MEET 12-year-old Aditya Seepersad, the young singing sensation and winner of the first-ever Chutneymusic.com CRC Rajkumar 2022 title. The contest title couldn’t have been more apt; “Rajkumar” means “prince” in Hindi.
“I’m overwhelmed with the victory,” said Aditya whose submission “Mor Man Laga” won the top prize this weekend.
The title Rajkumar is part of the youth development program of the popular website www.chutneymusic.com which was founded by Jason “DJ Floops” Sookram in 2018 to promote East Indian culture and the chutney genre of music. Sookram laments the current stigma attached to chutney music. By working with younger people, Sookram hopes to change the dynamic when it comes to topics that are usually sung in chutney.
“Aditya is a good singer who we hope to train from a small stature to improve the quality of chutney music,” Sookram said.
Aditya may only be 12 years old, but he already has a growing musical repertoire and has had the opportunity to work with some of the biggest artists and producers in the T&T music scene. Apart from his love for cricket, football and video games, Aditya has a passion for music and loves playing tassa and trap set. He started singing at the age of nine when he was asked to perform for his primary school’s calypso competition in 2018. Aditya was shy at first, but he overcame his nervousness and sang “L Education is Key” which was written by Nermal “Massive” Gosine.
The following year, he took to the stage again with a song written by his father Narine Seepersad and Kenneth Salik called “Plain talk” which blew the competition away and took first place. He then recorded his first Bollywood cover of the song “Mere Rashke Qamar;, at that time, he was a student at Kevin Ji School of Music where he was learning to play tabla. Although he had no vocal training, he enjoyed seeing other children dancing and singing to his music.
In 2020, he participated in his school’s calypso competition with the song “Trini Drumline”. He emerged victorious and took home the best overall performance. Although Aditya is looking forward to performing, he had to take a break in 2021 to focus on his SEA exams. He was then invited to join Anthony Batson and a few talented kids for a Divali project that year and later underwent vocal training with Ramkissoon Ramdath, one of Trinidad’s top singing teachers. For Divali last year, he sang a “Mero Man Raam” bhajan.
One of his biggest dreams came true when he recorded his very first soca parang “Ah Going Dey” last year. The song was written by Ricardo Melville aka Daddy Chinee. Aditya recorded the song at Maha Studio, where all the major artists in the country such as Bunji Garlin, Machel Montano, Ravi B, KI and others recorded. Aditya and her nine-year-old brother Arvin then made daily headlines when Seepersad performed for Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley. Aditya is no stranger to Chutneymusic.com and decided to compete for Rajkumar’s title. He sang the traditional chutney song “Mor Man Laga” given to him by Sunil Ramsunar which won him the top prize.
The freshman at Preysal High School wants to follow in his uncle Deodath Colai’s footsteps and become a pilot one day. In the meantime, he soaks up all the experience and knowledge about the music industry he can get his hands on. It has a MuzicMekanic Entertainment management team and is guided by music director, vocalist and radio host Rishi Ram. Aditya, whose role models are her father and Raymond Ramnarine, already has a few projects underway this year, most of her new music coming out this year is original. His family played a big role in the budding musical career of the young star. his brother Arvin makes sure he practices his songs and learns all of his lines.
“We are very proud of Aditya for this achievement in winning this competition. Aditya is a very hard working kid, he loves music and likes to entertain people,” said his father who worked as a sound engineer for several bands. “We will always support our children in their interests and teach them the value of doing so.”
Right now, Aditya is working with his management team to encourage other passionate kids like him and help them get the training and equipment needed to improve their musical skills. His dream is simple: to stay humble, make people happy with his music and represent T&T.
