Before Kiran and Nivi Saishankar could speak, they could sing. When they were 2, neither had uttered any words. Their parents enrolled them in speech therapy, but it wasn’t much help. After the twins watched other children sing in church, the host asked their mom, “Why don’t you teach your kids an Indian devotional song?” Nivi says her “mom was perplexed because how can we sing if we can’t really speak?”
Their mom had faith that music would get her daughters talking. They learned “Gopala Radha Lola,” a bhajan (Indian devotional song) praising Lord Krishna that’s often used as a lullaby. Within a week, they were singing it unprompted. Within months, they were talking, too.
Seven months into the pandemic, Kiran and Nivi stood in their living room, covering “Overwhelmed” by Royal & The Serpent for TikTok. Kiran in glasses and a butter-yellow hoodie, Nivi in a blush sweater. The lo-fi setup was the same as their earlier videos. But this one started the domino effect toward their first-ever headline show at the House of Blues’ Voodoo Room on November 20.
Kiran starts the video with the chorus before Nivi speedruns a tongue twister of “sa re ga ma pa dha ni sa.” Those sargam notes are the Indian classical equivalent of solfège, Western music’s “do re mi fa so la ti do.” Each syllable represents a different note, so singing them as fast as Nivi can (in a way I can only describe as a rainstorm over a xylophone) requires a great deal of vocal agility.
The video eventually collected 8.6 million views (with tens of millions more on other similar videos), using something familiar to introduce broader audiences to a musical vocabulary personal to the Rancho Peñasquitos–based twins. It was a spaghetti-on-the-wall, throwaway concept that Nivi says they initially thought was “dumb.” Nivi suspects the novelty helped it click with viewers outside India, where TikTok was banned in June 2020, alongside dozens of other Chinese apps amid border tensions.
“People who are watching these are not Indian, they don’t know what this is, and they think it’s so cool,” Nivi says. “Music can reach anyone; there are no boundaries of language, where you’re from, or who you are.”
Their training began with Carnatic music lessons at age 5. In middle school, they learned Western classical music styles, like opera, under Annet Nakamoto. “[She] really believed in us and took our music seriously,” Kiran says. They say they were pretty much the only kids their age doing opera (how many middle schoolers do you hear singing Verdi?), and starting early helped them learn to open up their voices. They performed with the Indian Fine Arts Academy of San Diego, and later with choirs at Westview High School and in senior living facilities.
Courtesy of Kiran and Nivi Saishankar
Nivi double majored in business economics and music and Kiran double majored in psychology and music at UCI. While there, the pandemic started and the pair downloaded TikTok which had quickly become the world’s most downloadable non-game app in March 2020, according to Sensor Tower.
“It was slowly becoming a thing that all my friends were talking about, and I just went on it for fun,” Nivi says. “Then we just started posting in our dorm room.”
At first, they posted mostly Western pop covers. After “Overwhelmed,” they brought their Carnatic training to “Holiday” by Lil Nas X, “Snowman” by Sia, and “Driver’s License” by Olivia Rodrigo. These videos caught the attention of Jason Derulo and Alicia Keys—both of whom sent DMs of praise and later collaborated with the sisters in person.
The timing offered fertile soil: broader American audiences were becoming more interested in music outside of their own language with musicians like Bad Bunny and BTS—whose songs feature very little English, if any at all— topping American charts. Luminate’s 2023 research found that 40 percent of US music listeners listened to non-English music; 63 percent of Gen Z and 65 percent of Millennial listeners said they listened to new music to experience new cultures and perspectives. And by 2020, YPulse reported over half of Gen Z teens used TikTok.
Those TikTok covers have evolved into original music, including the lonely ballad “8 Billion People” and the spicy “midnight snack” (which also includes a verse of sargam notes), with more singles to come soon. Typically Nivi records vocals and handles production, Kiran works on composition and melody, and they collaborate on lyrics.
“When people hear our music, I want people to feel seen, feel like they relate with our lyrics,” Kiran says.
San Diego has a grounding effect on the sisters. Weekly LA trips help them meet songwriters and producers, but San Diego helps the creative process flow more naturally. “I can just let all the noise out [in San Diego],” Nivi says. “In LA, there’s a lot of noise and a lot of people trying to get something out of something. Being here helps us stay grounded, go back to our roots, and not let the noise affect creative ideas.”
For two sisters whose biggest musical breakthrough came from an integration of their culture into popular music, that sense of rootedness just might be their biggest asset.
Kiran and Nivi will perform their first-ever headlining show at the House of Blues on November 20.
Emma Veidt is an editor at San Diego Magazine. She earned her bachelor's and master's degrees from the Missouri School of Journalism. She loves running, hiking, and rock climbing, but really, she mostly loves encounters with the street cats around North Park.
