Saturday night blues

The Guide talks to Arunima Dasgupta and finds out this band, set for its first performance in Pune, is all about blues

The Guide talks to Arunima Dasgupta and finds out this band, set for its first performance in Pune, is all aboutu00a0 blues

From the City of Joy, The Saturday Night Blues band is getting ready to regale Puneites on Feb 10. The band has been performing every Saturday night at a night club on Park Street inu00a0 Kolkata, for over a decade. Afteru00a0 performing at different venues across the country, the band is soon going to perform in Pune.

The Saturday Night Blues Band, one of the only mainstream blues bands in India, was formed in October 1999.
It's member Jayanta Dasgupta, who has been a veteran in the music scene for over 25 years, and a guitar graduate from the Musician's Institute, Hollywood has been inspiring the band to play blues rock and jazz blues since January 2000.

Arunima Dasgupta aka O-roon d Queen B! is the vocalist and percussionist of the band. Stuart Munro aka Stuie the Undertaker! is the bass guitarist, Avinash Chordia is the drummer and Shaukat Ali aka Chuku is the lead and rhythm guitarist.

u00a0According to Arunima, "The Saturday Night Blues happened because of Jayanta. He and Ehsaan (of Shankar, Ehsaan, Loy) went to the same school in US, so the music connect was inevitable!"

She adds, "We are basically into blues, which is definitely our genre of music."u00a0 Their lively, energetic music has won them a massive, steady fan following.u00a0 Their informal and interactive approach towards the music and the audience always results in a fun-filled, entertaining evening.

Be it the down home delta blues of Mississippi, the chic and groovy sounds of Chicago or the smokin' jazz blues of New Orleans or the gritty blues of Texas, this band plays it all! Robert Johnson, Howlin' Wolf, Elmore James, Albert Collins, Albert King, Koko Taylor, Freddie King, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Eric Clapton, Robert Cray, Susan Tedeschi are some of the artists, whose numbers they perform. Always open to experimentation, this band also specialises in creating their own interpretations of classic blues standards.

Pune will beu00a0 a new experience for this band. "We have not played in Pune before and are really looking forward to it," says Arunima. But she recalls, "I studied at Fergusson College for a few months before moving back to Kolkata ufffd that was in 1997! The crowd in Pune was pretty rocking back then and I'm sure it's still pretty much the same!"