A. R. Rahman.... 'Mozart Of India'

 

Allah Rakha Rahman (born 6 January 1966 as A. S. Dileep Kumar) is an Indian film composer, record producer, musician and singer. His film scoring career began in the early 1990s. He has won fourteen Filmfare Awards, eleven Filmfare Awards South, four National Film Awards, two Academy Awards, two Grammy Awards, a BAFTA Award and a Golden Globe.

Rahman obtained a degree in western classical music from the Trinity College of Music in London, and set up his own in-house studio called Panchathan Record Inn at Chennai, arguably one of Asia’s most sophisticated and high-tech studios. Later by working in India's various film industries, international cinema and theatre, by 2004, Rahman, in a career spanning nearly two decades, had sold more than 150 million records of his film scores and soundtracks worldwide, and sold over 200 million cassettes, making him one of the world's all-time top selling recording artists. He was described as "India's most prominent movie songwriter" by Time magazine in 2005.

His works are notable for integrating eastern classical music with electronic music sounds, new technology and traditional orchestral arrangements. Time magazine has referred to him as the "Mozart of Madras" and several Tamil commentators have coined him the nickname Isai Puyal (English: Music Storm).In 2009, Time magazine placed Rahman in its list of World's Most Influential People.

trinity college of music
His notable film career began in 1992, when he began the Panchathan Record Inn, a music recording and mixing studio attached to the backyard of his house. Over time it would become the most advanced recording studio in India. He initially composed scores for documentaries, jingles for advertisements and Indian Television channels and other projects.

In 1992, he was approached by film director Mani Ratnam to compose the score and soundtrack for Ratnam's Tamil film Roja. The debut led Rahman to receive the Rajat Kamal award for Best Music Director at the National Film Awards, an unprecedented win for a first-time film composer. Rahman has since been awarded the Silver Lotus three more times for Minsaara Kanavu (Electric Dreams, Tamil) in 1997, Lagaan (Tax, Hindi) in 2002, Kannathil Muthamittal (A Peck on the Cheek, Tamil) in 2003, the most ever by any composer. Roja's score met with high sales and acclaim in both its original and dubbed versions, bringing about a marked change in film music at the time.

Rahman followed this with successful scores for Tamil–language films of the Chennai film industry including Ratnam's politically charged Bombay, the urbanite Kadhalan, Bharathiraaja's Karuththamma, the saxophonic Duet, Indira, and the romantic comedies Mr. Romeo and Love Birds, which gained him considerable notice.  His fanbase in Japan increased with Muthu 's success there. His soundtracks gained him recognition in the Tamil Nadu film industry and around the world for his stylistic versatility incorporating Western classical, Carnatic and Tamil traditional/folk music traditions, jazz, reggae and rock music.
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The Bombay Theme—from Ratnam's Bombay—would later reappear in Deepa Mehta's Fire and various compilations and media. Rangeela, directed by Ram Gopal Varma, marked Rahman's debut for Hindi-language films made in the Mumbai film industry. Many successful scores for films including Dil Se and the percussive Taal followed.  Sufi mysticism would inspire the track "Chaiyya Chaiyya" from the former, as well as the composition "Zikr" from his score for the film Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose: The Forgotten Hero, for which he created large orchestral and choral arrangements. Musical cues in scores for Sangamam and Iruvar employed Carnatic vocals and instruments such as the veena with leads of rock guitar and jazz. In the 2000s Rahman created hit scores for Rajiv Menon's , Alaipayuthey, Ashutosh Gowariker's Swades and Rang De Basanti. He composed songs with Hindustani motifs for Water (2005).

Rahman has worked with Indian poets and lyricists such as Javed Akhtar, Gulzar, Vairamuthu and Vaali. He has consistently produced commercially successful soundtracks when collaborating with particular film directors such as Mani Ratnam who he has worked with since Roja, and the director S. Shankar in the films Gentleman, Kadhalan, Indian, Jeans, Mudhalvan, Nayak, Boys, Sivaji and Enthiran.

In 2005, Rahman extended his Panchathan Record Inn studio by establishing AM Studios in Kodambakkam, Chennai, thereby creating the most cutting-edge studio in Asia. In 2006, Rahman launched his own music label, KM Music.Its first release was his score to the film Sillunu Oru Kaadhal. 

Rahman scored the Mandarin language picture Warriors of Heaven and Earth in 2003 after researching and utilizing Chinese and Japanese classical music, and co-scored the Shekhar Kapoor project Elizabeth: The Golden Age in 2007. His compositions have been sampled for other scores within India,  appearing in such films as Inside Man, Lord of War, Divine Intervention and The Accidental Husband.

In 2008, he scored the Slumdog Millionaire soundtrack, for which he won a Golden Globe and two Academy Awards, becoming the first Indian citizen to do so. In the United States, the soundtrack topped the Dance/Electronic Albums chart and reached #4 on the Billboard 200 chart.The song "Jai Ho" reached #2 on the Eurochart Hot 100 Singles and #15 on the US Billboard Hot 100

Music style

Skilled in Carnatic music, Western classical, Hindustani music and the Qawwali style of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Rahman has been noted to write film songs that amalgamate elements of these music systems and other genres, layering instruments from differing music idioms in an improvisatory manner. Symphonic orchestral themes have accompanied his scores, occasionally employing leitmotif. In the 1980s, Rahman recorded and played arrangements on monophonic sound, synonymous with the era of his musical predecessors K. V. Mahadevan and Vishwanathan–Ramamoorthy.

In later years his methodology changed as he experimented with the fusion of traditional instruments with new electronic sounds and technology. Rahman's musical interests and outlook stem from his love of experimentation. Rahman's compositions, in the vein of past and contemporary Chennai film composers, bring out auteuristic uses of counterpoint, orchestration and the human voice, melding Indian pop music with unique timbres, forms and instrumentation. By virtue of these qualities, broad ranging lyrics and his syncretic style, the appeal of his music cuts across the spectrum of classes and cultures within Indian society.

His first soundtrack for Roja was listed in TIME's "10 Best Soundtracks" of all time in 2005. Film critic Richard Corliss felt the "astonishing debut work parades Rahman's gift for alchemizing outside influences until they are totally Tamil, totally Rahman."Rahman's initial global reach is attributed to the South Asian diaspora.

Described as one of the most innovative composers to ever work in the industry, his unique style and immense success transformed film music in the 1990s prompting several film producers to take film music more seriously. The music producer Ron Fair considers Rahman to be "one of the world's great living composers in any medium".

^{Rehman is also associated with lots of social service agencies.
CONITINUED........}