Prepare yourself for a phenomenal masterclass in rock history, acoustic orchestration, and creative survival on this edition of The Artist Conversation, as hosts Sandeep Kulkarni and Suraaj Parab welcome Grammy-winning guitar virtuoso, producer, and legacy builder Janet Robin. As the youngest student ever taken on by the legendary Randy Rhoads, Janet’s career has been an absolute blueprint for musical longevity, taking her from the high-voltage clubs of the 1980s LA rock scene to playing mandolin in a multi-layered "guitar army" assembled by Fleetwood Mac's Lindsey Buckingham.
In this episode, Janet details the relentless work ethic required to navigate structural radio gatekeeping, her experiences writing tracks alongside Ann and Nancy Wilson of Heart, and the creative epiphany that led her to step out from behind the vocal mic to launch her instrumental force, The String Revolution. Featuring real-world advice on mastering multiple genres, a look at her physical Grammy statuette, and reflections on the cyclical nature of the music business, this conversation is an empowering must-watch for any independent musician dedicated to mastering their instrument and building a lifelong career in the arts.
The Neoclassical Foundations of Randy Rhoads: Guitarist Janet Robin shares personal insights from her childhood mentorship under rock legend Randy Rhoads at the Musonia School of Music, detailing how he instilled baseline performance discipline, prioritized the blues as the foundation of rock, and taught her how to build memorable melodic motifs.
Surviving the Sunset Strip Era: Janet recounts her time as the teenage lead guitarist for the 1980s all-female rock band Precious Metal, pulling back the curtain on the institutional misogyny of 1980s radio programming and detailing how the 1990 Seattle grunge movement dismantled the LA hair-metal scene overnight.
Orchestrating a Grammy-Winning Guitar Army: The veteran instrumentalist describes her transition into session work under Fleetwood Mac’s Lindsey Buckingham, explaining how his meticulous production style inspired her to found her acoustic ensemble, The String Revolution, culminating in a Grammy win alongside acoustic master Tommy Emmanuel.
Sandeep Kulkarni (00:02.545) Today's guest is Janet Robin, a Grammy-winning guitarist, composer, and songwriter whose work spans rock, acoustic performance, film scoring, and instrumental music.
Suraaj Parab (00:15.289) Welcome, Janet, to The Artist Conversation.
Janet Robin (00:18.158) Hello in India, and hello in Oceanside, California!
Sandeep Kulkarni (00:26.365) Yes, So-Cal! We are so excited to have you on the show. When Suraaj first told me about your background, I immediately went to research and listen to your material. Your journey is incredibly inspiring. To jump right into your roots: you began studying electric guitar with the legendary Randy Rhoads when you were still a kid. What did that elite mentorship teach you that has stayed with you throughout your entire career?
Janet Robin (01:14.862) I actually started out on the acoustic guitar with other teachers when I was about six or seven years old. Around the age of nine, my older brother, who was also taking guitar lessons, decided he wanted to transition to the electric guitar. Being the younger sister, I had to do everything he did! I begged my parents to let me switch to electric too.
My mom somehow got a referral for a great electric guitar teacher at a small neighborhood music school located literally around the corner from where we grew up. She thought it sounded perfect, so my brother and I moved our music studies over to Musonia School of Music—the academy founded and run by Randy Rhoads’ mother, Delores Rhoads.
I started studying with Randy when I was nine. At the time, I was the youngest student he had ever taken on, and I might have been one of only two young girls he taught. I stayed with him as a dedicated student all the way up until he landed his historic arena gig with Ozzy Osbourne.
Sandeep Kulkarni (02:39.889) That is phenomenal. What was it like taking lessons from him back in 1977, before he became a household name on the global rock circuit?
Janet Robin (03:01.07) We are talking about 1977. I started out playing a Fender Stratocaster. Sadly, someone out there has that exact guitar because it was stolen out of the back of my mom’s station wagon! After that, I took the insurance settlement money and bought a Gibson Les Paul, specifically because Randy played a Les Paul and I wanted to be just like him.
Back then, my private lessons with him were only $8 for a half-hour session. Every single lesson was special because he was a completely special human being. He was a spectacular musician and guitar player, but he was also an exceptional songwriter. He was so uniquely advanced. I had never heard or seen anyone handle the fretboard like him. Eddie Van Halen was just emerging on the LA scene at that time, but where Eddie popularized two-hand finger-tapping, Randy focused heavily on lightning-fast pull-off techniques, seamlessly weaving classical scales into heavy blues-rock structures.
If you analyze a track like "Crazy Train", the main guitar riff functions exactly like a catchy pop hook. To me, it holds a similar rhythmic sensibility to a Steve Miller song. Randy possessed an extraordinary capability to inject elite classical virtuosity into his guitar solos, but he never let it eclipse the song itself. He understood that a great rock song required a massive melodic motif.
He would compose these great chord progressions on the spot during our lessons. He would play a rhythm progression, and I would try to play a lead line over it, or he would play this mind-blowing lead guitar work and then immediately break it down for me saying, "Okay, let me show you the exact physical technique behind how I just executed that riff." Then we would trade roles; he would play the rhythm progression while I attempted to mimic his lead techniques. That back-and-forth improvisation taught me the foundations of structural songwriting. He taught me how to make a guitar riff act as a structural motif.
On the technical side, playing that fast required endless repetitions. The single greatest lesson I absorbed from Randy was pure discipline. If you don't hold the discipline to sit down and practice your instrument for hours, what is the point of trying to build a music career?
Sandeep Kulkarni (06:26.959) Once you began studying with him, how many hours a day did you practice?
Janet Robin (06:33.006) I was already deeply obsessed with the acoustic guitar, but once I started taking lessons from Randy, my practice routine became completely manic. He was so blindingly good it would make you think, What the fuck is that? It was crazy. At that time, he was playing in the original lineup of Quiet Riot—the first era of the band, long before the commercial lineup that emerged after he passed away.
The original Quiet Riot played all over the LA club circuit, and crowds packed those rooms specifically to watch Randy play. My parents were incredibly supportive; they would chaperone me into these underage rock clubs when I was only 10 years old so I could watch my guitar teacher perform on stage. The entire crowd would just stand there with their jaws dropped, staring at his hands. We all knew it was only a matter of time before a major global artist picked him up. Nothing against the rest of Quiet Riot, but Randy and the bass player, Rudy Sarzo, operated on a completely different level.
Beyond physical discipline, the greatest gift Randy gave me was self-esteem. Growing up as a little girl in the 1970s, I didn't want to play with dolls; I wanted to play rock guitar. I was constantly met with misogynistic, outdated gatekeeping—people telling me, "You can't play sports with us because you're a girl," or "Girls don't play rock guitar." Randy never treated me with that bias. He looked at me simply as a musician and said, "Hey, you want to be a serious guitar player? Just put in the hours, do the work, and practice." That validation completely shifted the trajectory of my life because it erased my insecurities. At that time, there were only a handful of prominent women rocking out on electric guitar—Nancy Wilson from Heart, Bonnie Raitt, and Lita Ford. But I wanted to play with the neoclassical intensity of Randy Rhoads.
I stayed close with his family for decades. I was very close with his mother, Delores, and I actually had the profound honor of playing guitar at her funeral.
Sandeep Kulkarni (09:28.914) The story of his audition with Ozzy Osbourne is legendary.
Janet Robin (09:20.802) When he got the call to audition for Ozzy's new solo band, he walked into the room and simply started playing some basic classical exercises to warm up his fingers. Ozzy walked in, listened to him warm up for a minute, and instantly said, "You have the gig. You don't even need to play an official song for me." Ozzy recognized on the spot that he was in the presence of a musical prodigy, much like Mozart.
Randy instilled that deep confidence in all of his students. He explicitly told us, "Don't try to play exactly like me. I am going to teach you the mechanics of these techniques so you can master the instrument, but your job is to develop your own signature style." You can actually find old audio bootlegs of Randy's guitar lessons on YouTube where he tells his students that they must learn how to play the blues. He believed that if you don't master blues guitar, you cannot play authentic rock and roll, because blues is the definitive foundation of all American rock music. The very first songs he had me track were roots-rock pieces by Chuck Berry and Jimi Hendrix. People don't associate Randy Rhoads with the blues, but his foundational blues phrasing was immaculate.
Suraaj Parab (11:43.94) You carried that training directly into the industry, becoming the lead guitarist for the all-female rock band Precious Metal when you were still a teenager. What was it like navigating your voice inside the legendary 1980s LA rock scene?
Janet Robin (12:16.462) I joined Precious Metal when I was 16 years old, sadly just one year after Randy passed away in that tragic plane crash. I was still in high school, had just gotten my driver's license, and answered a classified ad in the paper. I explicitly chose that ad because it specified an "all-female band." Prior to that, I had played in bands with guys who either didn't take my musicianship seriously or were more interested in trying to be my boyfriend than focusing on the music, which I had zero interest in.
The Go-Go's had already broken out commercially, but Precious Metal didn't want to play standard new-wave pop; we wanted to be a real, heavy rock band. We hit it off instantly. By 16, my chops were quite advanced thanks to my years with Randy. We started writing original material together, and that is where I truly cut my teeth as a collaborative songwriter.
I was highly demanding during our writing sessions; I insisted that we feature a dedicated electric guitar solo in every single song. In the 1980s LA scene, the guitar solo was a major selling point for a track. I wanted to ensure my structural skills were fully portrayed on our records, so I utilized the heavy classical and blues techniques I had learned from Randy.
It was an intense journey navigating the 1980s "hair metal" era. On the positive side, our band stood out because all five of us were legitimate, highly skilled instrumentalists. On the negative side, the institutional misogyny was rampant. Guys would walk up to us after a live set and say, "Who is your boyfriend playing your guitar parts behind the curtain stage?" Suraaj Parab (14:41.935) Oh my god, that is awful.
Janet Robin (14:37.068) I would look them dead in the eye and say, "No, bro. You just physically watched my hands play every note right in front of your face. What is wrong with you?" Or we would receive backhanded compliments like, "Wow, you play really well for a girl." People actually thought that was a compliment back then!
Despite the industry bias, we earned the deep respect of the top rising rock acts on the Sunset Strip. We were close friends with Duff McKagan from Guns N' Roses, we co-wrote an original song with C.C. DeVille from Poison, and we opened major arena dates for bands like Extreme. Once these rock musicians watched us perform live right in front of them, they knew there was no one playing behind a curtain. We were playing with real power.
Our biggest obstacle with Precious Metal was commercial radio formatting. Our sound sat right on the border of pop-metal and hard rock. Metal radio stations refused to play our singles because we were deemed too pop, and mainstream pop stations wouldn't play us because our guitar tracks were too heavy.
To top it off, back in the 1980s, radio music directors would explicitly tell our management team or our radio promo reps: "I’m sorry, we can only include one female-fronted rock artist or all-female band on our weekly station playlist at a time, and we already have our one slot filled." Just one slot for an entire gender! It was completely crazy.
Sandeep Kulkarni (16:39.313) That is absolute madness. And these were major radio stations telling you this?
Janet Robin (16:48.578) Yes, major institutional stations like KLOS. Stations like K-ROK were a little more progressive and open-minded, and heavy stations like KNAC helped, but across mainstream American radio, that "one female slot" was the unspoken rule. We pushed through, booked our own independent tours, kept writing, and fought hard until 1990—which is exactly when the Seattle grunge explosion hit and completely shut down the 1980s rock scene overnight.
Sandeep Kulkarni (17:20.081) The grunge era entirely shifted the musical landscape.
Janet Robin (17:24.01) We literally received calls from our management team saying, "Mainstream radio formatting has flipped completely. They are archiving all 80s rock tracks and exclusively playing grunge records now—Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, and Alice in Chains." Sandeep Kulkarni (17:34.861) I remember that structural shift vividly. I joined my very first metal band as a lead vocalist right around 1992 and 1993, right in the thick of that transition.
Janet Robin (18:00.43) The industry suddenly looked down on everything from the previous decade. But music works in cyclical waves, and those classic heavy rock elements are making a massive comeback today.
Sandeep Kulkarni (18:05.613) Absolutely, it's a continuous circle. Following the dissolution of Precious Metal, you were personally hand-picked by Lindsey Buckingham of Fleetwood Mac to join his solo touring band as a core guitarist. How did working closely with a master arranger like Lindsey alter your approach to guitar textures and songwriting?
Janet Robin (18:42.126) That opportunity arrived at the perfect moment. When Precious Metal disbanded and the industry shifted to grunge, I was completely broke and wondering what my next career step should be. I decided to try the "hired gun" path, working as a professional session player and backing guitarist for established artists.
An A&R representative from our previous record label had transitioned into working with a prominent talent agency that cast musicians for major stadium tours. Lindsey Buckingham was preparing to launch his very first full-scale solo concert tour. He had completed massive stadium tours with Fleetwood Mac, but he had never toured entirely on his own as a solo artist.
Because Lindsey’s solo studio albums features incredibly dense, intricate, multi-layered acoustic and electric guitar tracks, he realized he couldn't replicate those arrangements live with a standard four-piece rock band. Lindsey is an absolute musical genius—another modern Mozart. To execute his vision for his solo record, Out of the Cradle, he decided to recruit a literal "guitar army" for the road.
He hired five guitarists total—four of us backing him up on stage—alongside two percussionists, a primary drummer, a bassist, and a keyboardist. It was a massive, powerhouse ensemble. Lindsey intentionally avoided hiring famous session players; he wanted fresh, hungry, lesser-known younger guitarists who could bring a vibrant energy to the production.
He specifically wanted two male guitarists and two female guitarists for the backing lineup. He designed it that way because Fleetwood Mac’s iconic vocal arrangements rely on precise male and female harmonies, and his solo material required those same high-register background vocal layers. He figured if he was hiring musicians to execute those complex vocal stacks on the road, they might as well be world-class guitarists too!
He cast me and my brilliant friend Jan Kuehnemund, the founding lead guitarist of the 80s rock band Vixen. Jan was a phenomenal guitar player, bassist, and vocalist.
Lindsey instituted a highly rigorous, instructional pre-production phase. He sat down with each of us individually for months, teaching us the exact note-for-note layers of every single guitar track on the record. It was exactly like sitting in a masterclass with Beethoven every single day—and getting a great weekly salary for it!
Sandeep Kulkarni (22:16.177) Getting paid to study arrangement with Lindsey Buckingham is the ultimate gig.
Janet Robin (22:21.678) It was spectacular structural conditioning. It forced me to completely push my high-gain metal guitar style to the side. This was 1992; Lindsey wasn't chasing grunge trends, he was executing timeless, intricate acoustic orchestrations and complex finger-picking patterns that I hadn’t practiced since I was eight years old.
I had to learn how to track complex multi-tonal parts on the mandolin, acoustic twelve-strings, and various nylon-string classical guitars. There were certainly no mandolin tracks in Precious Metal, I can promise you that! It was the most creatively inspiring period of personal artistic growth in my entire career. Randy Rhoads gave me the technical tools as a child, but working with Lindsey taught me how to orchestrate those tools on a world-class level.
Lindsey was a relentless perfectionist. Unbeknownst to the backing band, he was recording every single instrument and vocal line onto individual ADAT tape tracks during our multi-hour rehearsals. Every night, he would go home and listen to those rehearsal tapes with surgical precision. If he caught you singing slightly sharp, dropping a wrong note, or playing slightly off-tempo, he would sit down with you the next morning to have a serious, intense conversation about your execution.
Sandeep Kulkarni (24:20.165) Was that process incredibly stressful to navigate daily?
Janet Robin (24:32.366) It was terrifyingly stressful! The stakes were incredibly high, we were performing at an elite global level, and you simply cannot make a mistake on a Fleetwood Mac arrangement or a Lindsey Buckingham solo composition. I spent my entire weekly salary hiring private vocal coaches and advanced guitar instructors to ensure my parts were flawless. I became completely obsessed with perfection.
Lindsey whipped all of us into world-class shape. It taught me never to take a musical part for granted, to lock into the pocket, and to obsess over the macro-details of time and pitch. I have carried that exact standard of production forward into my own career, and I drive the independent artists I produce completely crazy with that same perfectionism!
Sandeep Kulkarni (25:43.921) Do you think that level of intense, hands-on musical coaching from a legacy band leader still happens in the modern touring industry?
Janet Robin (26:05.394) No way. Today, stadium-level pop stars like Lady Gaga utilize an external music director to manage the backing band's rehearsals. In the modern touring circuit, you either hit the ground running perfectly on day one or you are instantly fired and replaced; legacy artists rarely sit down with you personally to mentor your execution.
Years after that tour wrapped, I sat down with Lindsey and told him, "You scared the absolute shit out of me during those rehearsals!" He smiled and replied, "Janet, I knew exactly how advanced your training was, and I knew you would rise to the occasion if I lit a fire under your ass." He saw my potential and pushed me to meet it.
When that tour concluded, he acted as a mentor, encouraging me to step out from being a sideman, start writing my own lead material, sing my own songs, and get out on the road as a solo artist. He had me send him my solo demos, reviewed my tracking arrangements inside the studio, and constantly supported my trajectory.
He was incredibly proud when I eventually won my Grammy Award. I called him up and said, "Lindsey, you are the one who drove me completely crazy with perfectionism, so you are a major part of this trophy too!" I have been blessed to have these iconic male guitar legends enter my life as non-misogynistic mentors who judged me strictly on my ability to play the instrument. It validated my endurance in what can be an incredibly brutal career path.
Suraaj Parab (28:37.751) Your career graph is remarkable. You have collaborated with iconic vocalists like Ann and Nancy Wilson of Heart, acoustic virtuosos like Tommy Emmanuel, and legacy acts like Air Supply.
Janet Robin (29:02.702) I am deeply grateful for every single one of those eras. The learning process never ends. No matter how many decades you spend touring, you are never "good enough." If you ever start to think you've mastered the guitar, go watch Tommy Emmanuel play an acoustic set; he will instantly send you back to the practice room! That humbleness is what motivates a true artist to keep evolving.
Today, I maintain a select roster of advanced guitar students, and those students teach me just as much as I teach them. It forces me to analyze modern musical trends and learn complex tracks on the spot. It has made me a highly versatile, multi-genre player. I always tell my students: "You can hold a favorite genre, but if you want to survive as a working professional in the music industry, you must master every single style imaginable so you never have to turn down a gig." My modern focus has shifted heavily toward record producing, helping independent artists arrange their scores, and leading my instrumental band, The String Revolution.
Sandeep Kulkarni (31:01.627) Your collaborations are legendary. What did writing alongside Ann and Nancy Wilson of Heart teach you about the art of listening?
Janet Robin (31:18.988) During the production of Precious Metal’s final studio album, our label was distributed by Capitol Records, which was Heart’s label at the time. The executives paired us up, and we flew up to Seattle to co-write tracks with Ann and Nancy. It was a spectacular experience observing their creative process up close. Ann Wilson’s vocal tracking is otherworldly—she would sit right in front of me and deliver these massive, spine-chilling vocal takes effortlessly.
After our evening writing sessions, we would sit around the dinner table playing acoustic covers of Elton John and the Beatles. Nancy and Ann were massive childhood idols of mine because they proved that women could completely dominate mainstream rock. We bonded over the shared obstacles of navigating a male-dominated industry as female instrumentalists.
The greatest lesson I absorbed from the Wilson sisters was pure perseverance. They achieved massive commercial success in the 1970s, survived a major career lull, mounted a multi-platinum comeback arena run in the late 1980s, and navigated the industry shifts of the 1990s. They proved that longevity requires the resilience to ride out the cyclical ups and downs of the business.
My gig with Air Supply came about when their tour manager, who had previously managed Precious Metal, watched me perform as a "hired gun" electric guitarist on a 1970s heritage roadshow tour. Air Supply was looking to inject a powerful electric guitar energy into their live shows. Their manager told Graham Russell and Russell Hitchcock, "You need to watch this girl play." They invited me to join their international touring band without a single formal audition or rehearsal. They simply handed me a CD of their live set list and said, "Our first stadium show is at the Grove in Anaheim in front of a massive crowd. Learn the tracks."
Sandeep Kulkarni (34:22.545) That is the ultimate trial by fire—no rehearsals, just step onto a major stage and deliver!
Janet Robin (34:32.622) It was another level of professional pressure! Coming from Lindsey Buckingham's hyper-regimented, months-long rehearsal schedule to Air Supply’s "here is the audio track, see you at soundcheck" framework was a massive shock to my system. It taught me how to be completely self-reliant on the road.
By the early 2000s, I was balancing those high-paying hired-gun tours with my own independent, DIY solo records, booking my own routes, and running my own independent label. Eventually, I developed severe vocal cord nodules that required intensive surgical intervention.
Singing lead vocals became incredibly difficult and painful. While I enjoyed singing, I am a guitar player first and foremost—that is my true identity. I can deliver immaculate backing vocal harmonies, but leading a set vocally takes a specific toll. I realized that audiences were packed into my solo shows primarily to watch my physical guitar pyrotechnics.
I decided to found a new musical project that required zero vocal tracks, allowing me to focus 100% of the production on experimental guitar arrangements. I chose acoustic instrumentation because it is far more efficient to tour with internationally. I wanted to build a powerful acoustic "guitar army" inspired by the multi-layered tracking layouts I had executed with Lindsey Buckingham. I wanted to arrange iconic classic rock covers and original instrumental pieces in a completely elevated way using elite players. I put out a blind audition advertisement looking for virtuosic guitarists I had never met, and that is exactly how The String Revolution was born.
Sandeep Kulkarni (36:57.104) The String Revolution beautifully fuses classical mechanics, rock energy, and world music textures into an entirely distinct style. Your instrumental arrangement of "Folsom Prison Blues" featuring the legendary acoustic virtuoso Tommy Emmanuel won the Grammy Award for Best Arrangement, Instrumental or A Cappella. What did that monumental milestone represent for you after navigating such an extensive, winding career in the industry?
Janet Robin (37:33.262) It is vital to state that an artist should never create art for the sole purpose of chasing trophies; art is entirely subjective and cannot be clinically judged. However, growing up in the United States watching the Grammy Awards, that stage represents the absolute Olympics of the music industry.
Winning that award brought a profound sense of validation and institutional respect. Because all members of our ensemble collaborated line-by-line on the score, the Recording Academy recognized us all as individual arrangers, meaning each of us received our own official Grammy statuette. Here it is right here in my studio!
Suraaj Parab (38:25.335) Wow, that is absolutely gorgeous. The iconic gramophone.
Janet Robin (38:29.016) Holding this physical validation made me reflect on every ounce of hardship, financial strain, and industry gatekeeping I fought through across my decades on the road. I am profoundly grateful that my mother was stable enough to witness that moment; she battles dementia now, but she understood that her daughter had won a Grammy.
My father passed away before that milestone, but if he had been alive, he would have run down the center of the street blasting a horn in celebration! I know he was watching from above.
Winning that Grammy was the culmination of pure perseverance, hard work, relentless practice, and mastering the business side of the industry. Independent artists often fail to realize that longevity requires aggressive networking, constant reinvention, mastering multiple instruments, producing external talent, session tracking, and teaching. The morning they announced our victory, my entire life flashed before my eyes.
When we stepped up to the podium, the band graciously allowed me to deliver our acceptance speech, which is a high-pressure moment because the broadcast directors cut your microphone after exactly 30 seconds! Having Tommy Emmanuel's legendary name featured on our arrangement certainly amplified our visibility during the voting cycles, but the Grammys are uniquely prestigious because the winners are chosen strictly by peer-to-peer musicians, producers, and audio engineers—not by record label executives or media journalists.
What's beautiful is that Tommy Emmanuel had been nominated for a Grammy twice before in his legendary career but had never won, until he tracked this unique acoustic arrangement with us! It was a beautiful collaborative victory. Success often arrives in your career in a completely different package than how you originally imagined it as a child. I will never take this achievement for granted. If we win more down the line, fantastic—but my daily focus remains entirely on tracking unique, quality, and emotionally compelling music.
Suraaj Parab (42:03.799) After spending decades touring international stages, tracking inside elite studios, and composing complex arrangements, what do you hope a listener ultimately experiences when they hear your music?
Janet Robin (42:24.026) I want my compositions to inspire them the exact same way my childhood guitar idols inspired me. I want the listener to feel an immediate, undeniable emotional connection to the arrangement. Because The String Revolution's catalog is entirely instrumental, we do not have lyric sheets or vocalists to explain the narrative; we must convey the entire story, tension, and resolution strictly through our physical finger-picking articulation and rhythmic dynamics.
I want a listener to sit back and think, I completely understand the story they are telling with those strings. Whether a rapid rock motif brings them joy or a heartfelt acoustic movement touches a memory of someone they miss, that emotional connection is the ultimate purpose of all art. If I can make a human being smile because of a unique guitar riff I arranged, that is a definitive victory.
Suraaj Parab (43:38.384) As an independent composer, I completely understand that desire for artistic connection. I experienced that same validation when I received my official confirmation letter from the Recording Academy approving me as a voting member. Seeing your name alongside your lifelong musical heroes on the official ballots is an unbelievable feeling.
Janet Robin (44:00.814) Becoming an official voting member of the Recording Academy is a massive milestone that carries immense professional respect. When we submitted our instrumental arrangements during our early cycles, we were met with silence; we submitted our work seven or eight times over the years before the momentum finally aligned into a physical nomination.
We were competing against some of the most phenomenal instrumental musicians on the planet, so I was completely content just celebrating the nomination itself. When they called our name as the winners, it was completely shocking. If your music can touch people's souls, and you can sustainably make a living by dedicating your life to your instrument, you have already won the game.
Suraaj Parab (45:07.521) Absolutely. When I cast my votes on the Grammy ballots for the first time, seeing my independent composition listed in the exact same category fields alongside legacy titans like Dream Theater was mind-blowing.
Janet, thank you so much for spending this time with us today and sharing the incredible, historic stories behind your music.
Janet Robin (46:04.782) It was my absolute pleasure! Thank you for giving me the space to share my journey with your audience.
Sandeep Kulkarni (46:13.371) Your path is a beautiful reminder that a dedicated life in music is never a single, straight line—it is a continuous series of evolutions. Thank you so much, Janet.
Janet Robin (46:24.238) That is a spectacular quote, Sandeep. I am absolutely going to steal that line for my upcoming clinics! Send me the official link the moment this episode drops so I can promote it across all my global channels.
Suraaj Parab (46:36.897) We will absolutely do that. To our global audience listening in today, thank you for sharing this space with us. Go stream Janet Robin’s solo albums and check out her Grammy-winning arrangements with The String Revolution on Spotify, Apple Music, and all major streaming networks. Follow her on Instagram, explore her website link layouts below, and if you have technical questions regarding string arrangements, send her a direct message—she answers every single creator personally!
Share this episode with a fellow rock music lover, join our international artist community on Discord, and we will see you all on the next edition of The Artist Conversation.
Sandeep Kulkarni (47:20.017) Thanks, everyone. Thank you, Janet!
Janet Robin (47:22.926) Thank you, guys!