Every Bollywood song is treated like a clap song: Javed Akhtar

Eminent lyricist, poet, and screenwriter Javed Akhtar feels that music in contemporary Indian cinema is no longer sympathetic to lyrics, and the tunes — often high on tempo — are not conducive to good poetry.

“I am very unhappy with the present music scenario in Bollywood. The music that is being produced is not sympathetic to lyrics, any more. There is more razzmatazz than emotional depth in the stories, so the situation for songs is not very emotional either,” he says.

“The tunes the writers are getting today are not very conducive to writing poetry because of the tempo and the orchestration. The tempo is such that words do not get established,” he shares.

“The music is so loud… every song is treated like a clap song. So, the percussion is often above the voice, and the music gets ahead of words. So, you just can’t understand what the person is singing. May be you only know the mukhra (beginning of a song) and the rest of it gets lost in the cacophony,” quips Akhtar, who has written songs such as Yun Hi Chala Chal (Swades; 2004), Iktara (Wake up Sid; 2009), and Shaam (Aisha; 2010). Akhtar goes on to add that Indian listeners prefer music that they can themselves sing. “Listeners should not go to the words; the words should come to them,” he feels.

The septuagenarian also shares how he feels his poetry has become more impersonal with time. “When I started writing poetry, it was mostly about my childhood, my mother, and so on. But after that, other interests and concerns entered my poetry, be it the socio-economic climate, or people,” he shares.

The ace scriptwriter, who, along with Salim Khan enthralled cinema buffs with their conceptualisation of the Angry Young Man figure in films such as Zanjeer (1973), is penning the script of another untitled project.

Terming cinema as a “captive art” not powerful enough to bring about social change, Akhtar holds that it is the changing trends in society that directs the content and evolution of films.

“Because a film is an expensive exercise, it is kind of captive as an art. Commercial cinema looks to cater to the demands of society. That is why you would see that the mainstream was making different kind of films in the 50s, 60s and in the 90s. Society is changing cinema; cinema does not change society,” he signs off.

The tunes the writers are getting today are not very conducive to writing poetry because of the tempo and the orchestration. The tempo is such that words do not get established.

JAVED AKHTAR, LYRICIST, POET, AND SCREENWRITER