Mohini Dey is a renowned bassist, producer, and vocalist who has gained international recognition for her extraordinary talent and versatility. She joins Alex to talk about growing up in an independently-minded musical family, the challenges she faced as a female musician in India, and the difficult decisions she had to make in the early days of her career. Mohini discusses the lessons she learned from her musical elders, explains her approach to teaching young musicians, and provides a track-by-track breakdown of her debut album “Mohini Dey”.

Mohini Dey began performing at the age of 11 and first appeared on record at age 14 after being discovered by film composer and jazz drummer Ranjit Barot. Since then she has played alongside Alex Lifeson, Steve Vai, Marco Minnemann, Dewa Budjana, Jordan Rudess, A.R. Rahman, Jason Richardson, Zakir Husain and various other notable figures in international jazz, rock, and classical Indian music. Her first, self-titled solo album (featuring her husband, saxophonist Mark Hartsuch, as well as Minnemann and other famed fusion drummers Narada Michael Walden and Simon Phillips) was released in 2023.

This episode is dedicated to Jerome H. Skolnick and Sujoy Dey.

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Moods & Modes is hosted and produced by Alex Skolnick. Executive Producer: Kirsten Cluthe. Edited by Tom Sullivan. Music by Alex Skolnick. Artwork by Mark Dowd. Distributed by Osiris Media.