(Above and below right) The O&M campaign for The Calcutta School of Music

O&M Calcutta is on a roll. After bagging the Calcutta Agency of the Year award at War of Ideas, Creative Excellence Awards ’08, the agency has taken a leap forward to bring home Calcutta’s first Cannes award for advertising. An innovative media campaign for The Calcutta School of Music fetched Ogilvy & Mather a bronze Lions in the category Best Use of Ambient Media at the 55th Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival on Tuesday evening.

O&M is the first agency from the city to win a ‘metal’ at one of the world’s most prestigious advertising festivals. “To win a metal at Cannes is any advertising person’s dream. It’s like winning the Oscar in advertising. Last year we had a nomination but this year we could turn it into an award. It feels great,” beamed Sharmista Dev, general manager, O&M Calcutta.

Conceived and conceptualised by team Ogilvy comprising Sumanto Chattopadhyay, Sukhendu Mukherjee, Soubhik Payra and Jayatsen Bhattacharya, the campaign titled Bach Gavotte was an out-of-the-box initiative designed to attract music enthusiasts and prospective students around the city to learn Western classical music at The Calcutta School of Music.

“Since the school has never been into much advertising, we thought of taking an idea out of the traditional media and presenting it differently,” says Jayatsen Bhattacharya, creative controller, O&M Calcutta.

It was sometime in November last year when Western classical notations from Bach, Haydn and Mozart’s musical works were strung on overhead wires against the sky to create staves at various stretches in the city. The piece displayed on the wires was then played through sound boxes placed inside kiosks with messages inviting passers-by to learn Bach, Haydn and Mozart, giving it an edge over conventional media vehicles.

“It was very well received by people curious to know about the sound and the visuals. It was both innovative and cost effective in reaching out to a wider mass and breaking the elitist tag attached to Western classical music,” explained Bhattacharya.

The Calcutta School of Music received more than 700 phone calls and requests for 250 enrolment forms following the campaign. “The response, which is the real yardstick, was overwhelming and added to the magic of our campaign,” said Bhattacharya.