MIT Swara

About Our Officers

Swetha Kambhampati (President)

Swetha Kambhampati is currently a sophomore at MIT majoring in Biology. She has been learning South Indian Classical Music for over 11 years under Smt. Padma Kutty in Southern California and has given many performances. She also learned Indian Violin for several years under Sri Delhi Sunderajan. Music has been an integral part of her growing up and her interests extend to semi-classical songs and bhajans. She is absolutely thrilled about MIT Swara and is looking forward to the major leaps this group will make in the coming years.

Priya Ramaswamy (President)

Priya Ramaswamy's major at MIT is Course 6 with BME. Music has always been one of Priya's passions. Though humming and singing along to old recordings since early childhood, Priya has been taking formal Carnatic vocal lessons for the last several years from Smt. Jaya Bala of Jayamangala from Maryland, and more recently, from Smt. Aparna Thyagarajan in Massachusetts. When she first came to MIT, she knew that there were many student enthusiasts of South Asian music, but realized that there was no common ground for all of them to get together, learn from each other, and enjoy the ragas and swaras of this rich art form. To foster this passion within MIT, she helped form MIT Swara, a community where people can get together and share this enjoyment. Currently Priya serves as the co-President of MIT Swara.

Nirupama Yechoor (Publicity Chair)

Nirupama is currently a sophomore at MIT majoring in Courses 9 and 7. She has learned Hindustani Classical Vocal music under Dr. Rajan Sachdeva in Detroit for 4 years. She is very excited about promoting Indian music on campus, and believes many students will come to share her love for the art.

Arvind Thiagarajan (Webmaster)

Arvind is a graduate student at MIT doing his PhD in Computer Science. Though not formally trained in music, Arvind is an avid rasika of both Carnatic and Hindustani Music, enjoys humming along with ragas and songs, and seeks out and listens to live concerts, as well as vintage recordings of Carnatic and Hindustani pastmasters with a passion.