From vocalizing/riyaaz to working on my singing & composing chops, learning new marketing skills and networking to increase my connections, creating new music/content, and staying connected with my fans on social media. However, I have been additionally busy for 3 years as an entrepreneur too, focusing on my Startup company ‘Throan Of Art’, which had been in ideation since 2016. Throan Of Art - is a PR & Digital marketing agency, Production house, Brand Solutions firm and now also has a new extension as we launched our very own Indie record label ‘THROAN OF ART MUSIC’ to promote local talent on an international level. My life now as an artist and entrepreneur brings in an added sense of drive, responsibility, passion, and determination to succeed and I’m grateful to my team who has been working endlessly creating music, shooting music videos for artists on other labels, focusing on brand building for our talent, corporates, and celebrities via our PR, Digital marketing expertise, network, and resources. My Label’s aim is to introduce great Indian Indie original music to a global audience with a flavor of our varied & rich cultural heritage, ‘music with no boundaries of language, culture, genres’; just a pure focus on creativity and artistic liberation through music made by Indian talent. Besides, I've been fortunate to have sung for multiple OTT projects on Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+ Hotstar, and Apple TV that I’ve not known the way time has flown by. As I always say, being busy is good.

12. What's your take on TV reality shows? Do you really think musical shows open up opportunities for aspiring singers?

Well, it's a controversial subject which I would rather leave for the people to realize on their own instead of me spelling it out. My personal opinion is that it does give a singer the fastest visibility and makes them an instant household name, they benefit from live shows for years; if that’s what the singer’s goal is. Though post the show, it's what the artist does on his own accord, using the fame of the show that really helps him/her make it or quit the industry. It's not as rosy as it may seem to some talented aspiring singers who feel that one reality show will launch them and make them into superstars like the iconic singers of ’80s and ’90s like Sonu Nigam, Sunidhi Chauhan, Shreya Goshal, or even the current heartthrob Arijit. Quite often singers get so carried away, that’s once the show ends, the year goes by, they feel a loss of purpose, as they face the reality of life that each year a new batch of singers like them enter TV music shows and the pool of talent keeps increasing, leaving each to fend for themselves. Artists get so busy mimicking their idols while singing, that when they come into the industry, some flourish beautifully, while some go astray as they don’t have their own unique sound and have never discovered their true voice. 

13. There are several music apps and we get to see a lot of people taking to singing because of apps like Smule or say Star Music. How much do these apps help singers? 

The apps are fun, harmless and are just like karaoke night crooning opportunities for budding and aspiring singers and I feel its a great morale booster as they are able to sing and make videos for their friends and family to know their talent noticed and also get public feedback instantly on whether they should continue to make more singing content or not, proven by the engagement they receive. It may help them by guiding them to sing in tempo, pitch, and rhythm and that helps these singers to create a foundation and build their confidence to start learning to sing professionally if they wish to pursue music as a career.

14. Musical concerts are a big scene abroad and musicians there earn as much as actors, do you think singers in India are paid as much?

You know the answer; musicians, composers, and singers seldom make as much as our Bollywood actors, unlike the west in Hollywood. I hope someday, things even out for all artists, actors, singers, dancers, and others from the arts industry alike; and we all make the rightful amount of money we may deserve with due royalties paid. However, playback singers do make a great of money from their live shows and tours in India and Internationally, which may be lesser than what international artists make, though the earnings are getting close to global standards.

15. Do you think there will be a big shift in musical concerts in the post COVID era?

I hope the live music and entertainment industry does get back on its feet in full swing, as our industry has been hit really badly by the pandemic. I’ve performed in more than 15 countries and I do miss touring and entertaining the audiences at such events so much. The rehearsals with my band, our ideation sessions for making our stage and studio music interesting with new arrangements to existing songs, the joy of performing for a real audience and feeding off their excitement and energy while interacting with them is such an irreplaceable high for me. A lot of artists/musicians, backstage technicians, event companies, and talent agencies have suffered so many financial losses with no incoming revenue stream. However, this is a tough phase for the whole world and I’m sure things will soon be alright, slowly but surely, and I look forward to resuming entertaining and performing at live events very soon.

16. What was your experience working for a movie like Brahmastra?

Well it's always a humbling and gratifying experience working for such iconic Bollywood films that seldom few artists are chosen among the majority. The music, the cast, the story, and the magnitude of this project is so huge that I am proud to have been chosen as a singer to contribute to this film. I co-incidentally met and briefly chatted with Ayan Mukherjee pre-pandemic at the Durga Pujo celebrations in Mumbai which I had performed with Sunidhi Chauhan this event was organized by Rani Mukherjee and her family, and Ranbir Kapoor also was present at that time. Little did I know that 1 year later I would be called by Music Composer Pritam Chakraborty to sing for Ayan Mukherjee’s film Bramhastra!!. Pritam sir or Pritamda as we call him, has always been a great support and encouragement to me as an artist and he trusts my contribution to his projects as I’ve worked on several of his super hit films and TV projects including doing all the vocal arrangements for his MTV Unplugged TV show, performing with him live on GIMA AWARDS as well. Recently we have worked together on LUDO for Netflix, 83, now the upcoming Bramhashtra of all the other films we have worked together in the past - Jagga Jasoos, Race, Ae Dil Hain Muskhil, Raess, Dilwale, Jab Harry Met Sejal, Agent Vinod Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani and more.

17. Have OTT platforms opened up more opportunities for singers in India? 

OTT platforms have certainly created several opportunities for artists across the fields of acting, music, dance, fashion, production, writing, and more. It may have not been an avenue for more film kind of playback opportunities for singers, however, it surely has created more work scope for singers to sing on BGMs of films/ web series’s, singing on promotional songs for the OTT projects, more opportunities for syncing indie music to film/web series content and music production work. 

18. What is next on your list? 

I just sang for Disney’s ENCANTO film which is recently released. Currently, I’m working on Netflix’s animated children’s series Centaurworld season 1 & 2, Apple TV’s upcoming web series Raphanis, wherein I am the singing voice of the character ‘Wembley’, singing on the iconic series Sesame Street and dubbing as the character voice of Gonger, Marvel Studios ‘HAWK EYE’ series, Brahmastra (coming soon), a Marathi film playback song in the movie Zombivali, an upcoming Telugu Jazz playback song, several Ad jingles for Nykaa, Hero, Facebook TVC’s, 7 of my own singles as a singer-songwriter releasing this year and 25+ singles releasing of other talented Indie artists via my Label ‘Throan Of Art Music’. Lots of studio sessions, a few live/ virtual concerts, composing new music, exploring new business opportunities as an entrepreneur and founder of my startup ‘Throan Of Art’ and hopefully curating a very special project that has been a dream for me and part of my vision board for myself. 

19. Any musicians you want to work with?

Pharell Williams, Coldplay, BTS, Mark Ronson, Illayiraja, Yuvan Shankar, Anirudh Ravichander, Hans Zimmer to name a few.