Subcontinental Synthesis: Electronic Music at the National Institute of Design, India 1969–1972 - Paperback

The history of India’s first electronic music studio founded in 1969 at the National Institute of Design in Ahmedabad by David Tudor.

A book companion to the compilation album The NID Tapes: Electronic Music in India 1969-1972 released by State51, available on vinyl here.

Copies bought via SAP will come with a link to a free download of The NID Tapes: Electronic Music from India 1969-1972 and a set of four postcards from the NID archives.

Subcontinental Synthesis explores the history of India’s first electronic music studio, founded in 1969 at the National Institute of Design in Ahmedabad with the support of the composer David Tudor. The essays and writings unravel the narrative and context surrounding the studio as well as the work of the Indian composers who created groundbreaking recordings during its four years of activity.

The texts reflect on the role of electronic music within a post-independence India, considering its interconnections with experimental design, radical pedagogies, and the international avant-garde, as well as the encircling conditions of Western ideological soft power within the global expansion of Modernism.

Contributors

Geeta Dayal, Alannah Chance, Matt Williams, Shilpa Das, Jinraj Joshipura, You Nakai, Rahila Haque, and Paul Purgas. Foreword by Budhaditya Chattopadhyay