one tree festival!

i was lucky to get some free passes to the 'one tree music festival' on the 9th and 10th of feb in mumbai.

the bands, like every year, were really classy. this year the line-up included joe bonamassa and the robert cray band on the first night. and gold spot (read what ultrabrown has to say about them here) and jose feliciano on the second night.

what i like about the one tree festival can be summarised as follows -

1. the music is not for kids. and so you will find yourself in the middle of an audience which is comfortably middle-aged (or should i say 'right-aged'). it helps when you know you fit the median on the age bell curve of the audience :)

2. these bands are classy acts and not like the used-up, burnt out popular bands which tour india since they don't get invited in any other part of the world!

3. i get free passes every year (i'm such a cheapo :P ), thanks to a dear friend. these music shows (including the teeny bopper bands and burnt out pop-stars) almost always cost a bomb!

but i've always wondered why these visiting bands always get a lot of big-name sponsorships (the one tree festival is sponsored every year by johnnie walker) while local bands and indian classical music have it much tougher?

p.s. i also attended the 'heartbeats' show organised by 'every tuesday' where the six gods/giants of indian music (zakir hussain, sivamani, viku vinaykaram, u shrinivas, selvaganesh and shankar mahadevan) performed together on stage! awesome experience. (and the organisers had managed to get a good line-up of sponsors too!)