In the layered world of New York’s creative vanguard, there are few who move as seamlessly between the exactitude of engineering and the intuition of artistry as Aseem Suri. Wherever Suri finds himself—be it a leading museum, a legendary concert hall, a city park transformed by technology, or a campaign activation for a renowned global brand—he brings a rare command of both structure and boundless imagination...
In the layered world of New York’s creative vanguard, there are few who move as seamlessly between the exactitude of engineering and the intuition of artistry as Aseem Suri. Wherever Suri finds himself—be it a leading museum, a legendary concert hall, a city park transformed by technology, or a campaign activation for a renowned global brand—he brings a rare command of both structure and boundless imagination, observes Julie Strack. His practice orbits questions at the core of contemporary music and multimedia: How does a sound become an environment? Where do improvisation and mastery converge? These are not hypothetical exercises for Suri; they are the foundation of a career that bridges continents, disciplines, and traditions, grounded in the principles of jazz.
In 2014, Suri’s musical reach extended to Boston’s Symphony Hall for the Festival of Lights tribute to Academy Award-winning composer A.R. Rahman, where Suri’s virtuosic vocals and arrangements—including the Bollywood hits Chhaiyyan Chhaiyyan and Jiya Jale—brought Indian classical motifs into conversation with contemporary jazz orchestration, drawing on a depth of understanding cultivated from a lifelong immersion in both traditions.
From early years performing with India’s Euphoria and Shubha Mudgal at landmark venues like Siri Fort Auditorium, Suri channeled parallel passions—engineering, production, sound technology—that were honed at the Indian Institute of Technology and later, at Berklee College of Music in Boston. Here, he mastered the technical languages of Csound, Max/MSP, and Ableton Live, shaping projects for Boulanger Labs that would define the cutting edge of music software and complex audio systems.
The foundation for Suri’s international reputation as a multimedia visionary was laid with works such as Piece of Mind, commissioned for the Boston Globe-acclaimed “Deciphering Identity” exhibit at the Jewett Art Gallery, Wellesley College, and subsequently featured as a centerpiece at the 2nd International Csound Conference in Boston. Visitors were invited to record their voice and enter a darkened room, where their words—looped, contorted, transposed—answered movement with altered sound and light. Just as jazz musicians state a “head” before improvising, Suri’s installation transformed a single phrase into endless variations, echoing both the freedom and structure of jazz. This multimedia work united light, sound, video, and digital sequencing, enfolding participants in a live dialogue between memory, identity, and technology.
As accolades gathered—a Roland Endowed Scholarship for Music Technology, the Robert Moog Award for excellence in sound art—Suri established his status as both a technical and creative leader. In 2020, he became the leading music/multimedia producer and sound designer at the prestigious Lume Studios in New York. Lume is a hub for immersive arts, at the crossroads of creative technology and branding, serving elite clients from Apple, Adidas, JetBlue, and NBC to Billie Eilish and Millie Bobby-Brown. Under Suri’s vision, Lume’s experiential programming—including the pioneering LUME Room/LUME Piano series and custom NFT, AI PhotoBooth, and interactive campaigns—has set the bar for innovation and creative integration, making the institution the go-to studio for cutting-edge immersive art and next-generation digital experience.
The significance of Suri’s ongoing role is evident in recurring successes: his oversight of signature residencies, multimedia commissions for brands, and his central curatorial influence on major events like NFT NYC, where he leads the immersive infrastructure that situates Lume at the heart of New York’s digital art scene.
Suri’s appointment as the new music/multimedia producer for Heavy Light Design—a premier studio renowned for groundbreaking work with Adidas, Vans, Moon Rise Music Fest, Lil Uzi Vert, Sam Feldt, and headline shows at Madison Square Garden—marks the next chapter. Here, Suri’s focus is immersive projection mapping, real-time sound design, and interactive event architecture, shaping flagship projects for Grammy-nominated acts like Alesso and for Lavan NYC, the destination for high-profile performers and multinational brands. His integration of platforms like TouchDesigner and Resolume represents, at scale, the jazz improviser's ability to anticipate, listen, and respond in real time. This is not technology for technology's sake, but to facilitate a dialogue—an evolving interplay among artist, environment, and audience.
Praised by curators and critics for its ability to foster reflection and connection in uncertain times, Communion draws its power from both technical sophistication and emotional sensitivity. Sound, light, and motion become the common language—prompting visitors to move, listen, and respond as one would with fellow musicians in a jazz ensemble. The effect is contemplative and deeply restorative: a counterpoint to the isolation of recent years.
In recognition of its impact, Communion is slated for a full gallery takeover at Manhattan’s All Street Gallery in 2026, an event already anticipated in New York’s art calendar as a milestone for immersive multimedia art.
The jazz impulse—listen, risk, transform—animates all of Suri’s work. The past, present, and future described here are neither a closed catalog nor a litany of achievements, but a continuous unfolding, a series of questions, a search for new dialogues. In every project, from the continuum of Beatles classics to the generative immersive spaces of tomorrow, Suri returns to the fundamental structure of jazz: the “head” is stated, the improvisation endless, and the invitation always open for others to enter, to respond, and thus to shape what comes next.
The Genesis of Creative Reinterpretation
Born in New Delhi, Suri’s journey from India’s capital to international acclaim began with pivotal moments like the 2009 Artistes Unlimited Continuum Festival. In the celebrated halls of Kamani Auditorium, Suri served as Lead Sound Designer-Arranger, reimagining The Beatles' catalog with a contemporary vision—88-piece chorus, ensembles, and soloists merging Western classics with multicultural perspectives. “I wanted to give this immortal music a broader perspective, to show how a new generation of musicians from different countries can dare to touch a legend and share with it their own dreams and hopes,” said Suri at the time, framing the jazz ethos of reinterpretation, variation, and improvisation—even with the most canonical works.In 2014, Suri’s musical reach extended to Boston’s Symphony Hall for the Festival of Lights tribute to Academy Award-winning composer A.R. Rahman, where Suri’s virtuosic vocals and arrangements—including the Bollywood hits Chhaiyyan Chhaiyyan and Jiya Jale—brought Indian classical motifs into conversation with contemporary jazz orchestration, drawing on a depth of understanding cultivated from a lifelong immersion in both traditions.
From early years performing with India’s Euphoria and Shubha Mudgal at landmark venues like Siri Fort Auditorium, Suri channeled parallel passions—engineering, production, sound technology—that were honed at the Indian Institute of Technology and later, at Berklee College of Music in Boston. Here, he mastered the technical languages of Csound, Max/MSP, and Ableton Live, shaping projects for Boulanger Labs that would define the cutting edge of music software and complex audio systems.
The foundation for Suri’s international reputation as a multimedia visionary was laid with works such as Piece of Mind, commissioned for the Boston Globe-acclaimed “Deciphering Identity” exhibit at the Jewett Art Gallery, Wellesley College, and subsequently featured as a centerpiece at the 2nd International Csound Conference in Boston. Visitors were invited to record their voice and enter a darkened room, where their words—looped, contorted, transposed—answered movement with altered sound and light. Just as jazz musicians state a “head” before improvising, Suri’s installation transformed a single phrase into endless variations, echoing both the freedom and structure of jazz. This multimedia work united light, sound, video, and digital sequencing, enfolding participants in a live dialogue between memory, identity, and technology.
Innovator, Technologist, Master: Leading in the World’s Top Studios
Suri’s acclaimed installation Operand was first revealed at Out Of The Blue Gallery, Cambridge, then later in Boston’s iconic Rose Kennedy Greenway for FIGMENT Festival—a public park rooted in civic history. As thousands encountered Operand, they became part of a free jazz ensemble: movement producing evolving soundscapes. Viewers weren’t just interacting with a system but, as in avant-garde jazz, engaging with each other, embodying improvisatory dialogue on a communal scale.As accolades gathered—a Roland Endowed Scholarship for Music Technology, the Robert Moog Award for excellence in sound art—Suri established his status as both a technical and creative leader. In 2020, he became the leading music/multimedia producer and sound designer at the prestigious Lume Studios in New York. Lume is a hub for immersive arts, at the crossroads of creative technology and branding, serving elite clients from Apple, Adidas, JetBlue, and NBC to Billie Eilish and Millie Bobby-Brown. Under Suri’s vision, Lume’s experiential programming—including the pioneering LUME Room/LUME Piano series and custom NFT, AI PhotoBooth, and interactive campaigns—has set the bar for innovation and creative integration, making the institution the go-to studio for cutting-edge immersive art and next-generation digital experience.
The significance of Suri’s ongoing role is evident in recurring successes: his oversight of signature residencies, multimedia commissions for brands, and his central curatorial influence on major events like NFT NYC, where he leads the immersive infrastructure that situates Lume at the heart of New York’s digital art scene.
Suri’s appointment as the new music/multimedia producer for Heavy Light Design—a premier studio renowned for groundbreaking work with Adidas, Vans, Moon Rise Music Fest, Lil Uzi Vert, Sam Feldt, and headline shows at Madison Square Garden—marks the next chapter. Here, Suri’s focus is immersive projection mapping, real-time sound design, and interactive event architecture, shaping flagship projects for Grammy-nominated acts like Alesso and for Lavan NYC, the destination for high-profile performers and multinational brands. His integration of platforms like TouchDesigner and Resolume represents, at scale, the jazz improviser's ability to anticipate, listen, and respond in real time. This is not technology for technology's sake, but to facilitate a dialogue—an evolving interplay among artist, environment, and audience.
ZYkR: Jazz Improvisation Meets Electronic Innovation
At the core of Suri’s artistic identity is his acclaimed project ZYkR, lauded as an “indie fascination” by Indian and international press. This electronic collective, drawing on the exploratory lineage of jazz, has featured custom instruments—prepared drums, sensor-woven gloves, real-time generative systems—at a range of celebrated venues: from Arlene's Grocery to Antisocial and the Village Voice stage, with collaboration credits from National Film Award-winning Pranjal Dua to Rolling Stone-acclaimed Pedro Zappa. ZYkR’s upcoming appearances at India’s Ziro Festival (the nation’s top eco-friendly music gathering) and at the Subjective Art Festival Tribeca—a marquee event that draws leading voices from across the art and technology spheres to one of New York’s most dynamic districts—underscore its recognition as a next-generation ensemble. Each show unites the logic of jazz improvisation—extended technique, collective invention, the ensemble room’s responsive skillset—with the possibilities of digital performance. Button, sensor, projection, and code become the horn, the keyboard, the brush of a ride cymbal expanding the territory of contemporary music.Communion: Dialogue in a Post-Pandemic World
In 2024, Suri’s Communion emerged as the standout installation at Subjective Art Fair, developed in response to the collective aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. True to its name, Communion cultivates a sense of shared presence—inviting participants to enter a darkened, immersive environment alive with spatial sound, subtle projections, and tactile sensors. Each interaction with the space initiates a jazz-like call and response—every touch, a question; each evolving sound, an answer—transforming individual gestures into a living, improvised score. The audio layers are neither static nor predictable, but continuously reconfigured by the bodies and attention of everyone present, creating a meditative yet ever-changing group experience.Praised by curators and critics for its ability to foster reflection and connection in uncertain times, Communion draws its power from both technical sophistication and emotional sensitivity. Sound, light, and motion become the common language—prompting visitors to move, listen, and respond as one would with fellow musicians in a jazz ensemble. The effect is contemplative and deeply restorative: a counterpoint to the isolation of recent years.
In recognition of its impact, Communion is slated for a full gallery takeover at Manhattan’s All Street Gallery in 2026, an event already anticipated in New York’s art calendar as a milestone for immersive multimedia art.
The Expanding Horizon
Whether designing environments for Grammy-level concerts, directing technical teams for Lavan’s high-profile gatherings, or shaping the DNA of Lume Studios’ industry-defining installations, Aseem Suri remains an architect of possibility. His future-focused collaborations—whether for NFT art, experiential festivals, or state-of-the-art brand activations—rest always on principles forged in the ensemble: improvisation, attention, and responsiveness guiding every system, every platform, every piece of sound and light.The jazz impulse—listen, risk, transform—animates all of Suri’s work. The past, present, and future described here are neither a closed catalog nor a litany of achievements, but a continuous unfolding, a series of questions, a search for new dialogues. In every project, from the continuum of Beatles classics to the generative immersive spaces of tomorrow, Suri returns to the fundamental structure of jazz: the “head” is stated, the improvisation endless, and the invitation always open for others to enter, to respond, and thus to shape what comes next.
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