Interview: Imogen Heap

An innovative singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, Imogen Heap knows no bounds, whether it comes to her music, her attire, or her creative projects. Heap’s distinct style of music combines her unique, breathy alto-tenor vocals, a variety of instruments, and a potpourri of sound effects to create a mosaic soundscape. Bending and fusing genres like electronica, folk and rock, her music has captured the imagination and love of 1,578,200 followers on Twitter, and 660,241 friends on Facebook.

In a BBC article, she affirms  that her “biggest asset is not cash – it’s a large, growing, devout fanbase.” An example of her own devotion to her fans was when she won the Grammy for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical. She wore a specially crafted “Twitter Dress” on the night, with its own Twitter feed displaying tweets sent by fans in real-time using the hashtag #twitdress. According to Heap, the dress was envisioned as a way to let fans “accompany me on the red carpet.”

Most recently she graced India with a tour that kicked off at the Bacardi NH7 Weekender last weekend (take a peek at pictures and a full  roundup here). However, this was not her first time in India. The first was was a romp in the Maharaja Express during her college years. The second was in Samode and Jaipur, Rajasthan for The Dewarists TV show where she collaborates with Vishal Dadlani (vocalist of Pentagram) to create the song, ‘Minds Without Fear’ (watch the episode here).

When I met Vishal in the room, I was like, ‘I like you. And I could spend three days or four days in a room with you writing a song. I think its gonna be fun.’ And that’s what it comes down to – do I like spending time with that person. I wouldn’t work with somebody, even if they were my most favourite musician on the planet. If I didn’t like them in person and didn’t get on with them, or I didn’t like their values, then I wouldn’t do it. When you asked me who I wanted to collaborate with in India? I don’t know at the moment, because I haven’t met them.

Though, she did point out earlier in the interview one person she was interested in working with

AR Rahman is one. He’s a big man, writes beautiful scores. One day perhaps that might happen.

She talks of her impressions of the current music situation in India, “There is a surge of effort to get not just international artists to India but to encourage local and national Indian contemporary acts outside of Bollywood, to see that there is a potential future making money perhaps and music in India.” She mentions Vijay Nair (founder of Only Much Louder) as one such force in the current independent music scene in India.

I love Vijay, I cannot say enough good things about Vijay and what he’s doing for the music industry here… I’m very excited. I think within the next few years, Vijay and his team and many people in these circles are really gonna start to make India a destination for international bands to come.

Inquiring about her future plans, her calm graceful exterior burst into a cheeky smile and little leap as she says, “I’ve got tons of ideas, absolutely tons of ideas.  Lets talk about till the end of the year.” She mentions three main projects:

1. Heap is working on a soundtrack for a film in Bhutan exploring the ideology and implementation of gross national happiness.
2. A real-life installation of how she intersects art and music in everyday situations and lives of people as she is doing a residency in Hangzhou, China. Heap will be meeting up with a different local person 24 times throughout a 24-hour period, following what they do. And then adding an “artistic accompaniment” to their lives. For instance, “So it could be one person who’s making an instrument, or it could be someone who works in the print-press for a newspaper, or it could be someone who is just on their way home on the bus. And each time something like this happens, I connect an artistic accompaniment. So in the print press, perhaps, find a dancer to run through the corridors of the print press and do a dance, perhaps to the sound of the machine. And then on the bus, bring on a choir at a certain point and sing a section of the song that I’m writing. And perhaps at dinner with a family we’ll have a traditional Chinese painter, painting something. So that will turn into a 60-minute film on this 24-hour artistic meets everyday life in Hangzhou. And there will be a song that will be released at the end of the year. And there will be a video for the song as well. And then there will be a 12-page, virtual 3D kind of digital document for the album.” Phew.
3. She recently did a film score for a crowd-sourced film called Love The Earth. Over 1,000 people submitted nature-related film footage which was edited and compiled into a 32-minute film that Heap scored music for and then performed at the Royal Albert Hall with a 100-piece orchestra and a 30-person choir (which included her mum). She was dressed in a tailcoat, white gloves and a stick picked out from her garden, painted white.

These were just her plans till the end of the year! However, we do know that her plans for tomorrow (ie, November 24) will be to play at Blue Frog, Mumbai. We hope that this India trip will not be her last as she maintains that, “Each time I come, I get more warmth and just want to come back more and meet more fantastic people.”