dhrupad and electronic soundscapes
the pattern follows your cursor, like sand on a vibrating plate. the round button plays an excerpt of our music.
We bring together our individual practices of Dhrupad and electronic sound synthesis. As our moniker suggests, we create long-form ambient listening experiences: a space for one to slow down.
Our performances are long-form listening sessions. Listeners are welcome to sit or lie down. We perform at festivals, venues and retreats in India and abroad, and also make soundscapes and installations.
vocalist · pianist · researcher
Practises Dhrupad as a disciple of Ustad Wasifuddin Dagar in the Dagarvani tradition. Her practice is grounded in the philosophy of the Dagar gharana, with a focus on alaap: vocal improvisation and the subtlety of vocal sound. She's a Music Therapy graduate and explored the work of sound further through Svaram's Integral Sonic Studies & Practices Program.
sound artist · maths teacher
Creates electronic soundscapes with modular synthesis on VCV Rack and field recordings. He researches and builds installations based on cymatics, and graduated from the Integral Sonic Studies Program at Svaram, Auroville.
Dhrupad is one of the oldest surviving forms of Hindustani classical music. Its name joins dhruva, steady, and pada, verse.
It is sung slowly and with restraint, with close attention to each note, to the breath, and to the resonance of the voice against the drone of the tanpura. Sahitya learns in the Dagarvani tradition, one of the principal lineages of Dhrupad, under Ustad F. Wasifuddin Dagar.
Our music stays mostly in the alaap, the unhurried opening in which a raag is explored note by note, without words or rhythm. The electronic drones in our sets come from the same place as the tanpura: a sustained Sa that everything returns to.
ārenenanomtom
the alaap is sung on syllables such as these, traditionally said to come from the invocation om ananta narayana hari.
how a dhrupad performance unfolds. our work is rooted in the first stages.
wonderfruit
enfold stage · the fields at siam country club, chonburi, thailand
photo: magnetic fields nomads 2026 · shrey gupta
wonderfruit ↗
audio-visual performance · 2026
A dream-like journey composed to mirror the fluid transitions of the sleep cycle. It's Dhrupad, electronics and live water-cymatics visuals, often in quadraphonic sound. It started as late-night online sessions in 2024 and was built out with the Serendipity Arts Foundation's Independent Music Production Grant 2025. The debut was in a transformed barn in Auroville, and it toured Europe in summer 2026.
sound immersion
A sound immersion combining Dhrupad-inspired vocal improvisation with a live set on Ableton Live and VCV Rack, synthesising elemental soundscapes alongside acoustic instruments. A space for one to come, lay down, and enter a journey with sounds.
The drones draw on the five elements: the Panchamahabhutas of Ayurveda (space, air, fire, water, earth) and the five elements of Traditional Chinese Medicine, with sections of the alaap linked to each. Each session offers a moment of introspection: to pause, listen, and feel rejuvenated.
“A whole new world where ancient melodies and modern soundscapes blend seamlessly.”
An hour-long piece for modular-synth drones and alaap, first broadcast on Refuge Worldwide, Berlin, in June 2026.
▶ listen on refuge ↗
installation
A water-and-light cymatics installation developed by Harsh, in which the music shapes patterns on the surface of water during performances.
theatre soundscape · 2025
Soundscape for Garam Roti, a solo theatre performance by Durga Venkatesan that uses the making of a fresh roti to ask what it means to be a woman, woven with recorded voices of women from across India. Staged at Odd Bird Theatre, New Delhi, in December 2025.
odd bird theatre ↗
sleep audio series · 2026
Four long-form tracks for Jñāna World that weave Dhrupad vocals with electronic drones: Forest Bathing, Spacious Silence, Terra Luna and Water Drifting. Released in January 2026., Ocean, Land and Fire. Each is shaped around an element, with voice, piano, drones and field recordings. Released in January 2026.
listen on jñāna ↗
film · score & vocals
Original score by Harsh and vocals by Sahitya for Song of My Mother’s Soul, written and directed by Tushar Sheetal Jain: a film about Dina, a sound recordist, and her mother, a classical singer. Premieres at IFFSA Toronto on 10 October 2026., a film by Tushar Singhal about Dina, a sound recordist, and her mother, a classical singer. Selected for IFFSA Toronto 2026.
iffsa toronto ↗
A piece shared with Love Letter for Gaza as a prayer and a remembrance for those surviving. Listen to the loop ↗
dhrupad · electronic soundscapes · cymatics
by pause.dxaAn hour-long performance that follows the stages of the sleep cycle.
We explore dream states through experimental music and sound, bringing together our practices in Dhrupad, electronic soundscapes and live instruments. Listeners can sit or lie down.
The set includes live water-cymatics visuals, projected in the room.
A form of Indian classical music known for its intricate, expressive structure and meditative quality. The key to our exploration is alaap, which gradually unfolds the emotion and builds up the intensity and expressiveness of a raag. Deep, resonant vocal techniques produce a powerful, earthy sound, carried by drones and live, evolving soundscapes.
Immersive soundscapes with pulsating drones, built with modular synthesis on VCV Rack and field recordings. An hour-long piece that guides you through the phases of the sleep cycle, inspired by the non-linear state of dreams. A conversation between drones and dhrupad vocals, shaped in dialogue with ecology: field recordings of water, fire, air, space and other natural elements.
A bass shaker excites a water surface, generating waveforms that evolve in real time with the music, projected onto the wall. Throughout the set we play the visuals too: the shaker's frequency, and the colour and strobing of addressable lights above. It all shifts with the sleep cycle, from deep rhythmic pulses to chaotic, dreamlike distortions.
Upcoming and past performances, 2023 to 2026.
venues & festivals
Sets of one to two hours for festivals, venues and cultural spaces.
Listening sessions for studios, retreats and smaller spaces.
A water-and-light installation, alongside a performance or on its own.
Soundscapes for film, installations and new-media art, and workshops on listening and Dhrupad.
For performances, sound immersions and collaborations, please write to us.
mail uspause.dxa@gmail.com
