Upendra and Friends plus Mr. Sunil and Babu

Upendra and Friends with Mr. Sunil and Babu have made quite a home for themselves at the Gypsy Avalon stage at Fuji Rock, where they’ve returned to play year after year. The laid-back atmosphere surrounding the stage setup plays perfectly into their hands, and plenty of fans had their chairs set up on the sloping, grassy lawn beneath the flapping Nepalese banners well before the two groups were set to appear on stage.

The sound of both groups implement a wide variety of traditional Nepalese and Indian instruments including a wooden flute, or bansuri, and two types of handdrums, tabla and madal. The set was actually split into two parts, with Upendra and Friends churning out upbeat, highly technical bass driven grooves and smoother moody melodies, which gave way to Sunil and Babu’s more free flowing, peaceful and meditational flute pieces later in the set. The artists wished to express that the Himalayan roots sounds of both groups were to promote the revival of happiness in Nepal after recent earthquakes there. Its certainly clear that their music continues to make people happy and they’ll likely return to Gypsy Avalon next year to share their highly skilled traditional Nepalese songs with fans once again.