BHARATI PAWASKAR
His youthful and soulful voice has mesmerised many. When he sings a melancholy note, the voice touches the hearts of the audience. “I enjoy the most when I sing. I believe that when you know the song well, it becomes your story and you deliver it with all your emotions,” says Arijit Singh, the owner of most enchanting voice today. Admitting that he has sung songs in different languages, sometimes without understanding the meaning, but that he makes it a point to get acquainted with each word and know what the sentence means, before lending his voice to it.
“As a kid I only learnt music. We were not allowed to perform, as our Guruji thought that I was not prepared for that at that age. It was only when I was 18 that my Guruji sent me to Mumbai to perform in a reality show. And that’s when the world came to know about my voice,” recalls Arijit, a humble, small-town boy from West Bengal who is awestruck by the legendary singers like Lata Mangeshkar and Kishor Kumar and many others.
Talking on his Bollywood experience, Arijit is happy that he got good songs to sing which brought him recognition. He returned to his hometown after the reality show but came back again to Mumbai. He recalls, “I was lucky to get Tips Music contract which lasted for two years and even though the project on which we were working got shelved we still got our pay cheques for the entire duration. This was not okay, as it’s weird to accept remuneration for not doing something. But I got to learn a lot. I set up a recording studio and made some jingles. Singing offers kept coming and I got recognition. My learning is still on. I want to know all the technicalities of how music is made. Finally I made Mumbai my home and set up my studio here.” He agreed that people in Mumbai are hardcore professional.
Arijit has ventured as a director now with his debut film ‘Sa’ which is being screened at IFFI 2018. ‘Sa’ was a long cherished dream for Arijit whose mainstream recognition came from singing popular songs in the Mumbai film industry. The film took a long time to produce and a lot of footage went waste before they could organise and plan the shooting nicely. “Making a film is a difficult process. It’s a hard work. Making a song is much easier as films have many aspects to cover. They are not just sound and music. Albeit when passion gets mixed with your work, one can enjoy the whole churning process,” he shares.
Oriyon Edutainment was conceived by Arijit as an expression of love for cinema. Its goal is to collaborate with like-minded people and form a film caravan. As a director, his debut film ‘Sa’ chronicles life of a simple family in West Bengal, in the aftermath of mass migration following the birth of Bangladesh. The birth of Lalu brings great joy but the tragic circumstances force his father to send Lalu to his childhood friend, a venerated maestro of Indian classical music. There he picks up lessons on culture, religion and urban-rural divide and learns to live with a smile and a belief that ‘everything is going to be all right’.
Arijit who married his childhood love, admits, “My wife Koyel Singh has written the story. We, as a team, enjoyed the process of doing this film. It was our childhood dream of writing a book together and here we are, making a film that has the story.”
He points out that music scene is changing rapidly now. “It’s sad that we are slowly forgetting or leaving back many cultural values. Indian Classical music is internal and beautiful. It’s for meditation and concentration. It is for transferring your thoughts and internal outpour. It offers solace, peace and joy. That’s why this music cannot be made mainstream music unlike western music which is loud, external and affects the physical body more than calming or soothing the mind.”
