Desi Quarter – music, passion and life, in full measure!

Desi Quarter – our musical extravaganza was established by Amit Khadikar in October 2016, and our first ever show was on 27th October, 2016 at Cafe 212, Phoenix mall, Pune. The name Desi Quarter represents a musical high that is tuned to our Indian Roots, with a mix of Bollywood, Sufi, Indie & some western music as well.

Amit is a Guitarist/Singer-Songwriter/Trainer/Music Consultant and has been a regular performer in the Pune circuit & outside for almost 10 years now. He also has a strong corporate background and has been with Infosys for 11 years after completing his MBA in Finance. He is a Principle Consultant in the SAP practice—a position which is not easily attained in such a short time, but that was partly achieved given that he is a goal-oriented person, driven by passion in any work/responsibility he has taken up till date. He is now on a sabbatical away from work. He has won multiple awards—both in his Corporate Career and in Music & notably was featured as the Youth Icon in Mint Newspaper in 2011 & won the Young Achievers Award in Infosys in 2016.

His love for music arose when he was in school & only grew stronger in his college days, when he took up learning the keyboard, harmonium, & guitar. Mostly self-taught, he went on to form a band called Hourglass Inversion while in Infosys, which is an alternative rock band. He also floated another project called the AKoustic Soul, which depicts the mellow side to his music, focusing on various emotions people go through & express.

Amit and I met around the end of 2014, as I was looking for someone with great guitaring skills. I had been asked to perform at a venue in ABC farms.

I wanted to be a doctor since I was a child and loved singing too. I was trained in Indian Classical for 2 years, but as I was still very young and my father was an in the Indian Army, which led us to move across small cities every 2 to 3 years, I was unable to pursue the same. Coming from a traditional background where music was not considered a career and being girl, I did not have the luxury of choosing for myself.

Having authored some of my life stories in Chicken Soup for the Indian Soul at Work, when I met Amit, I was a practicing dentist living in Pune, attending Karaoke around Pune to quench my thirst for singing. Along with dental practice, I plunged into Entrepreneurship, where I picked up the skill of life-coaching, but my true calling was Music.

From meeting with an accident during my internship in Bangalore and recovering from a completely paralysed left arm, escaping the threat of never being able to practice again, Music was my only companion!

Having participated and won various singing competitions in school and college, I was desperate to find my place in the musical universe. I work with a market research firm since July 2016 in Pune, due to which I found time over weekends and flexible work timings to finally pursue my passion.

Desi Quarter is not just a band, it is a family, with Amit, me and Anant Joshi, ex drummer of Highway 61, who is very well known in the music community in Pune, as the core members.

With Desi Quarter, we have done more than 190 shows in multiple formats, and, recently, we touched the mark of half century of lounge venues in Pune & outside. While we cover various genres of Hindi & English music, we try to infuse our touch to the cover songs as well & are now in the process of releasing our own original content, as a logical step in our musical evolution.

Amit’s experience with his other bands & his general flair towards composing & writing songs combined with the individual abilities of others involved helps give direction to our music. Music can connect people from such varied backgrounds in ways one can’t imagine!!

Amit and I are now married and would be completing our first successful year of marriage this November.

Our Facebook link: Fb- https://www.facebook.com/DesiQuarterPune/

& YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVOPWyUoIaxJsA6S6NOgVEg

 

as told by Dr Rajtarangini K.