Description
Seating is limited. Reserve your seat in advance to pick where you sit ($6 fee). Join the standby line for remaining seats on the day of the concert, free of charge. Line begins at 6:30 p.m., with entry at 7:20 p.m. if seats are available.
SUNNY JAIN’S Wild Wild East
Sunny Jain’s Wild Wild East (Smithsonian Folkways, 2020) encompasses myriad facets of Jain’s identity both as a first-generation South Asian–American and as a global musician, from his own family’s immigration story to his eclectic musical upbringing. In recasting the immigrant—steeped in the courage to leave a familiar homeland for a new beginning—as the modern-day cowboy and cowgirl, Jain sources musical inspiration from the scores of Bollywood classics and Spaghetti Westerns, Punjabi folk traditions, jazz improvisation, and rollicking psychedelic styles. Sunny Jain’s Wild Wild East is rooted in the contemporary global soundscape, singing in a new voice, “I am large, I contain multitudes.” In 2022, the band embarked on a milestone tour to Pakistan, headlining Music Mela in Islamabad and the Lahore Jazz Festival and performing with master Sufi dhol drummers Nasir Sain Wajdani and Sain Tanveer. Just months prior, the group performed on the National Mall in Washington, DC, for the renowned Smithsonian Folklife Festival.
SUNNY JAIN
The career of Sunny Jain is a celebration of cultural diaspora: deep-rooted tradition that ripples outward, changing—and being changed by—the cultures that it touches. He is a composer, drummer, dhol player, and thought leader. In 2022, Jain joined Planet Drum for their first show in fifteen years, playing alongside drumming legends Mickey Hart, Zakir Hussain, and Giovanni Hidalgo.
In 2021, Jain released Phoenix Rise, a collaborative effort featuring over fifty artists, such as Arooj Aftab, Michael League (Snarky Puppy), Adrian Quesada (Black Pumas), Endea Owens (The Late Show with Stephen Colbert) and Joe Russo (jam band darling). Accompanying the full digital album is a seventy-two-page physical book that combines music, art, photography, and planet-based recipes, all in the name of social justice. As executive producer and music producer, Jain partnered with the Center for Constitutional Rights to fundraise and advocate for the work they do.
Called the “Hendrix of dhol” by Manchester Salon (United Kingdom), Jain is most known for founding the pioneering band Red Baraat, a frenzied fusion of bhangra, hip-hop, jazz, rock, and sheer, unbridled energy that NPR has called “the best party band in years.” The band has performed across the globe, including stops at the White House during President Barack Obama's term, the London Olympics, TED, Austin City Limits, Bonnaroo, Luxembourg Philharmonic, Peter Gabriel’s WOMAD festivals (Australia, New Zealand, Spain, UK), and Padma Lakshmi’s Blossom Ball. Jain was also the drummer for the acclaimed Sufi rock band Junoon for several years, recording the single “Open Your Eyes” with Peter Gabriel and performing at the Nobel Peace Prize concert in 2007, Srinagar University in Kashmir in 2009, and the General Assembly of the United Nations in 2009.
Jain is developing his first musical theatrical piece called Love Force—supported by the National Endowment for the Arts, New York State Council on the Arts, and MAP Fund. His entry to theater began in 2018 when he served as musical director to the OBIE award–winning London-based play The Jungle, and he later became music producer to Mira Nair’s Monsoon Wedding, The Musical in 2023.
This performance is part of the Bill and Mary Meyer Concert Series.
Photography credit to Sachyn Mital, courtesy of Unlimited Myles.
Cost
$6
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Accessibility & Accommodations
Wheelchair accessible
