Lending his vocals to chartbusters Hips Don’t Lie with Shakira and Maria Maria with Carlos Santana, Wyclef Jean is a popular name in the hip-hop ghetto. From singing in his father’s church at the age of three, pursuing Jazz at high school to striking a chord with mass pop consciousness — hid musical journey has hit high notes time and again. The artiste was in town recently for a concert when mobile phone provider Motorola roped him in to unveil and gift their latest music edition to Miss India-World 2008 Parvathy Omnakuttan. Wyclef spoke to the media about his musical influences, Indian curry and a lot more, besides rendering a few lines from his song Triumphant.

 Excerpts:

Your first impressions of India.

As soon as I got off the plane in India, I had a huge fight. A huge fight with a mosquito (smiles). The heat too hit me on my face. But India is just like my home country Haiti. It may be a third world country but has this great raw energy. There is so much history and is in tune with the world. I love its culture.

Have you tasted the Indian cuisine?

Yes, I loved the Chicken Curry. The food is similar to our Carribean cuisine but high on the spice note.

What do you know about Indian music?

As students of Jazz, we appreciate Indian music. Indian music like western music has a chromatic scale and has notes in between. East is where the music originated. I love it. I love listening to Indian hip hop and pop music. In fact, my album called ‘Bollywood Meets Hollywood’ mixes Bhangra with western music. I have worked with Bollywood music director Aadesh Shrivastav for my album ‘The Carnival II: Memoirs of an Immigrant’.

Jazz to Hip-Hop - how did the shift happen?

Hip-hop is the culture of the community that I have grown up in. Break dance and graffiti are part of the culture too. Reggae again is natural music infused with spiritualism. I wanted to study Jazz in high school. I like to be eclectic like musician Quincy Jones.

Who are your favourite artistes?

Alicia Keys and Will.i.am from ‘Black Eyed Peas’. I admire everything that represents the world.