Music Review: Ravi Seenarine Provides Hot New Takes On Sweet Old Classics in debut album ‘Not Your Grandma’s Christmas Album”
For the last couple of years during the holiday season, The Gable Verse has searched and put out a call for artists and followers to submit to our Holiday Music Round-Up. This year, multi-instrumentalist and vocalist Ravi Seenarine was featured, with an entire self-produced holiday album titled ‘Not Your Grandma’s Christmas Album’. After taking a listen, it quickly became obvious that this body of work needed its own review to really appreciate the talent, dedication, and creativity put into making it.
Ravi’s 11-song, 41 minute long album is a mix of incredibly creative takes on classics with some festive and hopeful originals thrown in, for a Christmas album like no other. Ravi’s take on the classics are unlike any you’ve heard before including a rendition of ‘Jingle Bells’ played entirely with horns, ‘Grandma Got Run Over by A Reindeer’, with a Mariachi band interlude, and Jacob Collier style harmonies layered on top of each other, like a tasty baklava ready to be devoured.
“This is not your Grandma’s Christmas record
And I’m not trying to be a trendsetter
The whole world would get a little bit better
if we make all the things we want to make
Ignore what people say”
-Ravi Seenarine
Ravi is a New Jersey native and multi-instrumentalist who is currently attending UArts. Anyone with even an inkling of music ability knows that what Ravi is doing is extremely difficult (they play all the instruments except a couple on two songs) and challenging. To top it all off, this is the young musical mastermind’s debut album. Although the music was created in a very expert and proficient manner, Ravi ends the album with a spoken word interlude encouraging listeners to be themselves and create what they want no matter what people say, a beautiful ending to a unique and exciting collection of music.
