Bombay's Shri (Shrikanth Sriram), of Badmarsh and Shri fame, has been a main light in the UK Asian Music Scene since it first came to prominence in the early 1990’s

Shri trained as a classical tabla player, from a very early age. He turned tradition on its head by adapting his innovative feel for percussion to other instruments notably his self-made fretless bass and the Indian bamboo flute. Using his Tabla techniques he quickly developed a totally unique style of slapping and coercing the most haunting and funky sounds from a bass that combined the visual gravitas of a sitar with the reverberant voice of the bowed Indian Sarangi, establishing a reputation as a unique multi-instrumentalist and performer.

His curiosity and constant search for something new and interesting has led his career and experiences to be extremely diverse. These are absorbed in his compositions, rolling drum and bass, sublime filmic trances and funky grooves, which travel the length and breadth of deepest India to deepest South London. Truly new music.

Shri’s UK career started as bass player and accompanist to contemporaries like Talvin Singh and Nitin Sawhney. This led to him signing to Outcaste Records, and released his first solo album-Drum The Bass in 1996 produced by Nitin Sawhney.

Shabs of Outcaste records teamed him up with Labyrinth original Dj Badmarsh that led to the creation of Badmarsh and Shri. This collaboration produced two ground-breaking albums Dancing Drums (1998) and Signs (2001) both of which received rave reviews from magazines like Rolling Stone, Time magazine, India Today, Ministry amongst many others around the world.

A number of tracks from the album Signs were used on various global advertising campaigns like Pantene ProV and BP Ultimate in 2004 and on numerous TV shows including CSI and Eastenders.

The Badmarsh & Shri band toured the world from as far as New York to Singapore and played concerts ranging from Glastonbury to Womad, London Jazz festival at the Royal Festival Hall to Later with Jools Holland.

Shri’s unique sound spans across everything from his own albums and concerts to collaborations with other musicians, Contemporary Dance, Theatre, Remixes, various Radio and TV commissions.

The more prominent of these are: The Art of Fugue with Britten Sinfonia, classical pianist Joanna MacGregor and saxophonist Andy Sheppard performing everything from Bach to Moondog. Ragatroniks a band and album project with Norwegians - keyboardist Bugge Wesseltoft and Dj/programmer Per Martinsen. Strictly Dandia, composed for the play by Tamasha Theatre Company, which was presented at the Edinburgh festival and ran at the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith. Composed for Alladeen the play by The Builders Association and Moti-Roti, which is touring the world throughout 2004 and 2005. Writing some of the key program idents for the BBC Asian network. Wrote the theme tune for the new daily radio soap Silver Streets. Planned and composed for Akdemi’s dance extravaganza Coming of Age performed at the Southbank Centre, London and has also remixed many tracks ranging from Dela Soul to Andrew Lloyd Webber to Trilok Gurtu.