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MD by day, rock star by night
Sandeep Mittal is an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management-Calcutta and managing director of Cartesian, a data analysis firm. He is also the founding member and the lead guitarist of The Second Shift, a Mumbai-based band.
The group consists of Sandeep and Saumyajit Ray Chaudhuri on the guitar, Mohit James on the bass guitar, Vinod Easwaran on vocals, Prashanth Sumanth and Ashley Murray on percussion, has been jamming together since January last year. As their confidence grew, the band cut a demo CD of 10 songs all written by Sandeep.
By day
While they all share a love for music, the band members do very different jobs.
Saumyajit, aka SRC, a computer engineer, has an MBA from IIM-C, and works for PNB Paribas as a trader.
Vinod, an electronics and communications engineer and a postgraduate in marketing from the T A Pai Management Institute Manipal College in Manipal, is a deputy general manager at the ICICI bank.
Mohit, an MBA from Pune's Symbiosis Institute, heads human resources at VIP Industries.
Prashanth, a postgraduate in human relations, works for the Kalpataru group.
Ashley, a commerce graduate, works as a freelance voiceover artist. Shikha Lath, the band's manager and Sandeep's wife, an MBA, works as the client services director in Direxions, a marketing agency.
Musically inclined
Sandeep learnt the guitar in Class XI and began performing in college. Saumyajit got interested in the guitar in college, in the third year of engineering, he adds.
Vinod has been singing since school although he has never formally learnt music. "I loved the stage," he recalls, still enthusiastic about his first performance.
Mohit was initially interested in percussion, but then shifted to the guitar. A native of Jabalpur, he played for a band called Blue Frost in the Madhya Pradesh city. When he moved to Ahmedabad after his MBA, he joined another band which played together for three years.
Prashanth started off in the church band, "drumming and singing hymns."
For Ashley joining a band was inevitable. "My father sang in a band in Jabalpur, my uncle was a drummer, my sister sings. I used to play the drums (in Jabalpur). I have no formal training. My family loves music and I just picked it up."
Come together
Sandeep and Saumyajit met in college; Mohit, Prashant and Ashley were friends in Jabalpur and have been playing since. Vinod encountered Sandeep at a business meeting, discovered a common love for music, and began jamming together. Via a happy twist of fate, The Second Shift came alive.
The band first performed earlier this year at Cafe Goa, a restaurant in the northwestern Mumbai suburb of Bandra. They have performed thrice since at Not Just Jazz by the Bay, a well-known nightclub in south Mumbai. Last week, they peformed at the Hard Rock Cafe in Pune.
The band practices on weekends in a crowded room at Sandeep's Bandra home.
"They improvise and improve upon a song," notes Shikha. "After a few jam sessions they sounded really good and I thought it was time to record it. Once we had ten songs I decided to make a demo CD."
Striking a balance
As a trader, SRC's workday ends when the markets close. The music starts later and one doesn't interfere with the other. "I love my job, I love my music, I am happy with both," he says.
"One is a career," says Mohit, "music is my hobby."
Prashanth has a more philosophical take. "I was destined to be in HR -- intellectually. Music is close to my heart."