Two minutes into my conversation with pianist and BBC New Generation Artist, Kunal Lahiry, I found myself making a case for long-distance interviews. There was something epistolary about our exchange, which occurred in bits and bursts alongside the artiste’s everyday life.

When we begin our correspondence, Lahiry is having his morning coffee at a feminist cat cafe in Paris. He sends me a picture of a chonky grey cat. My tabby, a doppelgänger, rubs her ears against the cell phone as we begin discussing Lahiry’s powerful queer reimagining of Franz Schubert’s Winterreise in which he takes the dramatic scope and psychological landscape of the Schubert/Wilhelm Müller song cycle and situates it in a contemporary narrative for the queer identity and journey; a cycle of 24 new songs by queer poets and composers.

The first commission, he tells me, came from this opportunity he had with BBC Radio 3 as part of their New Generation scheme. “These four songs spoke of their journey as trans and queer people in Berlin in winter, which is very dark, very grey and very grim. It was about how young queer people found refuge in techno clubs and the encounters one would have with another anonymously and briefly in these dark spaces.”

His voice is delicate and unhurried against the cafe’s clamour—the mechanical frothing of coffee, the resonant thud of cups, occasional clinks and a whole lot of laughter spilling over from nearby tables. It was easy to imagine Lahiry in this setting, even easier to imagine him performing in this cafe, not the first venue one thinks of for a classical music recital.

This essentially encapsulates a dichotomy Lahiry often navigates—a contrast between conventional classical spaces and unconventional settings. “How does the audience’s reception differ in these contrasting settings, and does it affect your artistic expression?” I asked, curious. “I love it. I love performing in non traditional concert spaces, because it kind of subverts classical music and gives it a new sense of modernity and immediacy and strips it of all of its social classist values. It just allows music to touch people,” says the artiste. Lahiry is also an Equilibrium Young Artist, Samling Artist, Yehudi Menuhin Live Music Now Artist and Britten Pears Young Artist.

Lahiry makes an effort to look out for these spaces, despite the hurdles—subpar acoustics, the not-so great instruments, interruptions from outdoor and ambient noise—because this allows classical music to thrive in an informal atmosphere. More importantly, it allows him to not worry about interpretation, being accurate enough or being compared to recorded versions of the music. These spaces, he concludes, allow music to breathe. 

For the duration of our exchange, Lahiry was between his London performances and opted to hop on a train to be with his boyfriend in Paris instead of taking a quick flight back to his base in Berlin. The first time Lahiry realised the power of inclusive spaces was during a charity event for queer refugees in Berlin in 2022. It was a space teeming with diversity—drag queens, pole dancers, singers and Lahiry on his piano. “I decided to offer a 15- to 20-minute-song with a singing partner I collaborate with. The text was about being African American and queer,” he recounts. “It was a powerful moment when the music stopped on the loudspeakers, everything quieted down abruptly, and it was just me and the singer without any microphones.” He paints a vivid scene—a congregation, many unacquainted with live classical music, suddenly exposed to familiar faces sharing a stage, having interacted with them just moments before. “Many had never heard live classical music before and certainly not played by people who looked like them. They came to me after and said how healing it was and how they wanted more access to it.” In 2023, he spearheaded Queer Song Fest at St. George’s in Bristol, a boundary-pushing step in making classical music accessible to the LGBTQ community.

As Lahiry narrates this on the other end of the cell phone, Salman Toor’s painting ‘Music Room’ flashes in my mind. The fluid-like stance of the figures engaged in private moments. The pianist, the violinist and the musicians don’t demand to take centre stage. They are dotted across the room, casting an aura, a warmth that draws people together. In Lahiry’s words and Toor’s strokes, music is about coming together, about inclusion and a sense of connection.

Lahiry makes us want to trust the audience. Especially one that has not been exposed to Western classical music. “We feel the need to play very classical standard repertoire. We worry if they can sit through it, if we should stop and explain it to them. But it’s the opposite. They are so present, so deeply connected, so open and so enthusiastic. It is always interesting to hear their reactions. It challenges our idea of a modern-day audience.”

Later that evening, I play a recording of Trans*cendental Encounters that Lahiry had shared where he collaborated with performance artist Lyra Pramuk. Listening to it felt like blooming. Like blooming into oneself. And as I waltzed from my dishwasher to the crockery cabinets, I realised how we make the mistake of thinking of the audience and the venue as two separate entities. Lahiry’s words had me examining their interdependence. It struck me why he has taken it as his mission to reimagine a concert experience where communities can experience classical music without the confines of conventionality.

When Lahiry picks up the conversation next, he is waiting at the subway. The metallic screech of brakes and the muffled announcements punctuate his responses. He gets on the train and I can hear the door close behind him when we get to his upcoming performance at the NCPA. “I do find a level of liberation and incredible energy when music is being made by two people, but that being said, I have been wanting to explore what kind of music I would make if I didn’t have anyone else onstage with me.”

The performance at the NCPA will be his first solo concert since 2015. Here are a few words from the artiste for his listeners in Mumbai. “Take some time beforehand and listen to your fav music, have a drink if you like, put on your fav outfit. Treat this as a time out just for you, a mini self-care retreat. If you don’t know the music on the programme and feel the need to educate yourself, go ahead! But [all you need to do is] come with open ears and hearts, ready to discover.”