Talktime | Ananya Birla
22-year-old Birla, who started off as an entrepreneur at age 17, has forayed as a singer with her global single livin’ The life. She talks to Sangeeta Yadav about the challenges she faced to break into the international market
Tell us about your new single livin’ The life.
It’s all about following your dreams and passion and how, through adversity, you can find happiness, how an individual, who goes through unrequited love, is able to get through the lows in life in a graceful manner. It is a calling for people to follow their heart and not to take any negativity from anyone anymore.
Is it based on your real life experiencesIJ
It’s a mix of things I have been through and some I have seen around me in others’ lives. Everyone has different experiences but the emotions are the same.
Why English and not a Hindi songIJ
Music is universal, irrespective of the language. I love Bollywood music too and I started off my career by learning Santoor. But my first language is English, thus whatever I think and write be it my songs, experiences, thoughts and people’s stories — they are always in English.
What message does this one carryIJ
To spread love and live an ideal life as life is too short. The minute this realisation came upon me, I wrote the song. We all should do what we are passionate about and that’s the first step towards gaining of inner peace and happiness which doesn’t depend upon the other people but only on you. So it’s important to identify what you enjoy doing and take that up and follow through. Don’t restrict yourself from doing what you truly love because of societal pressure. If you truly start doing things you love, people around will see you happy. They will encourage you to follow your dream.
What’s passion other than musicIJ
I love my business — Svatantra Microfinance and my music. I want to continue to make music more frequently and keep evolving as an artist. Be it my business venture or music, I chose to do it on my own. The good thing is that my parents have been very supportive in my choices.
How did you feel while performing in front of your parentsIJ
The first time that I ever performed in front of my parents was the day of the launch of livin’ The life in Mumbai. In london, without any jitters, I used to gig in front of thousands of people and randomly play the guitar for others. But I could never play for my parents because I always felt that I was not good enough for them to hear me play and sing. Thus, this launch was a very big moment for me.
With Birla as a surname, do you think you had an added advantageIJ
It can be both an advantage and disadvantage. I feel really blessed to have such wonderful parents. No matter where I come from, everything boils down to the individual’s talent, passion, hard work and values. If the talent is not good enough, even if the person come from an affluent background, they will not be able to make in the long run as your talent takes you all the way.
Though I’m the daughter of Kumar Mangalam, I want to create my own identity through my hard work and make my parents proud of it. For me, having validation for my parents is very important. I want to see my parents happy and a lot of that comes from what I do.
Having said that, this popularity could have gone against me as people might think that I come from a traditional business class family. How can I be doing thisIJ For me, it’s all about perspective and how an individual deals with the circumstance. If I had not put the hard work in my passion, my live performance would have turned out to be really bad and people would have been laughing at me right now.
Difficult to debut internationallyIJ
It is very tough for an Indian to break into the international market. There were a lot of criticisms in the beginning. But that motivated me to better myself. If that criticism would not have happened, this would not have been so special. Rejection and criticism are a part of everyone’s journey. like people say that ‘this is not meant for you.’ Somewhere it’s important to prove people wrong who underestimate you. It’s about believing in yourself and your art more than anything else and continue to move on. That’s what I did and the result is this single. Hopefully, this will boost other talented people in India who love English music but have not been able to get that break.
How is the independent music scene shaping up in IndiaIJ
It’s improving give in that there is social media and the exposure that we have from the West. The best example is The Stage, India’s first English talent hunt for singers. There are so many talented singers who are getting recognised now.
Who all Bollywood singers you would like to work withIJ
I would love to work with AR Rahman, Shankar Ehsaan loy, Vishal Dadlani, Farhan Akthar and so many others. But right now my focus is to establish myself in the international music scene.
What are your future plansIJ
I am looking forward to the remix of livin’ the life by an amazing DJ which will be released in three weeks. I will be going to Philadelphia later this month to record my second single that will come out in January.