Rahmania

Ask any youth who is the greatest Indian film composer? The answer is likely to be A R Rahman. He has become a living legend for them with his brand of music where the singer is often immaterial. The oscar award has only added to his halo.

But is he a great composer he is made out to be ? My answser is no. He certainly doesn’t figure in my list of ten great film composers. No doubt he is highly talented and when he broke in to the industry with Roja, his music had a certain freshness which he carried for few more years. Whenever he does a melody track, it sounds great. But often his songs are drowned in heavy beats or BGMs that a singer’s role is limited. It is good to experiment with new singers but he sometimes overdoes it.

In the last three years, his music has been patchy. Some good scores and many forgetful ones. The song that won him an oscar was not his best and all the Indians know it. Blue and Raavan are disasters. Jodha Akbar and Delhi 6 have a few good scores. The music in Enthiran is nothing to crow about. In Tamil, his Vinnai Thandi Varuvaya has some good scores but his hesitancy to use established voices is often his undoing. It is his strength if done sparingly.

I think in Hindi, Shankar Ehsaan Loy and even Pritam, who is criticized as a copycat, are doing better than him. Their Rock On and Life in a Metro are sort of trendsetters. In Tamil Harris Jayaraj’s music is more in sync with the youth. I think that like Ilayaraja in the later years of his career, Rahman too is getting influenced by his earlier tunes.