New Grammy Winning Arkai Duo: Inside Their Big Win

It's been great, so happy to be here. Awesome, well, thanks for joining me. So we have Jonathan, is it myron? That's right. And we have Philip as she got.

She gone, yep, first acts there and then on everything for us. All right, cool. Good. I've got a lot more. It's the last thing.

It's always a bit of a challenge.

So that's good. Easy to pronounce. So you guys just won the best contemporary instrumental album Grammy this year, which is amazing. And very, very stiff competition in that category.

A lot of great musicians. But let's talk about how you guys first came together and met.

“I think you went to Drully Art, is that correct?”

Yes, right. So both Philip and I are classically trained. And we went to the Drully Art School in New York, but we actually didn't meet at school. I'm a little older than Philip.

And though we overlaps at Drully Art, we didn't meet in the building, which is kind of crazy, actually, because it's a very, very small place of 700 students. And you're kind of like all just in the same building.

And so you're bound to meet one another. We didn't meet each other. So it took a conference that was hosted at Drully Art, where we were rapping the school. And one day after classes, there was a party.

And we had our instruments with us. And Philip and I just started to jam. And there's a whole room of people. So you can imagine like, well, we were kind of like the DJs that night. And so we jam for over an hour.

The whole room started singing and dancing to our music. And that was the first time that Philip and I really had a profound conversation, musical conversation. And it was this magical moment for us when we heard our unique sound. And that was kind of just the impetus for what archive is today.

But for some extra context with that story, Jonathan says, Right, we just started to jam. No one at Juliard jams. I was just going to ask you that. It's a classical, it's literally a contemporary.

And everyone, at least in the classical music division. Right, we're studying primarily. It's become orchestral players, right? You're reading from sheet music. You're playing the master works of Western European literature.

But you're not learning how to jam. And so it's a find another person who clearly had been on their own exploration outside of school, because school wasn't going to teach us how to jam. So someone who had been on that journey. And then was already, was obviously curious about so many other kinds of music

and integrating that. I think that was the cherry on top that made that meeting so profound and unexpected. Yeah, and it's sort of like a, um, when you, it's sort of like dating a little bit.

“You have to try different musical partners.”

The deal of things is a challenge because you have to find people that are on the same page,

especially in the classical world because we always think of like the duo.

Classical duo, maybe it's violin cello, which is what you guys both play. Um, but yeah, like as you mentioned, Julie Art is not known for maybe jamming, I don't know. But how did, how did you guys get there individually? Like who were some of your early influences that kind of gave you a broader perspective

than just classical music? Yeah, great question. For me, what of my biggest idols is the cello's YoYoMop? YoYoMop? And I love YoYo, because that guy's an incredible classical musician, right? He plays with orchestra, he plays per seittles all over the world.

But he's so much more than a classical musician. He's actually like taking it upon himself to broaden his musical horizons. And I love what YoYo's done to like, well, collaborate with musicians from all around the world, but it's through his silk road ensemble. I thought that was a beautiful thing where you brought together some of the greatest musicians from around the world.

And they all shared the language of music.

And they create amazing music together that kind of defines boundaries and genres.

I love YoYo for that.

“I loved his collaborations with people like James Taylor, you know?”

Like all these artists from different genres. And so yeah, I really look to him as a musical influence, but also as a person and what he represents through his music. He's so much larger than music. My guy is just an incredible humanitarian and the leaders within the world, within the arts.

Yeah, I was kind of inspired by there was a whole crop of artists who grow through early YouTube, right in the days when YouTube was just becoming a thing. And some of these pioneers, I would say like the last generation of pioneers of classical crossover we might call it. There was a number of groups like two cellos, right? These two Croatian guys were taught in stadiums of rockpevers.

The piano guys were making these cinematic music videos literally piano on top of, you know, cliffside and waterfalls. The violinist Lindsey Sterling, who is playing and dancing acrobatics while she's playing.

That was a whole crop of artists who were all kind of coming, who were breaking, right, as I was in my very formative years. And a lot of those people were inspiring in the sense of they opened my ears to more kinds of music that could be made on my instrument. Because at the same time while I'm studying my concertos and my sonatas, right, the very classical training I was doing. I was inspired by those people to have my fun on the side with my friend.

Never in my wildest imaginations dreaming that I would one day be able to do that myself.

It was always kind of like, oh, for fun. It's cool that that's out there. Other, I have to give them a shout out. And an older group is the Turtle Island Spring Quartet. They're kind of like OGs.

They've been going since the 70s. But using again, the string quartet form, which I was playing Mozart and Beethoven quartets at the time. But taking great quartet form, but playing blues, jazz, Jimmy Hendrix, right, kind of doing all these different styles at a really high level. And so those were seeds that were planted while I was growing up before I got to Julie Art.

That again, never thought that that would be the route I would take, but they were, it was just planting seeds and planting curiosities that were going to come to fruition later down the river.

Yeah, and those one thing also a lot of the younger group you mentioned, having common is visual, the visual aspect, making videos. And that's something you guys, your sound of silence video, which for instance, which is one of the tracks on the album Brightside that you won the Grammy for. It's such a cool visual, you know, thing to see and just to kind of take in. Talk about that, like how important has that been the video of aspect with you guys and helping getting your name out there and getting seen and heard.

“I think it's been really huge for our brand.”

I think it's really huge for our brand, it's really huge for our brand. It's really huge for our brand, it's really huge for our brand, it's really huge for our brand. You know, those were like instrumental players that were going on and doing really, really incredible things. And so I think we just think of ourselves as maybe the next generation continuing their legacy. You know, and maybe creating our own legacy throughout the process of doing our own thing, but we love. We love our epic films, you know.

Well, and to kind of to pull it even back before the musical part of it, it's because both of us love film to begin with, right? I would Jonathan loves, right, surgically on the right, the classics. I love my Star Wars and, you know, kind of like epic sci-fi fantasy. And so that language of the visual media, which is the world we live in, right? The world we live in today is it's visuals, visuals come with everything.

“And so I think it's just us taking another side of our creative passions, because we should say that our videos, we basically do it all ourselves.”

We storyboard, we script, we make the shot list. We have a videographer, obviously, who's holding the camera, but then we go and edit the color. It's a, it is a core part of our kind of artistic product. We have our hands all over those. They're really, really special to us. Well, and along that line, this album, which I think is, is that you're actually your second full length album,

software, the one that won the Grammy, which is a pretty amazing feat actually on your second outing. So you guys actually sell produced that album, is that correct?

For the most part, yeah, I mean, you know, yes, we produced, we record mixed the album. We did have a few producers that kind of added their special sauce across the album, but we, yeah, we mixed it. We had it mastered by someone else, but for the most part of it's saying like, yeah, 95% of that album is. Yeah, and it feels, it feels really personal. I talk about doing, I know you're primarily, you kind of do a mix of covers.

“You mentioned live, you do covers at an original, but material, but tell me about that. Like, how do you, do you enjoy doing the covers?”

Is that something? Are you guys very particular about what songs you're going to cover? I would assume yes, but let's talk about that a little bit. Yeah, for sure. I mean, on the first level, some songs lend themselves to strings more than other songs, dry or sometimes, you know, an audience member will say, Oh, I want you to do this song and it's like that. That's just won't work. I'm sorry. But being a level beyond that, of course, we're trying to find songs that both resonate deeply with us that we love.

But also songs that we feel that we can do justice to them to kind of give them our own spin, because we don't want to just, you know, kick out a, Oh, you know, kind of like karaoke, right? That's just playing these melodies on top. Like, we wanted our sauce on it, and so sound of silence from the record is a perfect example, right?

Yeah, I need to do a great job. And again, like also the video, I would really encourage people to check out the video because it's super cool. A lot of candles died for this video. Right at this at home.

“Yeah, I think the last time we're going to do that. Yeah, light all the candles. Tell me about Grammy night. How exciting was that when you guys actually there or how exciting was that for you?”

Oh, it was a crazy, it was a crazy night. It was a crazy week for people who don't know like the Grammys are so much more than just the, the one, you know, the award show.

It's a whole week, festivities, so many events and parties. And it really was an incredible honor to be there.

You know, we were in a category with some artists that we grew up listening to like Baylor Fleck. That guy's a legend. You know, and so to be in the same categories as some of these incredible artists that we are so inspired by was was such an honor in itself. Yeah, it's, I mean, we think back to the day. It's a blur. You know, it's like you go for one thing to the next and then you're waiting at this very long awards ceremony. And we were near the end. And so I think we were like more than three hours into that.

That premier ceremony. And then our, you know, and I feel like, you know, with all these things we try our best. We put out a good property. Oh, good album. We feel the love, but you don't want to like get to ahead of yourself.

“So I think the word that we would use is like, we were like cautiously optimistic, you know, if you know, we're in a room of giants. And so, you know, we were cautiously optimistic and to hear our name get called.”

I mean, their videos of our reaction of it was it's the craziest feeling. It's like, it's like a bomb goes off. It's like there's nothing like it. And then we are skipping to the stage. And then, you know, we have to give her speech and you're shaking and you're feeling all these emotions. It was, it was incredible. And then, and just, yeah, what an honor. What a privilege. And I think for Philip and I, we think we're just full of gratitude. Truly, like we would not be here without scores of people who have believed in us over the years. And that's kind of what we talked about in our acceptance stage was just like number one our parents who sacrificed so much for us so that we can live a life of possibility.

But then so many people who have just believed in us for other years and have lifted us up. And so, yeah, just to enormous sense of gratitude and love for our community. Yeah, and you know, and people that they always see the artists up on stage. I mean, it's amazing too, because again, like you guys, this is your second outing as an album. And you always hear, and I've interviewed several people that have been nominated multiple times and they never win.

So to actually be able to win the first time out with an nomination is really, it's really an amazing feat. And also too, it takes a village. As you mentioned, you have support from your parents.

You know, going to schools like Julie Art, it's not, it's not an inexpensive endeavor living in New York, moving to New York.

“Where were you guys actually from originally? Were you from New York or did you come out there? How did that happen?”

Yeah, I'm originally from Southern California. I need to beat you guys. Disney land is our local landmark. I grew up 20 minutes from the park. But yeah, I was born and raised there all the way until I went out to New York for my undergrad degree when I was 18. And for me, so I've kind of lived around the world. My mom is from Taiwan at the American. I was born in Taiwan. I moved to the country of Singapore when I was four years old, which is a tiny little island country in Southeast Asia.

And my mom talked about sacrifice. My mom literally moved me from Singapore to Cincinnati, Ohio. When I was nine years old, so that I could study music. My parents did long distance for four years. So they could study with this great teacher in Cincinnati, Ohio. And so, yeah, I can't believe they did that.

But that's amazing. And it's awesome. I mean, the parents love and the fact that they support you guys because as we know, being a musician, it's not the easiest path.

A lot of parents, and I want to say Asian parents, but I'll put Asian parents that are not going to be. There's a part of a music, but it's hard. I want you to have a good career. And so that's awesome that they supported you along the way. It's amazing. That's so great. Yeah. If you could give some advice to younger musicians, people that, because you guys took a path that's not that common in the instruments that you play. Talk a little bit about that and being willing to explore different genres and be willing to try different things.

Yeah, I mean, there's so many things that we have learned along the way. A lot of things that we wish that we had been curious about or trusted ourselves to explore earlier.

We're studying classical music at the highest level. Oh, had that side thing didn't seem like it was ever going to connect or the side skills that we built up because there's a lot more skills that we have to use than just being great musicians, skills around management and leadership around technological skills, media creation, all these things. And at the time, you don't necessarily see how the thoughts are going to connect, but if those things are true to you, if that's if there's a curiosity and a passion there.

Just to have the willingness to pursue that, time will tell, but to have something that is really true and deeply passionate about like go for it. Yeah, I'll just add to that and just say that it's okay not to always know where are you going to go. It's like, and I think it's really important to like accept that, like for Philip, but we're still figuring it out, but I think that's just like part of life journey, but if we follow our curiosity and if we lead with courage and perseverance and we really look within and do things that are authentic to us.

“I think it leads to great things and like my gosh, it took years for our silence to kind of become what it is today for us to forge the path that we've forged, we're still forging it.”

And what I would say is that especially, I think in the world in general, but it's easy to get kind of, I don't want to intimidate it, but it is, the music rolled is it's so hard to make it in the music rolled and if anything, we need more artists that are unique who are doing their own things that's what's going to make these stand out within this incredibly saturated market that we operate within. And that is, I think, only going to get more saturated with AI and wow, you know, in the years to come and so it's just like we really need pioneers throughout their kind of doing their own thing and so don't be afraid.

Well, I think our journey is a testament to that.

Yeah, talk a little bit about the kind of along those same lines, talk a little bit about finding your own voice like because it's, it's a challenge for any artist to kind of find your style, find your, it's obviously to it's a process can you talk a little bit about that. Yeah, I mean, both of us, again, our roots are, our roots became from was in an inch wide and a mild deep, right?

“We were very at one kind of language and in a lot of ways right there, there's pros and cons to that, right?”

It's like that classical training gave us the technique, right, it gave us the work ethic, the discipline, the delayed gratification of right?

We've been playing, if we've been playing our instruments for decades before we're having met each other.

But I think it was when both of us were opening ourselves up to more kinds of music, not just to like enjoy listening to that's part of it, too, it's just you don't know what you don't know. But then actively taking steps to explore that and to say, okay, what might my own creative process look like if I started, to dabble in these other kinds of styles and languages, and so, you know, a lot of times we think of this like a spoken language, right? If you're trying to learn a new language, the easiest way to learn it is to go and immerse yourself, right?

Go to the country where the language is spoken and if you immerse yourself on that, right?

You keep hearing all those new words that sound completely forward to you when you start. Eventually, right, you're going to internalize those and then what happens, you're then able to speak that out. And so when it comes to finding your own voice, at least for us, ours is a language of synthesis, right? We have those classical roots, but then it is as we were starting to learn how to speak these new words, right? Oh, a little bit of rock language, a little bit of EDM language, a little bit of epic film language.

“And then as we were speaking all these things, right, suddenly you only, that you have to do it.”

And by doing it, then we started to discover, oh, this is how these things come together in a new way. And it just has taken time, time and repetition, and trying new recipes, but eventually we've landed on it. And a lot of perseverance, I can't say, you know, when you're doing your own thing, there will be a lot of people who say, oh, you should not do that. You should do it this way, or do that for what, where do you belong, or you can. And I would say like, yeah, maybe that's true, but at this same time, if you have something that's compelling and unique, people will remember you, right?

I really do believe that you have to be a Swiss army knife in this day and age. You have to like do so much kind of what Phillip said earlier, like, we do so much. We've been managing ourselves to be creating opportunities for ourselves doing your own production, doing everything it's kind of like, and that's really allowed us to kind of take next steps within our career.

To create new opportunities because we were never reliant on other people, right? And so I think it's like, yeah, it's like running a startup.

“But it really is, it's like you'd have to go out and find either you have to do what yourself you have to go out and build your team.”

And so yeah, but regards to like our brand and our identity, it's morphed so much over the years.

If you listen to our first album, Crossroads, which we released a year and a half ago, surprised me to say that it's like, that album is so much more life explorers were right.

Like there really isn't a, we're still trying to find our sound in that album. Like when we listen back, it's literally called Crossroads for that reason because it's like, where are you know, what are we trying to do? Bright side are second album is so much more confident. And so I do think that a lot happened between that first album that that second album around like kind of what our sound is going to be.

“I think for us, there was a moment where we realized actually, you know, what's really beautiful here. The secret is kind of the old and the new coming together.”

Where we honor tradition, but we also look ahead. And so what does that look like? And so yeah, it's this like cinematic feast that, you know, plays homage to our classical roots, but also to all the other kinds of music that we love in our own way.

It's fun to see the progress and see the growth and like we're always growing. You're going to be growing until the end of time. Hopefully, right?

If we're on the right path, what are you guys upcoming up? Are you going to be doing some touring? I know you guys have done a lot of touring in the past. Tell me about that and how also how people can find you if they want to check out your tourist schedule and that kind of stuff.

“Yeah, we're working on a big international tour right now. We will be announcing it in soon. But yeah, we, I think you'll be able to find all that information on our social media at Arkham Music or on our website, Arkhammusic.com.”

Awesome. Yeah, and it's exciting. I know you guys have worked with a lot of exciting folks. And you mentioned one's a Lindsey Sterling. We have a Cirque de Soleil, David Lusherpet Lusherpell. It was a great, a great guy, great director. Thank you so much for joining me. I know you guys are very busy and it's exciting to see young, young musicians. I'm old, so I can say young. But to see like, what a great start to your career with coming out and getting with the Grammy win. It's, you know, it's really exciting. I love what you guys are doing. It's innovative. It's different. I think you definitely have found your voice. It's going to continue to grow. So it's exciting to see where that's where that's going to go.

So everybody, please check out Bright Side, the album that you won the Grammy for. Check out the videos on YouTube. Very exciting. And you're all, you're on all the streaming services that we, we all know and love. Sometimes we love, sometimes we don't. But thank you so much for joining me. I really appreciate it, guys. Thank you there. It's a pleasure. Thank you so much.