AR Rahman doesn’t remember lyrics at concerts

Music maestro AR Rahman doesn’t like to be tied down by remembering lyrics or genres. “At concerts, I don’t remember the lyrics of songs. That’s my drawback, because I like to move on and explore different things. When you memorise a song, you stay with it, and you can’t just trip off and go to another zone,” shares Rahman, who recently performed at The Sufi Route concert in Delhi.

Explaining his stance further, he says, “I love doing multiple genres, like working on a symphony or with a Sufi or Rajasthani group or a hip-hop person, doing a rap.”

About the role of ragas, which Rahman weaves beautifully with romantic tunes, he says, “I feel that the only healing thing in life is love. Love could be romantic, divine, compassionate or kind... all that comes in the choice of ragas. It could become a love song, bhajan, qawwali or anything else. Like Khwaja Mere Khwaja, if you put another lyric, it will be a love song.”

Real life incidents have many a time provoked Rahman to write a melody.

“The Bombay (1995) theme was inspired by the riots. And it was extremely opposite to what had happened. I always feel blessed that as an artist you could do that. You can take something raw and uninspiring, and do a completely contrasting thing to it, and express it poetically and beautifully,” says the Mozart of Madras.

So, how does he bring himself into a particular zone to create that genre of music say, for example, romantic?

“There’s a lot of contribution from lyrics, too. Sometimes you are just doing the tunes, which could be anything, but then the lyrics actually fill the void and make it complete. And I used to wonder, these are very similar tunes then why did this tune become a hit and that one did not?” says Rahman.