Ronidkumar Chingangbam

Ronidkumar Chingangbam, popularly known by his stage name Akhu, is a lyricist, singer and founder of the folk-rock band Imphal Talkies and The Howlers.  He has worked with children in Manipur on a music project called A Native Tongue Called Peace. His band, Imphal Talkies, was one of the 32 bands chosen from 32 countries by In Place of War, a support system for community, artistic, creative, and cultural organisations in places of conflict and revolution, and, Un-convention, a series of grassroots music events that took place around the globe. This grant supports the dissemination of a musical performance, created by an earlier IFA grant where the songs explore notions of Manipuri identity embedded in lives, literature and folklore of the Meitei diaspora. 

In 2017, enabled with an IFA grant, Akhu travelled extensively across specific regions in Assam, Bangladesh and Tripura, interviewing the diaspora of the Meitei community. His attempt was to understand migration histories, their perceptions of Manipur and their engagement with other communities in their current locations. He collected oral histories, literature, folk songs and stories among the diaspora and studied the different musical expressions and instruments prevalent among them. This research provided material for Akhu to write and compose a set of songs that look at the idea of Manipur beyond its geographical boundaries. A music album with seven new compositions, titled Ema gi Wari (Stories of My Mother) was released and the performance premiered in Imphal in March 2019.

Supported by the current grant for dissemination, Akhu will now take this performance back to the places and the people whose stories are embedded in his songs. Along with his team of musicians, Akhu will perform in six locations - Lakhipur, Jaribom, Silchar and Hojai in Assam; and Lamabazar and Bhanugach in Bangladesh.  In each of these sessions, the performance will be followed by an interaction with the audience. Akhu imagines the music to eventually become a bridge between Manipur and the Manipuri communities of the diaspora. The performances will take place in intimate spaces, mostly in people’s homes. Interestingly, traditional Manipuri homes have always had performance spaces called Sumang and Sangoi where storytelling and other traditional performances would take place. These spaces, once closely connected with Manipuri identity, have, in the recent years, remained unused. Through this project, Akhu hopes to enliven these spaces and imbue them with new meaning and purpose through his contemporary music performance

Deliverables from this project to IFA will include photos and videos of the performances and the discussions.