Unfretted
Indian Strings in Conversation
Upcoming
Announcing our September 2024 US tour!
An article from the Chicago Reader: Unfretted at Chicago's Ragamala Festival (scroll down to find us!)
Ancient/contemporary. Indigenous/global. Bowed/strummed.
The chitravina ("the wondrous veena"), a slide lute with a deep resonance and textured glides, echoing in the Indian subcontinent for thousands of years
The violin, with a beautiful voice-like timbre, that found a firm home in the Indian classical soundscape two centuries ago
Unfretted brings together these two string instruments for a rich, creative dialogue in the Indian Carnatic classical style. The musicians, Vishaal Sapuram and Sruti Sarathy, are acclaimed in both traditional and global music circles for their powerful and nuanced music.
Experience Unfretted
Hindustani-style Kannada bhajan, Udupi '24
Vocal-violin lyrical improv, San Diego '23
Narayana Te Namo Namo
Original tillana with vocal percussion, Austin '23
"2 ragas, one story", Austin '23
Padam in Surati Raga instrumental + vocal
Fast-paced swara improv, Chicago World Music Festival '23
Carnatic + Hindustani bhajan arrangement, SF Bay Area '22
On the chitravina
Vishaal Sapuram
An acclaimed exponent of the rare chitravina from the Indian classical Carnatic tradition. Vishaal began his performing career at the age of nine and has over the years performed extensively in India, the USA, and around the world. His music has been hailed by critics as ‘mesmerising’ and ‘showing his musical wisdom’, its ‘sonorous sound taking the audience into a trance’…
On the violin
Sruti Sarathy
A leading Carnatic violinist, singer, and composer. Sruti is a rare artist who possesses both mastery in the rigorous classical form as well as a boundary-pushing musical vision, and she animates the stage in diverse contexts across the globe. Her soulful and genre-defying original music is a meeting place for Indian ragas, improvisational forms, speculative historical crossovers, South Asian diasporic experience, and literature…
