Bickram, wife Jaya and son Adit on the lawn in front of their house; (Below) The spacious living room on the second floor, where the couple chill out and entertain guests

It’s all about the sound of music. I couldn’t hear any melodies playing when I stepped inside the sprawling four-storey home shared by Bickram Ghosh, his actor wife Jaya Seal, their son and his parents, but music was obviously all around me.

There were several tablas scattered around the ground floor hall where Bickram’s father holds classes. In a corner, there’s a cupboard full of more tablas and more percussion instruments placed on a sideboard. “We can’t ever let go of our tablas,” says Bickram smiling.

The lives of almost everyone in this building revolve around music. Bickram’s father Pandit Shankar Ghosh teaches on the ground floor. Sanjukta Ghosh, Bickram’s mother, a vocalist, holds classes on the first floor. The Ghoshs’ large four-storey home Dhwani has grown in fits and starts. It started out in 1996 as a small house with a large garden. “My father always wanted a house surrounded by greenery,” says Bickram.

But in 1998, Shankar pulled down the old building and rebuilt it as a two-storeyed home. “After I got married in 2004, I added two floors,” says Bickram, who is preparing to release two new albums, Electroclassical and Sunev.

There’s now a small patch of lawn, dominated on one side by a terracotta mural of the Goddess Saraswati, which cleverly conceals the garage wall. Sanjukta commissioned artist Gautam Chakraborty to create the mural. When the weather’s good you are likely to find Bickram’s three-year-old son, Adit playing on the lawn.

Bickram’s parents live on the first floor and the ground floor drawing room is where formal soirees are held. The family hosts a Saraswati Puja concert every year for around 400 guests and the son and father team up to play for their guests. Bickram and Jaya live on the second and third floors.

Sitting in the sprawling living area on the second floor on a rain-washed evening, Bickram recalls how this floor was once the terrace with just a kitchen-cum-bar that catered to his friends and their innumerable jam sessions.

The percussionist’s den on the third floor serves as a party zone for his friends; (Below) The studio where Bickram records music and also keeps his instruments

Today it is a spacious room with a high ceiling and comfortable, rust-coloured suede sofas and a laterite-coloured floor. “I always wanted my house to be stylish and funky, not formal,” says Bickram.

So the living room is actually a chill-out zone for listening to music and watching films on the giant 41-in LCD TV. “While I supervise the upkeep of the rooms, the decor for these two floors is Bickram’s,” says wife Jaya, who’s planning a comeback to films.

Everything about the house hints to the fact that the couple loves to entertain. The living room — with its cosy seating and well-appointed entertainment system — has hosted many parties and special guests. The parties sometimes move to his rooftop den fitted with all the ingredients for a perfect musical adda. Bickram’s celebrity guests have included percussionist Pete Lockett, jazz artiste Jesse Banister, singers Swagatalakshmi Dasgupta and Rupankar and directors Sooni Taraporewala, Riingo and Raj Basu.

Apart from the living area, the second floor has two bedrooms. A winding staircase from the living room leads to the terrace where Bickram has his workstation.

Bickram and his father’s tablas and other percussion instruments are preserved carefully in the ground floor hall; (Below) A collection of wooden vases decorate the living area on the second floor

The two rooms at the top of the house are used as a studio — where Bickram conducts his musical experiments — and his den.

The den has a masculine feel to it. There are wood panels on the walls and ceiling. Large glass windows look out into a rooftop garden. While a dark wooden statuette from South Africa adorns a corner table, a comfortable sofa-cum-bed is where guests relax. A music system, posters from the film Psycho and Godfather, and a bean bag pep up the room. “I use this room to meditate and relax,” says Bickram.

The studio is where much of Bickram’s music is turned out. “My albums like Beyond Rhythmscape, Drum Invasion, parts of Little Zizou, and more recently, Sunev and Repercussion Zone — were all spun in the home studio,' he explains.

The room is small but Bickram has Pro Tools — an expensive recording software — installed on his PC. Also, there are all kinds of percussion instruments from around the world including congas, frame drums, djembes and talking drums. There are also other ‘effect’ instruments like rainsticks and chimes in this musical haven. And yes, he plays them all.

Once out of the den, the roof leads to a meditation room in the north-eastern part of the house, where Bickram and Jaya say their prayers at least once a day. This is their ‘abode of peace’, surely.