It seems ages ago, almost in another life, that I quit my job to become a performing musician, a flautist.

I did play the flute as a hobby during my engineering college years. It took some years for the hobby to develop into a serious passion. The moment of making a choice, however, came after having spent 14 years with a large multinational. I was discovering the possibilities of exploring Gayaki on the flute, with some modifications I made to my instrument. This of course meant that I would have to develop the technique, and devote more time to the flute.

I decided to quit the job, and plunge into the world of music.

I enrolled for the Master’s degree in Music at the Centre for performing arts at Pune University. During the two years at the centre, I worked on the subject of listener education, and designed an elaborate “Music Acquaintance Program”, which was delivered as an extensive workshop with a vocalist friend. As to my own development as a flautist, I was getting restless. This phase of restlessness came to an abrupt end when I found my present Gurus: Pt Suresh Talwalkar to begin with and now Smt. Padma Talwalkar. In their Sahawas, I started finding answers to most of my questions and things started making sense. Terms like Taleem and Riyaz now found new meaning, and I started experiencing the power of, well, experience!