AR Rehman on SRK, Guru and Music

Exclusive! A R Rahman on SRK, Guru and music

ARR at his candid best!
Source-Rediff.com


Interview: Arthur J Pais in New York

A R Rahman is a man of few words. But once he warms up, he can keep talking.

When we asked for an interview, he emailed just one line: Sure. I will call you. He did not specify a time or day. Given his passion for working in the night, I knew that meant I should expect a phone call from Chennai any time during the day hours in New York.

And as promised he called just two days after confirming that the interview will happen.

It was about noon in New York. For nearly an hour, he talked about a lot of things including how Shah Rukh Khan had become a 'bakra' and how he was 'blackmailed' by 'Mani sir' to sing the Tere Bina number in Guru.

Here's the first part of an extensive interview.

On working with Shah... ... Rukh Khan

I decided not to compose the music for his film, Om Shanti Om because I was refused the publishing rights of the film. But we could surely work in future. There should be no hard feelings in this business. Shah Rukh is warm-hearted and a smart producer but he was misled in this case.

The concept of music publishing is new in India and his advisors did not understand what it meant. They made him a bakra with their wrong advice.

As a composer, it is important for me to own some rights to the music, so that I could use it any way I want 20 years from now. For me, owning these rights is more important than owning property. Anything can happen to property but music rights will not collapse.

This is not an uncommon thing in the West. But in India, some producers have begun understanding the concept. Aamir Khan is giving me the music publishing rights to his next film. Rajnikant's daughter, who is producing a Tamil film called Hara, is going to do it too.