If listeners take just one thing away from Srimathumitha’s new music, she hopes it’s inner peace.
The Point Cook resident describes the genre of her eight track album titled I AM as ‘yoga spiritual indo world music’.
Srimathumitha says our state is a “beautiful multicultural scenario” and it felt right for her music to go in the same direction.
“I have used instruments and sounds from southeast Asia, like we’ve got the tongue drum, we’ve got the shakuhachi flute going,” she said.
“It’s a beautiful blend, it’s almost like the coming together of all these wonder sounds from different cultures and blending into one.”
The singer said her creativity was stimulated by the outdoors and natural sounds around her.
“There’s a beautiful lake here on Point Cook Road where you find beautiful swans, I was actually inspired by the wading of swans in the lake, so I actually used water sounds that flow through layers of the veena [traditional string instrument] and the mridangam [percussion instrument],” she said.
Srimathumitha also teaches yoga at Saltwater Community Centre and says she feels like it’s her “passion” and her “duty” to give participants an “authentic” experience that breaks away from the “general idea” that yoga is a physical practice.
“I think sometimes people shy away from the practice because they think, well, if I’m not bending enough, or if I can’t go upside down and flex my muscles and show off lean body then maybe I’m not doing yoga,” she said.
“I want to make it easily accessible to the entire community…no matter if they’re specially abled. If they have physical limitations, that’s fine. There are other forms like breath work and yoga through music and chanting that they can access.”
Fatima Halloum
