Monday, January 8, 2007

Mausami Gurung Speaks Out

Looks like things are going really great lately for the talented Mausami Gurung who is one of the most sought after female singers in the country today.

Some months back, she had gone on a tour of Australia along with other Nepali artists and it has just been a couple of weeks since she come back after a series of events in the UK. While she was busy performing abroad, some of our readers got back to us saying that "Mausami, instead of singing Nepali songs to Nepali audience abroad sang Hindi Bollywood numbers. Quote, “If we wanted to hear Hindi songs why would we call her here!". We often hear about Nepali artists entertaining their audience with Hindi numbers while touring abroad; not that we want to make an issue out of it. After all, artists are required to entertain the crowd and give them their money’s worth irrespective of what language they sing in. Nevertheless, since it was one of the burning issues plaguing some of our readers, we decided to talk to Mausami herself and get her thoughts on it.

She admits that she did sing a Hindi number ("Dummaru Dum") while she was performing in Australia. She says, "Music is something which is very broad. My opinion is that at the end of the day music is music. It is not something which can be chained by a nationality or language. It is so diverse and everyone should be open about it. I did sing that Hindi song since the audience was asking for more encores from me. I had sung "Changba Oi Changba" a zillion times and I thought they might get bored of it. James Pradhan who was also performing at the same event asked me to go ahead with it and I saw no reason not to. There are people who like me or anyone else for that matter, singing a Hindi number and there are people who don't like it. Now what are we supposed to do? As I said before, music is music and people should be open about it!" It’s loud and clear Maushami! Hope you are reading this from Australia.

Now, that our questions were answered, more so of one of our readers from Australia, we decided to change the subject and ask her about her next project. She says, "Well, I am working on my second album and I have made an effort to make it different from my previous venture 'Unforgettable'. My plan is to release this new album by the end of January. It has different flavors of songs on it starting from Latino to selo, romantic to R&B. I am also doing a duet with Sugam Pokhael. The song is called "Lyauna Ta". This song was incorporated in my first album as well but this time round we have made many changes on it!" Way to go Maushami! Keep it up and good luck with your second album!