My work explores rhythm through the lens of Indian Classical Music, using its highly developed rhythmic system to better understand, feel, and teach rhythm in Western music.

Indian Classical Music has precise way of thinking about time — particularly around subdivision, proportional relationships, metric modulation, and structured improvisation. These ideas offer a rich vocabulary for concepts like pulse hierarchy, rhythmic permutation, displacement, and cadential phrases that are underdeveloped in much of Western music. By bringing these tools into conversation with Western repertoire and practice, I'm working to build a cross-cultural framework that opens up new ways of thinking about meter and phrasing for musicians.

A key part of this work is developing a practical method for Western musicians to internalize rhythm through the voice. Much of the world’s musical practices use vocal syllables as a primary tool for teaching and feeling rhythmic structure as well as llearning repertoire. Adapting this approach - primarily using South Indian sollkattu - for Western contexts offers musicians a more embodied, immediate way to engage with complex rhythmic ideas before ever touching their instrument.

This isn’t about blending traditions, or even about learning traditional Indian Classical Music. It's about what we can learn from rhythmic masters across the globe, utilizing one of the world's most sophisticated rhythmic systems as an analytical tool that can sharpen how we think about, teach, and physically experience rhythm in Western music.