Harshita Parekh discusses her new project blending Bach, Beethoven, and Bollywood

Harshita Parekh began teaching piano and music theory in 2019, driven by a desire to create new possibilities for students wanting to learn music. She set up her own practice BM Piano & Music Theory Lessons, offering piano and music theory lessons to aspiring musicians from beginner to advanced level. It has been running successfully for over five years now, evolving to include over 30 students. Harshita comes from a background where studying music is not common and often disregarded. Through her musical studies, she has always challenged this perception and has inspired many young children of all backgrounds to take a step into the arts. Harshita began her first steps in piano with teacher Yuriy Chubarenko, who inspired her to continue her musical journey professionally. She completed her BMus (Hons) at Trinity Laban, specialising in piano performance under the tutelage of Alexander Ardakov. She has performed at venues across London such as Blackheath Halls, the Romanian Cultural Institute, and Chapel of St Paul and St Peter. Her interests lie in the world of Music Education, leading her to study our MA in Music Education. She is the recipient of Trinity Laban’s Innovation Award 2024, receiving the prize for her project ‘Bollywood at the Piano’, which aims to combine her classical training with much loved, popular Bollywood tunes. We caught up with Harshita about her time at Trinity Laban, her recent projects, and her performance highlights.

What first drew you to the piano?

My parents signed me up to piano lessons and it’s something that’s stuck with me ever since. They believed that an art form of some sort was necessary, so they first enrolled me into dance classes, which I wasn’t so keen on. However, when I started school, I was introduced to different instruments and the piano stood out to me because it was the biggest one. I loved that you could make a lot of sounds on it. The piano was also shown in several TV cartoons, so I instantly thought: ‘that’s the one’. I was about six years old when I started learning. I’d been with the same teacher, Yuriy Chubarenko, for a number of years and one of the key reasons why I pursued the piano was because of him. He’s inspired me, he’s told me about his musical journey. I liked the things that he did, so that inspired me to follow a similar path as well. 

You recently taught students and performed your piano arrangements in India. Could you tell us more about this?

I visited an academy in Mumbai and led a series of workshops relating to music theory. It was a really nice experience because I’ve never taught or led music in India before. It was great to connect with people who come from the same town and area as I do.  

For the past five years, you’ve been running your practice, BM Piano & Music Theory Lessons. You’ve recently been organising a concert for the students, where they will perform their favourite Bollywood tunes and mandatory exam repertoire. What has running this practice and the annual concerts been like?

When I started the practice, I really didn’t know where it would go. I began with one or two students and now I’ve got about thirty to thirty five students that I teach. It’s been so nice because lots of the students come from similar backgrounds to me. It’s lovely that people from ethnic minority backgrounds are taking part in learning an instrument. This wasn’t quite the case when I started: the good thing is that it’s improving. The concerts that I’ve been running annually feel really positive – they’ve given students the spotlight to perform. I’ve kept the choice of repertoire open to them, so they choose what to play to their friends and family. The pupils have the chance to watch their fellow students perform, which is also valuable. I’ll be running another concert again this December. This will incorporate some Bollywood tunes that I have been working on for my Innovation Award. The concert repertoire will be an interesting mix of Christmas songs, Bollywood music, and mandatory exam pieces. 

Bollywood at the Piano – Bach, Beethoven and Bollywood!: what motivated you to create this project?

I’m a classically trained pianist and I’ve always played music by Bach and Beethoven: this has been a big part of my training. I’ve always felt that I should connect to my own musical culture, and create something using what I’ve learnt. Bollywood has been a very popular demand in my household. My family constantly asks: why do you play Bach and Beethoven all the time, but never play any of the tunes that we know? The project originated from this and their requests to play certain Bollywood songs. I thought it would be fun to notate these Bollywood tunes because they’re not in Western notation. Why not combine the two styles I’m familiar with and put them into practice? That’s how everything came about. I’m working on arrangements right now with some old and new tunes. I hope to get them out there soon, so I can play them at care homes and to different audiences. 

I’ve been working on an arrangement from this movie called Shershaah, and the title of the song is ‘Raataan Lambiyan’, translating to ‘Long Nights’. It narrates the story of a soldier going away to war, forced to leave fiancée behind, and he dies in battle. It’s a nostalgic song where his fiancée reminisces on the moments that they spent together, showing the troubles behind war. This was one of the songs I played at the Royal London Hospital, which has a lot of patients from ethnic minority backgrounds. No one recognised the Bach and Beethoven, but they recognised this song. People came up to me and asked lots of questions about it: this has been another source of inspiration for the project.  

What are some of the performance highlights from your time at Trinity Laban?

I’ve been here for four years and there’s been a lot of performance opportunities. One of the most memorable ones was in my third year when I got the chance to play a complete concerto in Blackheath Halls. I performed Haydn’s Piano Concerto in D Major – it was a wonderful experience that my parents got to be there for. I’d never played a full 45-minute concerto, so it was really exciting. I’ve loved collaborating with other artists as well, especially dancers. At Trinity Laban, everything feels more fluid compared to other institutions: you can really easily access people from other departments and work with them whenever you like.