Living life on her own terms

India’s first woman DJ, Megha Kawale cracked into the male dominated DJ circuit 12 years ago. Her tryst with DJing began at the discotheque at the Taj Mahal Hotel in Mumbai. Kawale was trained on the job. “I never went to any DJ school,” she reveals.
“Climbing up the popularity charts was a tough task. Initially, I was on probation for three months. I took what I got and it wasn’t easy. Luckily, my father’s best friend used to frequent the night club at Taj and therefore he convinced my family that I was wasn’t playing tracks at any seedy joint,” adds Megha.

Megha shares that taking up a career as a DJ wasn’t easy, especially when her family wasn’t very convinced about her decision. “Working till the wee hours of the morning was a huge challenge. But I made my choice and watched my senior colleagues play, soak in the ambience and how they tried to figure out the pulse of the audience. My golden chance came when one day, both my colleagues were unwell and I had the opportunity to pour my heart out by playing all by myself. It was an unbeatable high!” she recalls.  

Cut to 2011. Megha has played at Club Cabana at the World Economic Forum in Davos, rocked international hotspots like London, Spain, Basel, Dubai, Bangkok, Istanbul, Chicago, San Francisco, Bombay, Delhi, and Hong Kong. She is the favoured choice of the Ambanis and might very soon release her first album. Her musical renditions are associated with a slew of high-end brands and while she jet sets across the globe, Megha blends original house music with tribal strains, churning out an electic fusion of Bollywood commercial with hip hop.

“DJing is like any other job. You have to prove your worth to reap rewards,” shares Megha. She adds further, “ When I started out, I didn’t know where I stood, or that I was the first woman DJ in the country. Even today, I thank God after each show for letting me live my dream. I believe that being a good DJ isn’t about simply mixing tracks. It is about mixing your music. Being good looking helps, but you have to deliver an exceptional performance to make it big in the industry.”

What powers her passion is her love for music. “I love the way the crowd on the dance floor pulsates to my music. I set the tempo and raise it to a crescendo. Of course, my investment in music is really high. I buy a massive quantum of tracks when I travel, subscribe to magazines, I am always tuned to the Web to learn as much as I can about world music,” says Megha.

For this simple Maharashtrian girl, being original counts. She has just wrapped up, on Malaika and Arbaaz Khan’s request, the Munni Badnam Hui remix. “Work is worship for me. I stay grounded and constantly try to reinvent myself. My work is an ongoing journey and I am determined to enjoy every second of it,” she says.