Dhols at the Oscars
Judging from everyone’s facebook status (yes, this is what it has come to), people are excited about the numerous awards Slumdog Millionaire won at last night’s Oscars (yes, Jodha, I watch the Oscars too). As was anticipated, the rag-to-riches film won Picture of the Year. Among it’s other awards was A.R Rahman’s win for Best Song, Jai Ho.
As anticipated, the Oscars presented this catergory’s nominations by a live song/dance number (the other songs nominated were another SM number, O Saya and Down to Earth from the film Wall-E which was sung by the lovely John Legend). The stage was full of multicultural bollywood-style dancers and instrumentalists. And if you looked closely enough, scattered throughout the audience were dholis. I tried to dig up some information about who these dhol players were and found nothing on the internet (PR anyone?). However, thanks to the fact that punjabi kids know what’s going on with all things bhangra-related (not necessarily a good thing may I add), I found out that the group of guys playing the dhol were the north american group called Dhol Nation Jess & Jag Tooray and Shawn Khalsi (see the comments below for the discussion of who it was – like I said, some PR would have straightened this out). Since the Oscars were quite clearly on a date with India last night, it was nice to see the dhol exposure. This is the best video I could find (start watching at 2:45, and again at 5:40). If anyone has any other information about last night’s performance – please share it with us.
15 Responses to “Dhols at the Oscars”
Yea! This was great!!! Great exposure for those dhol players.
Yea! This was great!!! Great exposure for those dhol players.
The dhol group are the brother and sister duo Jess and Jag Tooray, who are in fact Punjabi Sikh.
The dhol group are the brother and sister duo Jess and Jag Tooray, who are in fact Punjabi Sikh.
props to the dhol players.
but Slumdog straight up sucked.
props to the dhol players.
but Slumdog straight up sucked.
Vizio, was that the group playing on stage or in the audience? Do you have any more info?
Vizio, was that the group playing on stage or in the audience? Do you have any more info?
[…] Sundari on Dhols at the Oscars […]
The brother and sister duo are actually Jess and Malinder…Jag is there little brother and joined up with the crew as well.
The brother and sister duo are actually Jess and Malinder…Jag is there little brother and joined up with the crew as well.
the dhol foundation have been doing gigs like this for over 20 years-
the dhol foundation have been doing gigs like this for over 20 years-
the dhol foundation have been doing gigs like this for over 20 years
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Yeah, yeah, we know Lee, the US is always a couple of steps behind the UK
the dhol foundation have been doing gigs like this for over 20 years
::
Yeah, yeah, we know Lee, the US is always a couple of steps behind the UK