WAVES 2025: Papon recollects performing Indian folk music for 500 Serbians

Mumbai, May 3 (IANS) Playback singer Papon, who recently attended the inaugural edition of the World Audio Visual Entertainment Summit in Mumbai, has shared an incident when he performed live music in front of 500 Serbians.

Papon’s parents have performed on stage for 50 years, and this is something which makes him extremely adept and intuitive when it comes to live performances.

When he was posed with a language challenge during a performance in Serbia, his quick thinking came to his rescue.

The singer said, “I was in Serbia. There is an auditorium. They were demolishing the auditorium, and it was the last show. There were 500 Serbians. They all look like Englishmen but they don't speak English. So, I asked them, ‘May I speak in English?’. They said, ‘We understand but we don't speak’. Then I started doing Kumaoni folk, Assam folk, Rajasthani folk, and even my Bollywood songs”.

He further mentioned, “I kept singing. I told them the stories which I weaved. After 90 minutes of the show, there was a standing ovation kind of thing. We bowed and we came back. And the director of the auditorium said, ‘Go back, do what you did, again because there is an encore going on. You should go and do another song’. I said, ‘I have exhausted all my stock. I don't know what to sing now’”.

The director insisted the singer embraced the stage once again, and perform for the audience. Papon shared, “500 Serbians went through 90 minutes of whatever I sang. And they didn't let me go out of the stage. That's the power of folk”.

--IANS

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