Contextualizing the voice of a female pop artist: Western music and Indian modernity

Abstract

ABSTRACT Dubbed a ‘fusion pioneer’, Asha Puthli straddled multiple cultural mediums and created an alternative niche for herself as a global performer. By charting her trajectory as a musician, the genres that influenced her, the rise and proliferation of her music in relation to the cultural landscape of India during that period, this paper, which is structured around an interview with her, tries to understand what made her different from her contemporaries. How did her Indian roots supplement her in navigating the global music arena? Did she, as a female performer singing Western music challenge entrenched notions of femininity in India? By situating her as a performer who blurred boundaries and opened avenues of alternative resistance to set cultural patrimonies, her global presence and its impact on the Indian music scene are discussed, contextualising her work in the cultural ecosystem of India as it embraced modernity, inscribing Puthli as a hidden pop icon of the 70s.