19 February 2022

Swar stage, Indian Music Experience Museum, Bengaluru

Creating a platform for local youth talent at the Indian Music Experience Museum.

Using online platforms and working collaboratively, the Indian Music Experience Museum's Youth Advisory Board organised Swar Stage – an open call talent show. This event was an opportunity for young people to showcase their talent, for the Youth Board to develop skills through organising the event and for the Indian Music Experience Museum to engage with a new audience.

We had two objectives for this event. First, we wanted to garner publicity for the Indian Music Experience Museum, specifically amongst the community of young musicians. Second, we wanted to provide a platform for budding local musical talent.

The event was structured as an 'open-call talent show'. The Youth Advisory Board sent out an open call to musicians in Bengaluru, asking them to send one-minute clips of themselves performing. The YAB screened the submissions to select the top ten. On the day of the event, the performers were invited to perform live on a Zoom webinar for 3-5 minutes each.

The event

The event was anchored by two members of the board, and the performers were called up sequentially to present their music to the audience. Each performer was requested to perform between three to five minutes.

During the event, the Director of the Indian Music Experience Museum stepped into the spotlight for a few minutes to speak to the audience about the IME’s vision with their youth initiatives. All ten performances took place on the day.

The event was planned and executed by a team of 17 high school students. They worked in two teams within the larger group – one team worked on the Indian Music Experience Museum's social media presence, and the other worked on the planning and execution of the event. The workload was divided largely on the basis of personal interest, so they were able to produce consistent and high-quality work.

You can find out more about the event on the official Instagram page of the YAB

The event was exciting, enjoyable, and most importantly, it panned out as we had envisioned it to. I had the opportunity to work with both the backend operations and host the programme on the evening of the event. I can now appreciate the amount of effort that goes into organizing a public event, and I am certain that the skills I gathered here will supplement my future endeavors.

Young musical artist from Bengaluru.

The outcome

Many of the performers heard of the IME for the first time when they came across this event, and this is indeed the first time the museum has provided a platform for local youth in this way. Through word-of-mouth, the event will help spread awareness about the IME as an institution that recognizes the value in connecting with the local youth.

Besides the event-management skills gained in the two months of working on the event, there was a broader development in understanding how a large team works together in a professional environment. As we got further into the project, you could see the difference made by everyone being more proactive in taking up work and respecting deadlines, no matter how small the task was. This can be applied in professional situations that many of the group will be bound to encounter, or when working informally with teams of people when a target needs to be met.