Circle of Love, a Chennai-based independent music community platform that is passionate about developing India’s artistic diversity, launched the first season of Centre Stage, featuring performances by six popular homegrown indie acts. Premiered on October 22 2020, the season features the talents of The Easy Wanderlings, Mali, Jbabe, Profanyty, Stevie and Henny. Circle of Love will also be a YouTube channel which will host all of the content produced from performances to music videos.
Produced entirely in-house, each episode of Centre Stage was shot at locations around Chennai during the lockdown and streams weekly across Circle of Love’s social media platforms.
Circle of Love was founded by Sameer Sethi, an award-winning entertainment innovator with over two decades of experience. Sethi’s work has included leading cultural events such as Sunburn, Sensation India, Filmfare Awards, Mirchi Music Awards, A. R
Rahman Live, as well as international performances for artists including Anirudh. The platform is also spearheaded by Manny, a renowned underground music expert and one of the most established DJ’s in India today.
Speaking on Centre Stage, Sameer Sethi says, “Both audiences and artists connected to the indie music scene have been missing out on the performance experience this year, and we wanted to find a way to bring it to them. The artists are supported through this venture, which potentially widens their own reach, and the audiences get to enjoy their music safely, free of cost and from the comfort of their homes. Centre Stage is only the first of many initiatives and solutions that we have planned at Circle of Love for artists, venues and fans alike.”
Performances and events such as the Centre Stage series showcase the culmination of Circle of Love’s larger work in the community, which is about connecting artists to resources that allows them to develop their work. As Manny says, “What we do at Circle of Love goes far beyond curating performances. We are committed to giving artists our engagement at every stage of the creation process, whether that’s building bridges across genres for collaborative work, facilitating workshops and residencies, producing videos and much more. We provide infrastructural support and creative, administrative and technical expertise from the ideation stage onwards.”
Season 1 of Centre Stage can be enjoyed on Facebook (fb.com/circleoflovein) and Instagram (@circleoflovein) weekly. This has commenced from Thursday 22 October 2020 onwards.