"Anuraag Pendyal commandeers old-fashioned New Orleans music and venerates modern leftist values in a provocative but reverent way on solo originals vol. 1...Pendyal shows off his potential to create dynamic moments denser than the usual key progressions...I don’t regularly turn on NOLA R&B piano music from this century. Still, if more music like this came out of local jazz venues, maybe I’d start."
"Anuraag Pendyal is a piano player and songwriter originally from Carrboro, NC. He's been working as a musician in New Orleans since 2015, typically performing five plus times a week both solo and with groups in genres ranging from traditional New Orleans music to rock'n roll, reggae, hip-hop, stride piano, freely improvised music, and more. The album "Solo Originals Vol. 1" is an assortment of ten songs written in the past ten or so years. Anuraag's tunes are influenced by his travels, the music of his adopted hometown, his literary and other artistic interests, current events, his friendships and relationships, and minute details and happenings in his life that, with the help of a little imagination, take on a life of their own. You never know what will turn into a song."