Traditions: Ohio Heritage Fellows; 202; Vidita Kanniks interview, part 2 of 2

Q: Tell me about your role in your dad’s choir.

VIDITA: Umm, that experience has definitely been amazing because I was not only a part of the choir but I was also able to, umm, uh, I was also able to be an accompanist for the choir, so I played piano and I also had some solo parts in the music. And, actually composing the pieces itself, I was able to be a part of that with my dad. I was there with him, umm, when we made demo recordings, I was able to record that with my dad and I really got to know the music very well and it was just an amazing experience being able to participate in the World Choir Games a second time and especially with people from my own community, umm, singing Indian music from my own heritage and it was just a really awesome experience overall.

Q: When did you first start learning about music?

VIDITA: Umm, I guess it’s really hard to pinpoint that. Uh, when I was... ever since I was really young my dad has been working with me and teaching me, umm, like Raga’s and umm, Indian music theory I guess and you know, we’d be watching shows like Sagwa on TV and the theme song of Sagwa was Pentatonic scale and in Indian music, umm, the Pentatonic scale, umm, is known a Mohenum (SP?) at least one of them is so my dad would say, okay what Raga is this? And, I was really young at that time and I would identify the Raga and, umm, we were doing a lot of the Raga training and he would teach me short compositions, uh, Indian compositions probably when I was 5, 6 even. So, definitely very young, I was very young when I started off.

Q: What was it like to have you dad as a mentor?

VIDITA: Umm, having my dad as a mentor has definitely probably been a very different experience than most people would have had because he’s not only my teacher he’s also my dad. So, umm, it’s been advantageous for us because he can teach me in just a home setting. We’ll be sitting on the couch and he can be like okay, learn this new composition or we’ll go on road trips sometimes and road trips are you know, 6, 7 hours and he’ll be like okay, let’s use this time to learn a new piece or, uh, do some Raga identification and stuff like that. Umm, so it’s definitely been a really great experience having my dad and my teacher being the same person and also because he’s my dad I’ve been able to work with him and accompany him on all of his, uh, travels, lecture demonstrations. I’ve been able to, umm, do backup vocals in recordings, umm, and, uh, travel and I’ve gotten a lot of really great experiences out of having my dad as my mentor.

Q: Do you think what your dad is doing with music is important?

VIDITA: I think it’s definitely important, umm, because my dad has started this Indian Choral movement in Cincinnati and it’s branched out to so many different places, all over the world really and the Indian choral tradition is not something very common so the fact that he’s been doing this I think is very important. It’s a new kind of... it’s a new display of music, it’s a new type of music that he’s popularizing, he’s bringing it out and I think that’s very important. Also, his recording that we’ve done, I was able to sing those compositions in Vis-Ma-Ah, umm, with that CD it’s a genre of music that he has brought out and it’s another one of those things that not a lot of people are familiar with so I think it’s really great that he’s been able to make that recording of CD’s. It’s the first ever archival recording of those compositions ever and the fact that it makes that tie between Indian and western music I think is really cool. And, I was able to be a part of that too which is really special especially myself being both American and Indian, I guess I really represent those things and it’s been really awesome.

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