Hyderabad-based Shilpa Sivakumaran, who studied to be an architect, knew she wanted to create exciting things and start a business. It was when she was doing a stint at a manufacturing company that she moved towards creating pedal boards for guitarists.
The idea occurred to her in 2018, when she was sitting with a group of musician friends. They were talking about the hassles of importing pedalboards from the US. “They were lamenting about how the customs duty was so high that it cost them almost double to import it. I wanted to take a look at a board and my friend showed it to me,” she says.
A pedal board is an aluminium frame built at a certain angle with a certain rigidity, she explains. “I looked at the frame and told my friend that we could replicate this. He was surprised and was all game to try it as a fun project and see if it works out,” recollects Shilpa.
Working at a plastic moulding factory then, Shilpa created the first prototype. Her friend loved the design. “Looking at the successful design, a few other musicians asked me to create boards in different dimensions. I ended up making seven boards over three months,” she says.
Though the structure is simple, a pedalboard isn’t something a carpenter can make casually. “I knew a lot of vendors who did metal fabrication. In 2019, I quit my job and worked on creating pedalboards full time. My friend helped out with the research and development,” she says.
Through her company Soundhammer, Shilpa worked on making the pedalboard better, lighter and sleeker. “We also worked on making the boards more functional than imported ones. Every order we have received till now has been by word of mouth,” she says.
The pedalboards imported from the US are made with aluminium channels for cables, and welded on to side supports with legs and an incline. “We took an aluminium sheet which is laser cut and precision bent. Its strength is good and there is a lot of space underneath to mount something like power supply equipment,” she says.
The boards are made in multiple colours. “Across the world, mostly only black pedalboards are available. We came out with red, yellow, blue, military green, among other colours. We gave these coloured versions Indian names like Butter Chicken and Kadapa Slate,” she says.
More musicians prefer coloured boards to black ones, says Shilpa.
How much time does it take her to create a customised pedalboard? “From designing to finishing, it takes two-three weeks,” she says.
Her first pedalboard was made for Shiv Menon, a musician from Hyderabad. She has made customised boards for musicians like Warren Mendonsa (from the band Blackstratblues), Rudy Wallang (Soulmate), Tony Das (Peepal tree/ Thermal And A Quarter), Hrishi Giridhar (Anand Bhaskar Collective) and Carl Fernandes (Funktuation).
She has shipped boards to artistes in Shillong, Delhi, Mumbai, Kerala, Chennai and Bengaluru.
“Every musician comes and gives us his list of pedals for the board. At other times, our artist takes a picture of the current setup and works on our software to create a rough sketch. After the dimensions are discussed, the pedalboard is made,” she says. The boards vary in 14 to 32 inches in length and 5 to 16 inches in width. Check out Soundhammer at Facebook and Instagram.
Pedalboards from Soundhammer are 15-25% cheaper than boards imported from the US. “We hope to introduce standard size boards soon, which can easily compete with options imported from China,” says Shilpa.
Shilpa’s boards cost between Rs 2,000 and Rs 13,000.
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