Family members: Pritpal Ajimal

I met Pritpal Ajimal (Swayoftheverses) for a very nice little interview. I've been deeply touched by both his graphical and musical skills. Let's chat!

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I thought I’d be happy with a couple of people tuning in, at least that would have been a nice start and then I could develop and become really professional by, you know, 10 episodes or something. But it’s almost been a crash course for me because I’ve had to do really well in just two episodes and the amount of attention that it’s received has been absolutely amazing and not just from friends and family, from colleagues and people in the music industry too. To get comments from people like Mr Scruff, Charlie Dark and Coco Maria is just like, wow, this is really mad.

Pritpal Ajimal, Fad Magazine interview, 29/03/2022

The first Balearic Breakfast Show of 2023 started with a beautiful mix by Pritpal Ajimal (also known in our Family as swayoftheverses - click here to see his page on beehivv). Digital Artist (designer) and Radio Show Host, Pritpal is well-known in the South Asian Arts sector. Apart from creating promotional materials, he has also been involved in photography assignments and has been working with Manasamitra since the inception of the company, designing the website, branding, and promotional materials.

Listen to Pritpal's mix here during the first 2023 Balearic Breakfast show :

Also, if you want to discover Pritpal's creative talent, head over to Fadmagazin's website as he talks with Radio Presenter, DJ & Writer, Maria Hanlon about his exhibition Lines #1, which took place at Above the clouds. His mixes are available here.

1) Dear Pritpal, thank you so much for being here with us on the Balearic Breakfast Blog! 2023 was a beautiful musical year for the Balearicans, starting with your guest mix during the year's first show! Can you tell us a little bit more about your childhood? What did you listen to when growing up?

My parents always had music on, either traditional sikh hymns, north Indian Film Music or Radio 1 or Radio 2, so I had a very broad range of music to listen to. At the age of 13 I got the opportunity to learn Raga Based Music when Dharambir Singh came to teach at the Leeds College of Music.

2) You have quite an incredible professional life! You are an independent and Professional Graphic Designer. Can you tell us more about it?

I completed a degree in Software Development and was working as a programmer; but always felt the urge to do something creative, I had the chance to do a leaflet for south asian arts organisation and did an illustration for the amazing tabla player Pandit Sharda Sahai - head of the Benares style of tabla - as a part of the commission. My journery into graphic design started from that one job.

3) I saw some of your stunning graphic realisations, which I shared back then on the blog. How do you approach that part of your creative Journey?

I needed a creative outlet that wasn't anything to do with client work, so I decided to explore the journey of creativity, of learning, that act of repetition, using introspection and understanding of each step, that then allows implementation in the next iteration; taking you from simple first steps into an understanding and mastery of much more complex skills. For the medium I decided to depict a graphical representation of concepts, phrases and movements within different ragas, using a limited palette of colours within Adobe Illustrator.

4) We also know that you're a DJ (a member of the Melomaniacs; you played at the last and previous We Out Here festival in the "Love Dancin' tent" alongside Colleen and other great DJs we know and profoundly love). How did that part of your journey start, and do you approach a DJ set the same way when working on a graphic design?

I think like most people I've always made mixtapes, but with digital music files it became infinitely easier to curate a mixtape and burn it onto a CD, but I had never really thought to become a DJ. Charlie Dark was djing at a space outside the O2 Arena in North Greenwich and it was an opportunity to meet him in real life after listening to him and many other DJs on WorldwideFM throughout lockdown.

Whilst I was speaking to someone else, my wife told him 'I should be on the radio', and he asked me if I'd like to try out with a station - RunDemRadio - he had set up and was running every weekend. The seed was planted there and then. I was very fortunate to meet many, many people along this journey who have helped me realise this dream of first presenting a radio show, to eventually DJing at the We Out Here festival. Having the opportunity to ask questions and observe other amazing djs craft a set together has been like going to DJ school!

5) A strange but very Balearic question for you: when creating, do you feel like "losing your mind", meaning being disconnected for a moment from the world around you? Do you feel like ideas are pouring out of your soul, or do you have a more rational way of working things out?

I always use a combination of an outline of a plan, with intuition, to have a basic understanding of what I'd like to achieve and then leave the rest to the universe to guide me.

6) Lastly, what does Colleen's sentence "And remember, just be Balearic" evoke to you?

To have the ability to appreciate the beauty and magic of nature, from which everything we do originates.