SPICMACAY or The Society for Promotion of Indian Classical Music and Culture Amongst Youth seeks to conserve and promote an awareness of this rich and heterogeneous cultural tapestry amongst the youth of this country through focus on the classical arts. The name itself associates SPICMACAY with the youth and it is in fact a movement for the youth and by the youth for revitalizing the rich Indian culture in the wake of de culturisation .SPICMACAY has stood for excellence and Indian culture for more than 3 decades not only in India but also in abroad ; and needless to say that SPICMACAY is a synonym now for Indian cultural heritage and arts across the ages and continents.

SPICMACAY intends to bring out the very best and the diverse Indian classical heritage by organizing concerts and events and over the years SPICMACAY has emerged as a brand ambassador of Indian culture, youth and excellence.

The movement is being run by the combined efforts of the thousands of volunteers spread across the globe. It is this rare spirit of selfless volunteerism that has kept this 30-year old organization alive, and young as ever.
Though it is dutiful to the propagation of Indian culture and music among the people, that is not quite what forms its deep core.Dr. Kiran Seth, the inspirational founder and Chairman of SPICMACAY, puts it across as“The basic idea (of SPICMACAY) is not to promote any classical music, that’s not the basic idea. Yes, classical music is being promoted; it’s wonderful; that’s one of the wonderful horses of our heritage. But, what I find while teaching here and meeting young people, and looking at the education system; some of us felt that there were four aspects which were missing in the system. One was, there’s practically nothing that is inspiring, very little of subtlety, very little of abstraction, and very little respect for the mystical. The heritage encompasses all these four very nicely. So let’s give them the opportunity to get inspired by whichever road is most suited to them.”

The “big bang” of SPIC MACAY came in 1972 at a concert of Ustad Nasir Aminuddin Dagar and Ustad Zia Fariduddin Dagar at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in New York. After a few sporadic concerts (notable amongst them was that of Ustad Ali Akbar Khan) at Columbia University, New York, under the aegis of the India Club of Columbia University during the period 1972-76, the idea took a more defined direction in 1977 in India. However in 1979, a two-day programme again at IIT Delhi of Ustad Bismillah Khan, Dagar Bandhu, Ustad Amjad Ali Khan and Ustad Sitahid Parvez turned out to be a marginal success. MEFYS( Mechanical Engineering Final Year Students) organized the programme. It was at this programme that the name SPIC MACAY was first launched and the aim expressed was not to fight Westernisation but the process of deculturisation.