Early life
Born and brought up in Al Karama, Dubai, Jeremiah started playing music at the age of seven. He took guitar lessons as a kid, starting off on the acoustic guitar, and later, learning keyboard and drums along with his two brothers. At the age of ten, he started playing for various audiences at church programs and Christian events. For his school band, he picked up playing the bass guitar. As the guitarist of the Our Own English High School band, he won awards at various inter-school level competitions. By 2004, to pursue a professional engineering degree, he flew to India and joined the Hindustan College of Engineering, Chennai. Keba started playing at the New Life Assemblies of God Church every Sunday. He drew inspiration from watching various leading musicians in the city at work. As a youth, he spent hours jamming with friends and experimenting with different sounds and styles. He and his friends formed a band named Fire Frenzy. In 2005, he began teaching music at the Institute of Music Technology, Chennai, run by John Satya. [2]
Musical career
After his graduation, Jeremiah formed a band called Fire Frenzy, a Christian band consisting of him and his college peers; performing at church and with friends jump-started his musical journey. During this time, he also started teaching music at the Institute of Music Technology, Chennai. He began his industry career with music director James Vasanthan for the soundtrack of the 2008 Tamil film Subramaniapuram , which won various awards and critical acclaim for its music. Further, he collaborated with composers Yuvan Shankar Raja, Manikanth Kadri, Harris Jayaraj, Ouseppachan, A. R. Rahman, James Vasanthan, Anirudh Ravichander, D. Imman, and others. Jeremiah has also performed at various live shows, collaborating with artists like Leslee Lewis, Naresh Iyer, and Vijay Prakash, and international artists, namely Don Moen, Bob Fits, Steve Kuban, and Sean Michael. He has also lent his musical knowledge for different television shows and music competitions, including Airtel Super Singer , Sun TV's Ooo La La, and Vijay TV's Kadhal Unplugged.
Following the success of his work on the soundtrack to the 2011 musical drama film Rockstar , scored by A. R. Rahman, the Jeremiah has been frequently collaborating with the composer's film score outings. [2] [3]
As of 2013, he has played various guitars on around 500 different albums. In 2013, he worked on Rahman's film soundtracks Kadal, Maryan, and Raanjhanaa. That same year, his work for songs of the films Sutta Kadhai , Vanakkam Chennai , and both blockbuster Bollywood films Chennai Express and Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani were noteworthy. [2] Along the way, he also played on various gospel albums and concerts, collaborating with independent artists like Jonita Gandhi, Abhilash LR, [4] Sid Sriram, and Maalavika Manoj, among others. For one project, he was called by Rahman to his studio; [5] Jeremiah impressed him with his guitar skills and groove. Soon, Jeremiah would work alongside Joshua Prince for films like Maryan, Kadal, and 24.
In 2013, he completed work on the independent albums of Andrea Jeremiah and Maalavika Manoj. [6] He has continued to venture in his musical career, having performed over 800 songs. He is currently a member of the band RIJK (named for members Rodney Jayaraj, Isaac Dharmakumar, John Praveen, and himself). RIJK is a popular cover band for gospel and Tamil songs; the group plays a mix of genres, including rock, R&B, jazz, and fusion. A number of Indian singers have been guests on their cover songs, such as Pragathi Guruprasad, Jonita Gandhi, Andrea Jeremiah, Nikhita Gandhi, Alisha Thomas, and Ash King.
Musical journey
Keba has produced music for Tamil and Hindi films including Paiya , Pasanga , Engeyum Kadhal , Savari , Avan Ivan , Mankatha , 3, Action Replay, Rockstar and Ek Deewana Tha.
Keba has also played at various live shows collaborating with artists like Lesle Lewis, Naresh Iyer and Vijay Prakash and Christian artists like Don Moen, Bob Fits, Steve Kuban and Sean Michael. He has also lent his musical talent for different television shows and music competitions like Airtel Super Singer, Sun TV's Ooo La La.. and Vijay TV's Kadhal Unplugged.
Keba works on a lot of experimental music and plans to dedicate a lot more time working on unplugged music. He is currently working on his own album and plans to infuse it with the different styles of music he has perfected over the years. His playing style is greatly influenced by Jazz, Rock, RnB and acoustic styles of music. The man who makes music must take a break some time, and when he unwinds, Keba's playlist includes music from different genres- Dave Matthews Band, John Mayer, Four play, Nickelback, Metallica, Lincoln Brewster, Jeremy Camp, Michael W. Smith and Jimmy Needham being some of his current favourites.
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