Trina Basu & Arun Ramamurthy

Violinists, Trina Basu and Arun Ramamurthy, reimagine the potential of string chamber music with a unique sound both deeply intimate and cinematically expansive. Rooted in traditions of South Indian classical music, Western chamber music, and jazz, the duo is uniquely positioned to create a sound that feels ancient, orchestral, and contemporary or as The New Yorker put it “free-flowing and globe-spanning.” Combined with the duo's fluency in improvisation, there is a clear architecture to their sound that still gives space for the two violins to be delightfully indiscernible and shine individually. On their transformative debut album Nakshatra (SPINSTER 2023), Trina and Arun reach both into their past and high into the celestial realm, culminating in a lush and spiritual collaboration that bridges traditions and defies genres. A Sanskrit word evocative of constellations, stars, and interconnectedness, nakshatra perfectly encapsulates the album’s expansive sound, which quite surprisingly, is made by just two violins vibrating together in sublime harmony. Profoundly intimate yet bearing a cinematic gravitas, this work five years in the making conveys a feeling of two souls in conversation spanning hundreds of years into the past and the future.