::: Star Weekend Magazine :::

Event

Creating a Cyber Portal in music

Elita Karim

It was a night shimmering with stars from the word of music. Musicians around the city gathered at The White Castle in Banani to mark the .Loud launching ceremony by amadergaan.com, a Bangladeshi music portal. Pronounced as 'dot Loud', the project is a joint venture of AmaderGaan Ltd and Sound Machine Ltd aimed to promote musicians all over Bangladesh and around the world via Internet and various other activities. Several artists and musicians who became a part of the .Loud project will be receiving free web hosting space and domain from amadergaan.com, a 20% discount on recording costs and practice pads at Sound Machine and even official promotion of the respective bands.

An unplugged moment with Arbovirus

Sponsored by Banglalink, about 260 guests attended the event, which included musicians from both the underground and the mainstream in Bangladesh. "It is absolutely wonderful to see all these people under one roof," exclaims a guest. "We listen to their music at home and read about them in magazines. AmaderGaan has definitely done wonders bringing them all together and having them interact."

Hosted by Alif Alauddin, the vocalist of the band Pentagon, around 38 member bands and artists of .Loud were acknowledged at the event and presented free web spaces, which included prominent musicians like Ayub Bacchu from LRB, James from Nagar Baul, Habib Wahid, Warfaze, Bappa Mazumder, Ajob, Arbovirus, RaaGa, Breach, Cryptic Fate, Fuad Almuqtadir, Kronic, Pentagon, Reborn, Shironaamhin, Stentorian, Triloy, Yaatri, The Watson Brothers and many more.

The project is affiliated to Sound Machine Ltd, a leading sound equipment sales and rental, audio and video production and musical event management company. Sound Machine also has a recording studio, music store chain and a music school. After an extraordinary laser show displayed by Sound Machine, Thein Han Maung Titi, the Managing Director of the company spoke about the need to promote the channel of communication between musicians around the world and the use of modern equipment to fulfil the technical needs of musicians. "We also want to have the new and upcoming musicians to interact with us so that there can be an exchange of new ideas and inputs," says Titi. Everyone gathered for an unplugged moment, at the end of the programme, with Arbovirus, Ajob, Nemesis and other musicians who were present at the event.

AmaderGaan.com is probably the most popular music portal for Bangladeshi music and Bangladeshis to come together and discuss their thoughts and opinions. A self financed organisation dedicated to promote and expand Bangladeshi music all over the world, it has around 8500 members creating a close knit cyber family of music lovers. AmaderGaan has also organised several concerts, one of which was a charity concert for the musical legend of Bangladesh, Abdur Rahman Boyati. A huge fund was accumulated through the concert, which helped him in his medical treatment.

Directors of AmaderGaan and representatives of Sound Maching Ltd

Run by Faysal Islam, the MD of the organisation and Safwan Khan, the Deputy MD from all the way in Canada, these two young men in their early twenties had begun AmaderGaan.com a few years ago with just a handful of members. Eventually, the society grew and many of the renowned musicians of the country became members as

Alif Alauddin hosting the programme

well. "Music lovers in Bangladesh and the Bangladeshis living abroad tend to visit amadergaan.com to update themselves on various issues, especially music and its development in Bangladesh," says Faysal. "Besides the fact that we post the latest news regarding, album releases, concerts and other tit bits about musicians, the members also make it a point to voice out their opinions openly in the forums. They respond to albums, a certain piece of music they have heard, a movie they have watched or even a book they have read."

According to Rubayya Noor Nabila, the Director of Pubic Relations Officer of the organisation, the .Loud project was launched to actually bring all the Bangladeshi musicians closer to the internet. "There are thousand of Bangladeshis across the globe who want to know more about musicians here in Bangladesh," says Nabila. "In foreign countries, musicians have their own databases online, which makes it easier for everyone around the world to get to know more about them. Since we have a dedicated server of our own, we thought of providing the domain and the space to the musicians so that they can have some sort of a an identity online for all to see all over the world." Links of these musicians and artistes can be found on the official website of amadergaan.com.

Faizul Khan Tanim, the Director of News and Media of AmaderGaan, says that technical support will also be given to the musicians. "There are some who might not be able to update the site because of technical knowledge or lack of time," he explains. "In this case, the artistes would just have to let us know the information they want to include in their websites so that our technical support can take care of it instead."

AmaderGaan has definitely taken an encouraging step for the musicians, especially the young musicians and music lovers in Bangladesh to become more aware and accepted globally.