Arushi Jain: »Nothing else is important enough in that moment« – ALICE Guest Book 03

Arushi Jain tells us why her modular setup needs half an hour to warm up, how she found her instrument, and the unexpected joy of reading device manuals.

I heard that it takes half an hour for your set up to warm up. Why is that?

»I like a bit of a buffer to give the oscillators time to warm up. If I tune too soon, it’s going to end up slightly detuned. I have five to six oscillators playing the same melody, and there’s always going to be a little bit of dissonance between them even though they are tuned the same, because it’s an analog instrument. But it really throws me off if it’s too detuned.«

So what do you do if this happens?

»It happens to me in every performance. But I have figured out to really quickly tune it: The first thing I do is identify what’s not tuned. Then I turn it off, retune it, and bring it back in. Sometimes I just don’t have time for that. Then that voice is just gone, and that’s okay. I could fix it, but I choose not to. This machine is so dynamic and alive: sometimes everything works perfectly, and other times, it’s pure chaos.«

Continuing in the same vein … what’s going on inside your head when you are on stage?

»Performing with this instrument, for me, has always been an exercise in deep listening. When I’m up there, I’m just in it, listening in my in-ears. Nothing else is important enough in that moment anyway.«

Why is it important to follow your curiosity?

»Because it enables you to deepen something you already have a tendency to be good at or do something innovative in. It also tells you a lot about yourself, and how you see the world.«

What are you hyped about at the moment?

»I’m really excited about reading about creative people’s lives in memoirs. I’m currently reading the Indian author Arundhati Roy. She just released a book in september called Mother Mary Come to Me. It’s a memoir, but it’s also about her mother and their relationship. She’s an incredible writer at the top of her game.«

You went to Stanford University to study computer science, and there you signed up for this class called ”Laptop Orchestra”…

»I studied Indian classical music as a child, but I was never that musical prodigy. Like, it was something I did for a long time, and I loved it, but it wasn’t something I would spend my whole day doing, so instead of going to conservatory I went to study computer science. So I took a long break from the music world. The only reason I even started getting back into the Indian classical stuff was because I built my own instrument in that class – and then my professor asked me to perform with it. And I was like, omg, I don’t know any other music than Indian classical music. And then he was like, fine, that’s chill. And then I got back into it in a completely different way. That was the first time I ever composed music. I didn’t even know I could do it before this happened. I don’t think I would have wanted to compose Indian classical music on any other instrument.«

Yes, you’ve once said that it wasn’t until you discovered the world of modular synthesizers that you understoodthe power of making music. What kind of power is that?

»It’s just like any other craft. Once you know how to do it, you can say what you’re thinking with it, right! Modular synthesizers work with my brain somehow. I studied computer science, and I think I have a very technical way of thinking. I like to think in systems, and am able to keep a mental picture of many things at once. I love how I buy a module, and then I get a manual with it. I love reading manuals!«And you keep all of these?»For sure, yeah! I have them all in my studio … and I also have the pdf-verions of them on my iPad. I like that kind of culture of it. It makes me feel part of a larger conversation—a community of people building things for one another.«

The ALICE Guest Book is an interview format where, through conversations with artists who have recently performed on our stage, we gather inspiration, advice, anecdotes, and even recommendations for other artists on the ALICE program that are worth experiencing. With the guest book, you can get closer to the personalities you may have just seen live and hear what drives them as musicians, people, and music fans. The guest book is a place where very different artists leave their mark side by side—together forming a picture of what it means to be a creative artist today.

You can read all the interviews in the guest book here on our Substack: substack.com/@alicecph.