A.R.Rahman (Fan Club)-Part2 - Page 61

Your playback career really took off with your very first song Shakalaka Baby with Rahman, and since then you have had many hits to your credit, with films like Kal ho Na Ho, Main Hoon Na, Salaam Namaste. You have also collaborated with Rahman and the 150 member music group fro Miami University. How has it been working with him?

I think Rahman is not just a great musician, he is also a great technician. He is one of the big reasons that the music industry in India has risen above itself. He has raised the bar quite high. He is born with the soul of a great musician. That is something you cannot buy or learn. It is from within. He was also generous enough to let me bring my own influences on the table, whether they were Latin, Arab or whatever and that made me feel that the song I sang was truly my own.

Global Rhythms is amazing. These are students from different ethnic groups and they sang all of Rahman's songs without looking at any paper and with such joy. To get 150 people on stage together who don't know the language and sing his songs in Tamil and Hindi was quite something.

Guru to A R Rahman, Ilaiyaraaja says he always knew Rahman was a bright spark. "That's why I took him into my troupe! My keyboard player was drunk so I told my team to get me a player from somewhere. They came back saying a little boy was there - I was okay with the 11-year-old!" he smiles. From placing his fingers on the keyboard to helping him play, he's proud of his 'little spark' who has sure has gone places.

'' And looking at the current musicians, I really like Rahmansaab's work. AR Rahman is truly great."

''Rehman is a saint. He so simple and humble, that a person like him can be a saint and nothing else. He is all music. I have never seen him charged because of success or failure, and it is this quality which makes him a genius.''

"LIKE there's only one Taj Mahal in India, there's only one A R Rahman"

We are the first generation that can end poverty and we refuse to miss this opporunity. We have no time to lose. People are dying, children are dying, so do something now. No excuses, promises must be kept. All our voices together is going to make it happen. We are 6 billion voices and the world will do what we say. Only with your voice."

Everyone tell me that I am able to exact good music out of A.R.Rahman. I feel that if you are able to tell the concept of the film convincingly and properly to Rahman, he comes out with amazing songs for the situations. He is a genius and an amazing human being. He is an example of how a perfect human being should be.

Maa tujhe salaam. Life for AR Rahman is no different from his art. Which is why the music director is supposed to have declined giving music to any film showing nudity (this was even before his music was cut short by Mangal Amir Khan and he decided to stop lending his art to historical films). Besides being uncomfortable with the subject itself, Rahman was compromised by the fact that he was working from home then and his mother could walk into his studio anytime. The director's respect for his mother is legendary. There are other things the industry wallahs have had to teach themselves about Rahman — that they have to wait for their prayers to be answered. As one producer put it, "Working with him is like undergoing pregnancy. Initially, you feel like being on top of the world. But with each passing day, you start hating the troubles which come with it. Nine months after, when you hold the bundle of joy, you know its worth the effort. That's Rahman's music."