I am SO proud to announce that my debut album is officially out!! I have to admit that I am a bit nervous. It took me four years to get it out into the world, and I am praying that all my efforts translate into you guys enjoying it!!
http://www.tinasugandh.com
(*If you want all the lyrics to the entire album, they are on the digital booklet on iTunes)
It's been a long road! I have been wanting to share my debut "TablaGirl" with you for so long. It actually took me 3 years to make the album, since my producer (Angelo Montrone) and I wanted to make something more organic and heartfelt by using tons of live instruments. (The other producer on this album is Lester Mendez - Shakira, Jewel, etc). Although there is a strong live element to it, "TablaGirl" is still a feel-good mainstream pop album - but it has a huge Bollywood flare. (I really can't believe that after all these years of doing interviews and talking about what the album will sound like, you can actually just finally hear it for yourselves!! Anyway, I actually went to India and discovered all these gorgeous Indian instruments to use for the album, (and I basically just kept buying more and more of these instruments until Sony told me it was time for me to wrap it up and come home!) Some of my favorite "exotic" instruments that we used are the tabla (obviously), dholak, dhol, naal, ghatam, santoor, sitar, harmonium, ghungaru, bansuri, bul bul tarang, been, ektar, tanpura, goob goob, daffali, mridangam, and SO much more. (Yes, I know it sounds like I'm just throwing random syllables together and making all these words up but they all are really amazing instruments!) We also used the more common instruments of course like guitar, bass, drums, violin, etc. It was an absolute honor to watch these instrumentalists from all over the world throw down their magic on my album!
The other reason that this album took so long to release was because last year, my worst nightmare became a reality when I lost my beautiful, incredibly radiant, always-smiling, and eternally-positive best friend last year - my mom. I took the whole year off to take care of her and I can not describe how incredibly painful last year was because there really are no words. Although, since mom always taught us to see the good-and ONLY the good in everything and everyone, I will say that I am SO grateful that she got to sing on this album. This album would not have been complete without my mom's voice on it. My producer knew how important it was that I have my entire family on this album, and so he actaully flew out to California, and shipped all his recording gear out there in order to record my entire family, including my sister, brother-in-law, and niece and nephew! For example, that's my newphew's voice you hear at the very end of "HisStory", that's my mom's voice you hear at the outro of "Stay", it's my sister's voice that you hear for the intro of "T.here I.s N.o A.lternative" and it's my dad that you hearing shouting in the middle of "Break Me"! All of us say "namaste" at the very end of the album after the last track "Stay". My niece was so little at the time that we needed to use studio tricks to piece together syllables that sounded like "Namaste" (That is the ONE time I will admit to using "studio tricks"!) We basically just tickled her a lot until we got her to make some sounds-very cute!!
Point being, it's been a long road, and I so grateful for all of it. I'm grateful for the low points in my career as well as the high points because the lows kept me constantly aware of what's really important in life-family, love, smiling, spreading positivity to the world, etc. I am also extremenly grateful to have had a mother that I will strive to be like until the day I am gone - beautiful, radiant, selfless, open-minded, healthy, always-smiling, super-positive, lights up a room when she walks in it, and the list goes on and on.
THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH for everything! Thank you for your support, patience, and especially for all of the emails I received last year with words of hope and encouragement.
Tons of love,
-Tina
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