Jab Tak Hai Jaan | ARR | Shah Rukh | Yash Chopra

[Sunil_M88]

A.R. Rahman

Please, just stare at the name above for a few seconds... How do you feel now, at ease, relaxed? I hope so!

“Ar-Rahman” means the exceedingly compassionate, the exceedingly beneficent and the exceedingly gracious in Arabic. “Ar-Rahman” is also the first amongst the ninety-nine names of God (Allah) in the Holy Qur’an, not that it makes any difference to what I’m going to write ahead. Well, does it, you decide?!

A.R. Rahman or Rahman Ji (as I and many other devotees address him) must feel really irritated at the fact there are so many aspiring Music Directors (MDs) who want to be just like him.

It is not hard to follow the path lead by him: Have faith in God, stay humble and most importantly choose love and for aspiring MDs: Be inspired (please don’t copy), hence be original and believe in yourself.

Here we have a MD, who has no option but to change his style with every release due to so many clones emerging out of nowhere but IMO he would be doing so anyway regardless of clones being present or not because he has been a risk taker from day one. Or maybe he changes his style so that others will follow and reinvent themselves too. We don’t need to ask the real torchbearer of music to stand up. Here is man who has conquered the world and with the rate of technological advancements he will also be popular amongst extraterrestrials (OK, maybe not). He started off with fusion in his career (sorry, as I know some hate this term) and also has been sticking to all the conventions of popular genres, such as Classical, Waltz, Folk, Jazz, Rock, Latino, Electronic, Carnatic, Qawwali, Bhajan, and Bhangra, to name a few but the list is never ending, thus proving he isn’t in the scene only to follow the directors note but also to push himself to experiment even within his musical confinements. Composing the norm to any musical genre is rather boring but the way he experiments and improvises on already set examples makes you feel the love he has for music.

He is so humble that he doesn’t utter any criticisms against his detractors and clones and so lets his music do the talking in hope that those who want to be like him will also change their style and provide new sounds. We already have a few MDs following this standard.
So he has indirectly been teaching so many via the nuances put forth in his own material.

When you have passion for your work, then there is no competition and it is just about giving yourself and others joy. Once in a lifetime composer and I’m happy that his music has penetrated from my ears to my blood stream to my mind to my soul.

I salute this living legend that was, is and will probably continue to be a door to the world of music!

That said, we can now proceed with our opinions on “Jab Tak Hai Jaan” when it releases. Just a humble request to keep the discussions sensible please.

Thank you and Happy listening

Sunil Malhotra