BEHIND THE MUSIC
Anna Toso - Composer/Piano
One of Anna’s earliest memories is of climbing up onto the piano bench to watch her dad play jazz, boogie-woogie and classic standards that he would play entirely by ear. As soon as Anna could reach the keys he was teaching her some of the basics. She found her way to composing her own music early on and developed a rapport with music that has continued to unfold over her lifetime. Passionate about music, she had some early experiences with studying piano and ear training but started studying music theory more seriously at College of Marin (COM) in the late 70’s, early 80’s where she first met Scott Thunes (also featured on this album) as a fellow music student. Anna recalls Scott mentioning one time at COM that he was going to go traveling in Europe with this violinist he just met, named Patti.…
Taking a break from her music studies, Anna traveled overland through Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan to India via boat, train, bus, truck, taxi, to arrive in New Delhi to meet Patti Weiss for the first time in 1978. They were surprised, to say the least, that they both knew Scott (she had just been traveling with him in Europe before heading to India) and they learned they had many other friends in common. They studied music (Patti:Violin, Anna:Tabla) in New Delhi with Joi Srivastava, a well-known North Indian violinist in the Hindustani Classical Music tradition. Discovering that they could also play as a duo with piano and violin, Patti and Anna performed in a number of locations in India and Sri Lanka and then again when they reunited in the Bay Area. Anna continued studying and composing music, and simultaneously started a path of teaching natural history. She earned her BA degree in Humanities from New College of California, studied music at the Naropa Institute in Boulder, CO, and has been, in general, a perpetual student. Anna is currently working with Patti on a third album featuring more of her original work.
Discography:
Surrounded by Angels 1995
Train Ride Home 2020
Patti Weiss - Violin
Patti Weiss began studying classical violin at the age of six. After high school she studied for a year at Berklee College of Jazz in Boston, and spent the next year traveling from Greece to India overland through Turkey, Iran and Afghanistan. Upon arriving in India she met Joi Shrivastava – a well-known Indian classical violinist and spent six months living with his family and studying with him. She also met Anna Toso just a day after she met Joi, and Patti and Anna then moved together into a rooftop apartment in Bengali Market, an area of New Delhi. They travelled and played music all over India and then went to Sri Lanka where they played at the Intercontinental Hotel as a star duo!!! Anna then travelled and lived in Paris on her way home. Patti flew to Thailand and lived in Chiang Mai in northern Thailand for two months performing in the Sweet Room on Rajwathanee Road with a bluegrass band, made up of all Thai Musicians. She then returned home and spent four years earning her BA in South Asian languages (Hindi and Urdu) from U.C. Berkeley. After graduation, she was scouted by the FBI as a translator/agent, but decided instead to change courses and earned a Ph.D. in Neuropsychology from the Pacific Graduate School of Psychology. She became a Neuropsychologist, working both forensically and with children with Learning Disorders. Patti has guested with the Gipsy Kings on three North American tours, played with Beach Blanket Babylon for 3 years (8 shows a week), performed for a year with Josh Groban, four years with Trans Siberian Orchestra, and did one tour with Smokey Robinson, as well as performing and composing music for five feature films, including The Truth About Cats Dogs, Guinevere, Kazaam (with Shaquille O'Neal) and Under the Tuscan Sun. She and Anna are now working on their third CD.
Partial Discography:
Planet Passion (ancient-future.com AF 2010)
Surrounded by Angels (Jaguar Jazz JJM 7923-2)
Train Ride Home 2020
Scott Thunes - Bass
Scott Thunes is a bass player, formerly with Frank Zappa, Wayne Kramer, Steve Vai, Andy Prieboy, Mike Keneally, Fear, The Waterboys, Big Bang Beat, and others. He played with Zappa's band from 1981 to 1988, and plays on such albums as The Man From Utopia, Them or Us, Broadway the Hard Way, You Can't Do That on Stage Anymore, Does Humor Belong In Music?, The Best Band You Never Heard In Your Life, Frank Zappa Meets the Mothers of Prevention, Ship Arriving Too Late to Save a Drowning Witch, Make a Jazz Noise Here, and Guitar, a double-album compilation of Zappa's live guitar solos.
His most prominent bass performance can be heard on Frank Zappa's Valley Girl, which peaked at #32 on the Billboard Hot 100.
He played bass on Frank Zappa's Jazz from Hell, which won a Grammy Award for Best Rock Instrumental Performance in 1988. In February 2012, Thunes performed in California with Dweezil Zappa and the "Zappa Plays Zappa" band.
In October 2013, he performed with the Los Angeles Philharmonic in a performance of Frank Zappa's 200 Motels, which was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Classical Compendium in 2017.
In June 2017, he performed in a concert of Frank Zappa's music with the Czech Philharmonic under conductor Sarah Hicks.
Thunes has been a rock band teacher at the Marin School of the Arts since 2017.
Photo credit to Lorelei Ghanizadeh Voorsanger.
Madhabika Nayak - Vocals
Madhabika Nayak was born and raised in New Delhi, India and currently lives and works in the bay area. A Clinical Psychologist and public health research scientist by profession, Madhabika has nursed a love for music from a very young age. As a teenager, she trained for 7 years in Hindustani vocal in the Gwalior gharana tradition under the guidance of Pandit Ram Chandra Keshav Moghe, “Gwalior Sangeetratna”), disciple of the famed Pandit Balakrishna Rao Ashtekar (fondly known as Raja Bhaiyya Poochwale). She received a few months of training in Odissi classical music as a young child from Shri Bankim Sethi, disciple of Suramani Balakrusna Das.
Madhabika has performed various forms of Indian music across different U.S. states, including Hindustani classical, shlokas, bhajans, geet, ghazals, folk and Odissi classical and folk music. Madhabika has collaborated with local Indian non indian musicians in the bay area and musicians in Delhi. For samples of Madhabika’s music in diverse vocal genres, visit her Youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/c/MadhabikaSings) and soundcloud (https://soundcloud.com/madhabika-nayak).
Jesse Sheehan - Tabla
Jesse Sheehan is a very talented musician, experienced in both tabla and saxophone. Jesse enriches the Indian Train Ride and Train Ride Home pieces with his tabla playing, reflecting an important aspect of Anna and Patti's travels in India.
Jesse spent close to 4 years in India learning and performing Indian rhythms on the Tabla.
He studied in the Farukhbadh tradition primarily with his guru Pandit Nayan Ghosh but has also received instruction from Pt. Anindo Chatterjee. Jesse has performed tabla with Bhagavan Das, Ragani, and indian fusion master Louiz Banks as well as drum and bass. For more information about Jesse and his music, you can visit http://www.jessesheehan.com/