“Shawn Mendes started following us on TikTok and Sia shared our cover of her song, “Snowman” on her instagram story which was really amazing. We were shocked to see that they both even knew who we were.” Fraternal twin sisters Kiran and Nivi went viral on TikTok and other social media platforms with their mashup covers with songs infusing Carnatic music with songs from artists like Sia, Jason Derule and Coldplay. They recently introduced the world to some of their original self-produced music including “Is There Peace?”.
Shawn Mendes, Jason Derulo, (saw the collab with him which was very cool!) SIA are fans which is amazing! How did they discover your music? Have Shawn Mendes and SIA reached out to you in some way and are there future collabs coming up?
Shawn Mendes started following us on TikTok and Sia shared our cover of her song, “Snowman” on her instagram story which was really amazing. We were shocked to see that they both even knew who we were. We are just grateful for all the love and support we have been receiving!
You guys have a huge social media following on both Instagram (150K+ followers) and TikTok (1.2M+ followers)! How did you go about building your following?
We found TikTok by sheer luck and Nivi had the idea of posting singing videos. We started posting our first video which got 1000 likes in a day and we were pleasantly surprised by that. This gave us the motivation to continue to do more videos. I would say posting consistenting helped us build our following.
Usually as you grow in popularity, the majority of comments & interactions you have with followers is generally positive, but there’s always that small vocal group of negative followers. Is this something you’ve seen and if so, how do you deal with them?
Yes, there have been some negative comments, but we don’t really take it to heart as everyone has their own opinions about things and what’s important is to do things that we love and believe in. Our fans love us for our music and we feel that that is a very pure relationship that makes us forget about the negativity, not only from social media but the tragic events that have happened in the past year.
I personally view social media in a positive light. I see it as a tool that can be used for good or bad (similar to a car). Do you agree or disagree with this statement?
Yes, definitely agree. Social media can be good and bad. One example of the positives is that it has helped us gain a following that we wouldn’t if it weren’t for social media. One of the negatives is when people are negative to one another on social media. However, overall we feel like the good outweights the bad.
At what age did you get into creating music? What was the spark that got you excited about music?
We started composting at around 15 or 16. When we were young, we were trained in Carnatic music and listening to our favorite musicians sparked an interest in us to practice 3-4 hours a day. The passion incremently increased from there.
