Indian Producers/DJs Prayag Mehta and Rishab Joshi, who together make music as Lost Stories are considered one of India’s biggest exports to Electronic Dance Music. Starting their journey in 2008, Lost Stories soon rose to fame with their single ‘False Promises’ which was released on Tiesto’s Black Hole Recordings. After playing a fundamental role in putting India on the global map with respect to EDM music, Lost Stories has now slowly and steadily built their own academy to impart not just technical knowledge but also to create a support system for aspiring music producers.
Along with garnering widespread acclaim for putting up stunning performances for world’s biggest music festival ‘Tomorrowland’ for five years in a row from 2015 to 2019 in Belgium, Lost Stories has also performed at several global events, including Mysteryland, and IMS Ibiza, Global Citizen Festival, New Horizons festival, Electric Daisy Carnival, Sunburn, VH1 Supersonic and others. Some more milestones accomplished by the dynamic electronic duo include playing alongside DJ Tiesto and reaching number 1 spots with three of their singles on Top 100 Dance Albums iTunes Charts.
Ranked at number 52 on world’s top 100 DJ’s list by DJMag (2016/17), Lost Stories have had successful music collaborations with internationally renowned music artists like KSMR, Matthew Steeper, Zaeden and also officially remixed global hit songs like ‘Faded’ by Alan Walker and ‘Wherever I Go’ by OneRepublic.
With the global exposure they have received in the international EDM Industry, Rishab and Prayag have now jumped into building their own academy which aims at teaching technical knowledge and basic functionalities into music production and performance, and also acquaints aspiring musicians with problems faced in the music industry, and how to tackle them in a musically competitive market such as India.
Prayag Mehta who hails from Mumbai comes from a Gujarati business family with absolutely no music background. But his passion and dedication for electronic music led him to achieving all his dreams. He is a self-taught music producer and was only Indian whose track ‘One Last Time’ got featured in DJ Tiesto’s radio show back in 2008. When asked about what it takes to survive and rise in the electronic music industry, Prayag commented, “In my opinion, just technical know-how is not enough to survive in the changing times of our industry and thus we ensure that the academy also trains it’s students in other necessary aspects such as music business, social media marketing, brand building and positioning, media relations, fashion styling, confidence building for live shows and public appearances, etc.”
Rishab Joshi approached Prayag Mehta on a social media channel ‘Orkut’ in the year 2008 where he sent Prayag some of his original music. Prayag had already received support from one of world’s most renowned DJ at the time, DJ Tiesto. After sharing their music with each other, the boys realized that although their sounds were different to one another, they could complement each other to create a unique sound. That’s where Lost Stories began.
Although Rishab has not been officially trained in music, he belongs to a family that is musically inclined. His grandfather and father both belong to the classical music field. Since childhood Rishab has been observing music and its nuances and that observation led to his love and expertise in music. Rishab who is a college drop-out proved that conventional education is not the only means to success in this industry.
Prayag and Rishab both have achieved success in their music careers by their own passion and survived through consistent trial and errors, therefore they understand the importance of providing training and building the understanding of the business of music. Lost Stories Academy, which was incepted in the year 2016 was started with an intention to build a community and to make this field feasible and accessible to all budding electronic music producers.
The academy began with just one student but now has hundreds of students enrolled. Lost Stories Academy has given the EDM industry some great artists namely, Abbas Kagalwala (Artist name – Abbas K Music), Pratham Mehra (Artist name – Kimera) and Murtuza Gadiwala who completed the Advance Music Production & DJing Course in 2017. All three of them have worked on developing background score for Jackie Bhagnani’s short film Carbon which has crossed over 10 million views so far. Abbas has played many shows such as India Nightlife and Convention Awards, Amsterdam Dance Event in Mumbai and his original track ‘Dreaming’ has clocked over 7500 streams on all multiple platforms. Whereas, Kimera has supported Lost Stories, Zaeden and many other Artists for live shows. His new track Cold Walls has garnered more than 20,000 collective streams across major streaming platforms. Kimera rose to fame after his official remix for Lost Stories “Faking it” was played at Tomorrowland 2018.
So far, Lost Stories Academy has trained hundreds of students since 2016. Currently, they have three courses of training, depending upon the students requirements. The most basic course, namely, ‘Music Production Beginners’ is a short course of two-months duration where the students are introduced to Music Theory, Sound Designing and Track Arrangement alongside complete training in Ableton Live. A more advanced course is the ‘Music Production – Advance Plus’ spanning for 6 months, where they are taught advanced Music Theory, Sound Designing, Track Arrangement, Mixing and Mastering from start to finish. The course also includes Demo Drops as well as feedback sessions from Lost Stories and guest Artists.
Subsequently, they also have ‘Music Production – Advance Gold’ course which is a comprehensive course for all above mentioned details as well as access to online tutorials by Lost Stories, a complete guide on Music Business, insights on social media and brand management. Additionally, students get the opportunity to be in the studio with Lost Stories as well as get acquainted to stylized photoshoots, video shoots, and networking opportunities.
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