Shib Shankar Chowdhury (artist name: Shib) is an independent musician, vocalist, singer-songwriter, composer, filmmaker and academic from India. He is a registered independent musician/vocalist with Indian Music Industries (IMI), Mumbai, to publish and release his songs internationally through publishers and record labels. He is also registered with BMI, USA (BMI IPI Nos. 1057541660 and 105741758).
Professionally, Shib is an Assistant Professor of English and former Head of the Department (H.O.D.) of Humanities & Social Sciences at Ghānī Khān Choudhury Institute of Engineering & Technology (GKCIET), Malda, a technical institute under the Ministry of Education, Government of India. His institutional profile is available at the GKCIET Faculty Profile.
Alongside his academic career, Shib has developed an interdisciplinary practice combining popular-music research, ethnomusicology, songwriting, vocal performance, music production and filmmaking. He earned his Bachelor's and Master's Degrees in English from Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), a Central University, New Delhi, in 2005 and 2008, respectively, and completed his Ph.D. in English from Techno India University, West Bengal, in 2021. His doctoral dissertation focused on “Women in 21st Century Anglo-American Popular Song.”
Shib has undergone advanced training in English Language Teaching at Exeter College, University of Oxford (2013) and studied Ethnomusicology at Charles University, Prague (2018). In 2011, he participated, with a scholarship, in the Herrsching Rural Youth Leadership Workshop in Herrsching, Germany, organised by the Federal Ministry for Food and Agriculture, Bonn, Germany, as part of an international programme focused on rural youth leadership and development. His ethnographic research has taken him across cities including Budapest, Rome, Vienna, Prague, Birmingham, London, Cork, Dublin, Limerick and Cardiff.
Shib has presented his research at international academic forums including EUPOP 2019 in Ireland and Innovation in Music conferences in London (2019), Stockholm (2022) and Edinburgh (2023). He also presented his research at the British Forum for Ethnomusicology (BFE) / Royal Musical Association (RMA) Research Students’ Conference 2022, held at the University of Plymouth, UK, where he was also invited to chair a session. In these academic presentations, Shib has presented his own original songs as an integral part of his research and creative practice.
In 2026, Shib's research paper “Songs as Counter-Archives: Memory, Protest, and the State in Popular Music” was accepted for presentation at the IASPM-US 2026 Conference, held at George Washington University, Washington, D.C., USA, from 26 February to 1 March 2026. In addition to presenting his research, he was invited to chair the panel “Memory and Remembrance.” His presentation incorporated his own original songs, reflecting his interdisciplinary approach to popular-music scholarship and creative practice.
Shib is also participating in the International Network of Innovative Apprenticeship (INAP) 2026 Conference at the University of Konstanz, Germany, where he will deliver a lecture based on his research and chair a conference session on 24–25 September 2026.
Alongside his academic work, Shib has pursued extensive musical training. He studied Western Contemporary Vocals at the Calcutta School of Music from 2016 to 2020. His studio albums have been mixed and mastered by internationally acclaimed and award-winning engineers including Trevor Gibson, Goetz Botzenhardt, Andrea Succi, Barry Grint and Zac Zikis. His music is distributed internationally through Ditto Music (UK), while his songwriting and publishing rights are administered globally through Songtrust (USA).
As a filmmaker and visual artist, Shib has developed internationally produced music videos combining original music, narrative and cinematic storytelling. His music videos “Yada Yada” and “I Am Virus” were produced internationally and filmed in London and Manchester through Irish and British production houses.
“I Am Virus,” a music video themed around the global COVID-19 pandemic, was produced by Steve Robin and recorded at The Barn Recording Studios in Brisbane, Australia. Both “I Am Virus” and “Yada Yada” were screened at the film festival associated with the 48th World Conference of the International Council for Traditions of Music and Dance (ICTMD), hosted by Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, in January 2025.
As a musician and filmmaker, Shib has created four original music videos, produced in international locations including the United Kingdom, the United States and New Zealand. His music-video work is being released internationally through the VEVO music-video network and its YouTube channels.
His latest cinematic music-video project, “You Are Not Lost,” represents a further development of his work as a musician and filmmaker. The music video was filmed in Washington, D.C., USA, under the direction of Emmy Award-winning director Dave Macintosh, with Emmy Award-winning professionals involved in the production. “You Are Not Lost” is scheduled for release through VEVO. The project combines Shib's original music with an internationally produced cinematic visual narrative.
Through his work across academia, popular-music research, ethnomusicology, songwriting, vocal performance, music production and filmmaking, Shib continues to explore the relationships between music, culture, identity, memory and society. His career reflects an interdisciplinary engagement with both scholarly research and creative practice, in which his own original songs and music-making form an important part of his academic and artistic work.
International Membership
Shib is a member of 1. IASPM(International Association for Study of Popular Music Studies) 2. Royal Musical Association (RMA), Manchester, UK. 3. European Popular Culture Association ( EPCA), Finland. 4. British Forum for Ethnomusicology (BFE), UK. 5. International Council of Tradition of Music and Dance (ICTMD). 6. International Singer-Songwriters Association, (USA). 7. Brahma Kumaris World Spiritual University, London (UK)