Senior Keshav Ramaswami recently won district at the Guitar Center’s King of Blues competition. The competition is made up of four different stages: preliminaries, district, regionals, and the finals that are in Hollywood. On June 24th Ramaswami was picked to play at regionals in Arlington Heights, IL.
“I was thrilled that I got to be in regionals,” Ramaswami said. “Only 25 people in the nation get to that level from the approximately 4,500 people that entered.”
For the competition, each contestant chooses a blues track from the Guitar Center’s website. This track plays in the background while Ramaswami plays his solo over the music. Some contestants plan out their solos, but Ramaswami improvises.
“I usually have ideas about what I am going to play,” Ramaswami said, “but when I am on stage the solo goes wherever the music takes me and I just go with it.”
Ramaswami has been playing the guitar since he was 5-years-old when his dad taught him to play classical guitar. Five years ago, Ramaswami began teaching himself to play the blues and has been hooked on it ever since.
“I wanted to start because it is just a style of music that really appeals to me,” Ramaswami said. “It opened up such a huge amount of possibilities in terms of finding my style and uniqueness.”
In order to prepare for the competition Ramaswami played at least an hour everyday. Any extra time he had was spent playing over the tracks he chose.
Ramaswami flew out to the Chicago area for regionals on July 15th. Although he felt good about his performance, he didn’t qualify for the finals.
“It was a great experience,” Ramaswami said, “and I was honored to be chosen.”
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