http://www.mlive.com/entertainment/aanews/index.ssf?/base/features-1/1144680116196230.xml&coll=2&thispage=1
Indian composer mixes old with the new A.R. Rahman
brings his winning style and other artists to EMU
Monday, April 10, 2006
BY KEVIN RANSOM
News Special Writer
As the world keeps turning, it keeps getting smaller.
Still.
Indeed, due to such varied forces as the Internet,
digital technology and continued cross-cultural
pollination, more Americans are grooving to
world-music styles today than they were 10 years ago.
Or even five years ago.
One form that has burrowed into the American
pop-culture consciousness in the last couple of years
is Indian music. And, within the broader Indian-music
scene, one sub-genre getting attention is the fusion
of classical Indian music with modern rhythms.
Perhaps the most accomplished of these fusionists is
A.R. Rahman, who began his career as a writer of
commercial jingles and went on to become India's most
popular composer of film scores.
Until the last year, Rahman's biggest claim to fame
was his collaboration with Andrew Lloyd Webber on the
London and Broadway productions of "Bombay Dreams'' in
2002 and 2004, respectively. Webber produced, Rahman
composed the music.
But Rahman's profile got even higher when he struck
the seeming unlikely collaboration with the Finnish
folk group Varttina to compose the music for the $23
million, four-hour-long stage production of "Lord of
the Rings,'' which opened in Toronto on March 23.
Rahman's unique synthesis of traditional Indian music
with more contemporary rhythms inspired Sidney Fallon,
wife of Eastern Michigan University president John
Fallon III, to seek out a meeting with Rahman during a
recent trip to India. Rahman and the Fallons had a
mutual Indian acquaintance, and the three parties
began discussing ways for young Americans to learn
more about Indian culture.
They decided on a pair of benefit concerts by Rahman
and fellow Indian artists Sekar, Kalish Kher and
Vasundhara Das. The first concert will be at the EMU
Convocation Center on Saturday, the second in Dayton,
Ohio on April 22.
The show, "Wake Up! A.R. Rahman with 150 All Stars,''
will bring together Rahman's works on stage through
colorful costumes and set designs, along with Indian
and American singers and dancers. Rahman also will
perform with the Global Rhythm All Stars, a group of
more than 150 American artists that have performed
with numerous Grammy-winning artists.
Joining Rahman on stage will be cellist V.R. Sekar,
founder of the Madras String Quartet; singer/actress
Vasundhara Das; and singer/actor Kailash Kher.
"I love his music,'' said Sidney Fallon. "I like that
it's a wonderful fusion, which has a basic foundation
in Indian music and then brings together a lot of
different rhythms. Many of the songs he'll perform
will be in Indian languages.''
Fallon said that 70 percent of the funds raised by
ticket sales will go to the creation of an endowment
for a program that will "help our young people to gain
a greater understanding of the world by studying
Indian music, and culture.''
Three filmmakers are also expected to be in town for
the event, Fallon said. Rakeysh Mehra, director of
"Rang da Basanti,'' will show the movie and talk to
students, and music from the film will be performed at
the concert. Ramkumar Ganeshan also plans to meet with
students and faculty. And Swedish filmmaker Niclas
Ribbarp expects to make a documentary about the
project.
In India, Rahman has come to be known as the "Mozart
of Madras,'' and, according to the BBC, he's sold
between 100 million and 150 million CDs.
He's also collaborated with a range of artists, from
Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan to Michael Jackson to David
Byrne to Sarah Brightman.
But Rahman started out amidst much more modest
circumstances. Following the death of his father when
Rahman was just 9 years old, he turned to music and
developed his instrumental skills. Then, at age 17, he
took a job writing music for TV commercials before
leaving India to earn a degree in Western classical
music from Oxford University.
Still in his early 20s, Rahman had a fateful meeting
at a party held to celebrate an award he won for
writing a TV jingle. One reveler was Mani Ratnam, a
leading Indian filmmaker. One thing led to another,
and, in 1992, at age 25, Rahman composed the score for
Ratman's film, "Roja,'' in the Tamil language. The
score won acclaim in India for its fusion of classical
and modern Indian music, and Rahman was on his way.
Rahman's next several projects were also
Tamil-language films, and he became known as India's
leading Tamil film-music composer. From there, he
turned to India's more commercial and cross-cultural
Bollywood movie biz, composing the score to Ramgopal
Varma's "Rangeela.''
In 1997, Rahman found a global springboard for his
talents when he signed with Sony Masterworks and
released "Vande Mataram,'' a re-creation of India's
national song that became an anthem of sorts among
Indian youth. Sony released the record in 28 different
countries.
Fast-forward to 2004, when "Bombay Dreams'' made it to
Broadway. The success of that project led Rahman to
broaden his horizons once again. This time, it was in
China, where he composed the score for the Chinese
epic film "Warriors of Heaven and Earth,'' which Sony
Pictures distributed on a worldwide basis.
Fallon is looking forward to Rahman's upcoming EMU
show for more reasons than one.
"I really do think one of the best ways of bringing
peace and harmony to the world is to learn about other
cultures, and music is probably the most powerful of
all,'' said Fallon. Then, with a laugh, she added:
"I'm also learning Hindi, so listening to this music
is a great way to pick up the language.''
__________________________________________________________
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