Time Travel with Utsavi Jha
The makings, hearings and thoughts of a singer-songwriter
Just days before Utsavi suggested we host a session that’s almost like a film reel of her life and it’s connection with music, I’d hosted a session called Teenage Reminisce. We queued and played tracks that we listened to a lot in our teenage years, whether it was teen Gen Z music or millennial music. The session was one where people had a lot to queue and say, making it all the more clear how we often associate extremely strong memories with music. That’s why we were so sure that Utsavi’s idea of a Time Travel session would be evocative at the very least, and extremely immersive at the very best.
Utsavi led the listening session — we started with the first song in English she heard and ended with what she’s listening to right now. With this curation, she that took us through the music she was listening to and discovering at different points in her life, as the background tracks of different events that signified Utsavi’s personal growth.
The driving force of the session, that led to as much engagement and interaction between listeners and Utsavi was, without doubt how easily she was vulnerable, speaking of memories, people and thoughts that we are often afraid of understanding ourselves, let alone sharing with people on the internet.
Utsavi’s music is a representation of her emotions, thoughts, self — awareness and introspection. Where she might be in life, what she might be feeling, thinking, processing and understanding about life, love, relationship with others and self is all beautifully culminated and cumulated in the songs she writes.
The session curated by Utsavi was 1hr 40mins long (as opposed to the usual 50–60 min sessions), but we didn’t feel it one bit. Contrarily, it was a session that felt like we were talking to an old friend from school we’d lost touch with, because the memories and feelings she spoke about were so tremendously relatable, and insightful. We went from chit — chatting about travel, to talking about love, heartbreak, dealing with flaws and insecurities and so much more in between.
A realization that resurfaced yesterday was that every person, especially artist, is very actively shaped by music — either in their lives, or their musical careers. If there is anything of originality, it’s these memories, these learnings and the music we associate them with, but we never hear about it. The artist sessions are a phenomenal way to get a peek into someone’s life immersively, effortlessly and with them narrating it, like a friend would at different points in their lives.
Listen to Utsavi’s music here and follow her on Instagram here.