Brother-sister duo Charisma and Calvin Dixon were the two Calcuttans on the red carpet at the 57th Grammy Awards on Monday morning. Currently based in LA, Charisma, 17, and Calvin, 25, — from the Sher-e-Punjab (Theatre Road) family — are hoping to be backed by Happy man Pharrell Williams! Over to the siblings...
How exciting was it to witness the Grammy Awards live as special invitees?
Charisma: The Grammys was fabulous! It was our dream.
Calvin: More than just fabulous. To see Stevie Wonder, Barry Gibbs and artistes and legends we’ve been listening to for generations on the red carpet!
Charisma: I saw some of my favourite artistes like Taylor Swift, Ed Sheeran, Sam Smith, Sia! And how can we forget how outstanding Pharrell Williams’s performance was and how unique was what he wore!
Calvin: Oh man! These moments felt like a beginning to our dreams and our dreams have just begun. A lot more is heading our way. We hope for the best. We met Pharrell Williams but can’t say more because a lot is under wraps until everything’s official but it’ll be great news soon!
Tell us about your journey from singing in Calcutta’s churches to making it to the Grammys....
Calvin: Our journey started when I moved to Bombay to do film studies and recording arts at SAE College. I already had some songs of my own that I wanted to record and there were producers I found who introduced us to YRF Studios. Charisma was 13 then, I was 21 and we recorded our first single Lonely Soul. Charisma was still living in Calcutta so she flew to Bombay for the recording. It was mastered in the US and then we shot a music video in Australia because that is where our big sister Collette Dixon lives. We wanted to show the social issues in Australia, musicians on the streets trying to play for a living. I shot the video myself. We got amazing feedback after we came back and released it on YouTube.
Immediately, in three months, we did Healing Rain which gained a lot of recognition and that’s when we got called to the US because a US label in Oklahoma called TMG (Tate Music Group) that has produced gospel albums of artistes like Kenny Rogers and Billy Graham spotted us and wanted to sign us on. The funniest part was that they didn’t even know that we were Indians. When they got in touch with us, they told us ‘Why don’t you come to our office tomorrow?’ And I was like ‘Tomorrow? It’s a 24-hour flight!’ Then they asked us ‘Why, where do you live?’ And when we said ‘India’, they couldn’t believe it. They were still open to meeting us so we decided to go on and meet them. The label wanted to sign us for marketing and distribution so we decided to go in for a full album, a gospel album. We completed the album in 2014 and released it in June. That’s when we sent our tracks to the Grammys for consideration and our song Healing Rain got shortlisted in the Top 20 category. We didn’t get a nomination but since we got shortlisted we received an invitation. It was a great feeling and an honour to be there representing our country as the first gospel band to be there.
And how did Pharrell Williams come into the picture?
Calvin: We had just finished touring churches in the US from the East Coast to the West Coast when we also decided to go for an acting audition in LA. There was this management team Carman Hall Entertainment that really liked Charisma but wanted her to brush up on her acting skills. That’s when I walked in and I told them that she sings as well. So she sang and when they heard her they were really shocked! They loved her voice. They wanted her to go meet the head of the company called Morgan who’s our manager currently. Morgan wanted Cassius D Caleb who wrote Bruno Mars’s Just The Way You Are, which also won a Grammy, to write for Charisma while he also had some of his own songs. When Morgan introduced us to Cassius, he had songs he was waiting to give to an upcoming artiste. He had a song called We Could Do Anything and hoping that Charisma would nail that song. He was the man we had to impress. When Charisma went for an interview with him, he wanted to know everything about her.
Charisma: I was so so excited and nervous at the same time.
Calvin: He was giving us advice and asking us questions. Then he asked us to sing, so Charisma sang.
Charisma: And he was totally taken aback. He told me that my voice was very unique. That whenever I sing I put my foot out and I roar, which was so dope!
Calvin: He said, ‘I don’t know about your background but you seem humble and it’s in our voice. That just shows how good you could be as an individual artiste.’ It was great to meet him and hear his songs. He hasn’t given that track to anyone yet. In fact Lorde and Jessie J wanted that track but we’ve got our fingers crossed. Hope we get it.
Calvin: Then Cassius and all of them got together and discussed that Pharrell would be the best bet for Charisma’s publicity since Pharrell is really fond of working with women artistes. Since he’s the dude right now in whatever productions he’s doing, it’s a hit. They’ve approached him and are waiting to sign the final deal so yes, it’s going to be Pharrell Williams publicising Charisma and she will be in his videos so it’s going to be very exciting for us. At the moment Pharrell is in a consignment deal with us but once they decide on the percentage and all that jazz we’ll know how exactly it’s going to go. Our management team has met him already and discussed things with him. We’re also in talks with Jeff Bhaskar, who’s produced Locked Out of Heaven, Uptown Funk, for his great production skills. Really hoping for the best.
You were in Calcutta last week when you performed at Someplace Else...
Calvin: We had come to India in November touring around Mumbai, Pune and Goa. We didn’t have a place to sing in Calcutta. We were performing at Quest Mall when Gautam Singh of Someplace Else approached us. Gautam knew me for a long time since I had done a few gigs there previously with my band Eternity but with Charisma it was the first time. We were the first ones to sing gospel at Someplace Else, so it felt really good.
Tell us about your Calcutta connect....
Calvin: My father owns Sher-e-Punjab on Theatre Road, opposite Kala Mandir, that makes some great Indian and Chinese food. It’s also what makes us big foodies!
Charisma: But I can’t touch any of that now... I’m on a diet! Till Class VI I studied in Loreto House and from VII to X, I was in South City International School.
Calvin: I went to St. Xavier’s Collegiate School.
Charisma: It was a tight schedule when I was in Class X and we were travelling to Kerala, Bombay, Australia recording and shooting our music videos. Class XI onwards I started home schooling because we started travelling to America.
Calvin: We were scared about Charisma’s boards but thankfully she did well and our parents have really supported our mission. That really helped us. We come from a humble background. We used to live on Elliot Road. We are thankful to everyone who’s praised our songs. It’s the only reason we’ve come this far.
How did you get into gospel singing?
Calvin: We have never been trained in music. I’ve been trained in keys and that’s what I played live till I was 18. Then I started doing a lot of homework learning stuff on the Internet. All the singing we learnt was from the church. Charisma started singing from the age of eight and I started playing the keys at the church when I was 15.
Charisma: It was only at 13 that I started training my vocals.
Calvin: The vocal exercises were all that I used to download online. There was never a professional vocal teacher for us. We carry on with this exercise because hard work is what carries you.... Our music and videos are very centred on people who have been affected in life by major issues. Our last music video on Help Me Find A Way is about all the rape victims in India and around the world. Healing Rain is based on the true story of my sister meeting with an accident while our first music video was about homelessness and musicians playing on the streets. In India it’s difficult doing gospel but our parents helped us financially to record our first album Jesus In The Mirror at the Yash Raj Studios.
How would you describe Charisma’s musical style?
Calvin: Very unique. Our manager says that her voice is very warm with a texture of Shakira, yet very young. They find an influence of Ellie Goulding and Taylor Swift and because of her unique texture they plan to name her the “Indian Shakira”. At first I created songs to suit her voice with pop vocals on a rock ballad sound. Then I started experimenting with other genres and she’s very versatile. We’ve done reggae, EDM and a lot of other experiments. Charisma is my brand and I will be doing the songwriting and production with Pharrell once that happens while Charisma will sing.
What’s the positive and the negative of a brother-sister duo making music together?
Calvin: Since we’ve always been playing together everywhere, be it at church or anywhere, we have bonded and virtually grown together in terms of musical knowledge. We do have our fights like any other brother-sister but we fight about being successful and not getting distracted or diverted.
Who or what are your musical favourites?
Charisma: I love Sia, Bruno Mars, John Mayer, Taylor Swift.
Calvin: And I really like Imagine Dragons, Bruno Mars, who I think is the best live performer in our generation, John Mayer, Bastille and Ed Sheeran.
Both of you are so young. Are you ready to take your chances with music alone or do you have a back-up plan?
Calvin: I do films and Charisma acts. We have a short film on YouTube called The Foot (Mission Impossible 3) and that is how I got selected by Fox to work as an assistant director. Film is a passion and that is my back-up option, and I would also consider being a producer. No matter what happens we’ll still go at it and keep trying.
What’s your calendar for 2015 like?
Calvin: Looks like it’s going to be pretty busy. We are heading back to the studio after this. Consecutive recordings of different tracks. We’ll also be touring UK, China, Indonesia and hopefully we’ll be in Calcutta soon to see our family. Our parents will be visiting us this summer.
And when in Calcutta, we’re sure to find you at…?
Calvin and Charisma: 10.30am mass at St. Thomas Church. That’s where we started singing years ago.
OH CALCUTTA
FAMILY: Owns Sher-e-Punjab on Theatre Road, opposite Kala Mandir
SCHOOL: Loreto House and then South City International School, for Charisma. St. Xavier’s Collegiate School, for Calvin
CHURCH: St. Thomas Church, where they started their gospel singing
Mohua Das
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