Lagatar24 Desk
Ranchi, April 4: Indian composer Ricky Kej has brought a storm of congratulatory messages all across social media platforms as he earned his second Grammy at the 64th Grammy Awards held at the MGM Grand Marquee Ballroom in Las Vegas.
Ricky greeted the audience with a Namaste as he accepted the trophy with rock great Stewart Copeland. He and Steward Copeland, won the Best New Age Album for Divine Tides.
He took to Twitter to express his gratitude and said, “Won the Grammy Award today for our album Divine Tides. Filled with gratitude and love this living-legend standing with me – @copelandmusic. My 2nd Grammy and Stewart’s 6th. Thank you to everyone who ever collaborated, hired, or listened to my music. I exist because of you.”
Won the Grammy Award today for our album Divine Tides 🙂 Filled with gratitude and love this living-legend standing with me – @copelandmusic . My 2nd Grammy and Stewart's 6th. Thank you to everyone who ever collaborated, hired, or listened to my music. I exist because of you. pic.twitter.com/Pe4rkOp0ba
— Ricky Kej (@rickykej) April 4, 2022
Divine Tides featured artists from around the world and is a “tribute to the magnificence of the natural world and resilience of our species”. The nomination description read: “This critically acclaimed album contains 9 songs and 8 music videos that were filmed around the world from the exquisite beauty of the Indian Himalayas to the Icy forests of Spain. ‘Divine Tides’ has already won several awards at various festivals from around the world. With rich textures of transcendent music, ‘Divine Tides’ is a surreal audio-visual experience carefully pieced together by two masters who are at the top of their game.”
But that’s not all about this amazing music composer. Here are some other interesting facts about Ricky:
- Ricky Kej was born on August 5, 1981 in North Carolina, USA. He is half Punjabi and Marwari by birth. He moved to India when he was 8 years old.
- Kej started off his career as the keyboardist of Bengaluru-based progressive rock band Angel Dust.
- Kej is a self-taught musician but studied classical music at around the age of 24 to overcome what he observed as a handicap at the time.
- He produced a benefit album, 2 Unite All, with Peter Gabriel, aimed at urgent humanitarian aid to the Palestinians in Gaza.
- He has won more than 100 music awards in over 20 countries.
- The majority of his relatives worked in the medical field. His father and grandparents were both doctors, and he formed a Faustian bargain with his parents to allow him to pursue music after completing his degree.
- His mother Pammi thought he received his artistic traits from his grandfather Janaki Das, an actor, Olympic cyclist, and freedom fighter.
- Along with being a music composer, Kej is also an environmentalist.
- At the COP14, Kej was selected a UNCCD Land Ambassador to promote public awareness about land degradation, desertification, and drought.
- Kej is also a UNESCO-MGIEP “Global Ambassador for Kindness,” a UNICEF Celebrity Supporter and an Earth Day Network ambassador.
- He earned a Grammy for his album Winds of Samsara in the Best New Age Album category at the 57th Annual Grammy Awards in 2015.
- In 2014, Winds of Samsara arrived at No. 1 on the US Billboard New Age Albums Chart.
- In 2015, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and then-French President Francois Hollande launched his album Shanti Samsara – World Music for Environmental Consciousness at the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference.
