Filmmaker and music composer Vishal Bhardwaj attended press meet for the launch of 7th season of Royal Stag Barrel Select Mtv Unplugged along with Shankar Mahadevan, Rekha Bhardwaj, Papon, Armaan Malik, Amaal Malik, Sidharth Mahadevan and Monali Thakur on Wednesday in Mumbai. During media interaction, Bhardwaj said that he takes pride in creating original compositions.
When asked Bhardwaj about his opinion about rehashing or remixing old songs, Bhardwaj said, “It’s a very individual thing. I don’t think that way but if some thinks and wants to do it then it’s his choice and if composer gets ready to do it then it’s also his choice. Personally, I take pride in creating originals so I will stick to that”
Rekha Bhardwaj added on the same, “Actually, if it doesn’t kill the soul of the song then I am open for singing. It shouldn’t change the reflection that I have for that song as long as we retain that, we can rearrange it rather than spoiling aesthetic s and if we can beautify it then I would love to sing”
Asked on recreating old songs for films, a trend in Bollywood at present, Shankar said, “I have never been approached for that and I think people who worked with us always want us to make original music. So as a music composer I have never rehashed any old songs, except for Pretty Woman in Kal Ho Na Ho.”
Talking about featuring for the first time on MTV unplugged, Bhardwaj said, “Stage not has been my forte. I never been on stage as I have been always behind the camera but Jaggi (Producer of MTV Unplugged) has been persuading me for past many years so this time I had to come but I had to work a lot on it. I was very nervous and it was very fearful.”
When asked Bhardwaj whether presence of eminent musicians around him during performance helped him, Bhardwaj said, “No.. on the contrary, if Pandit Vishwa Mohan Bhatt or Ustad Rashid Khan were playing instrument on your song then you don’t feel like singing but that time, you have to forget their presence and get some courage from within and try to sing”
Talking about songs which he is going to perform on MTV Unplugged, Bhardwaj said, “Songs which are created 25-30 years ago, I feel are timeless so it was interesting exercise to re-imagine and re-orchestrate that song because when composers created it 25 years ago that songs are still melodious but when you recreate that for a show like this then it sounds even better so it shows us that how we grow with time”
Music composer A.R. Rehman composes Tamil song and make them in again Hindi too so when asked Bhardwaj whether he also has intensions to compose in other language, he said, “I am doing music for Malayalam film now and this will be my second Malayalam film and those melodies are very good so I will change them into Hindi”
Vishal Bhardwaj, Shankar Mahadevan, Rekha Bhardwaj, Papon, Armaan Malik, Amaal Malik, Sidharth Mahadevan, Farhan Akhtar, Shalmali Kholgade and Monali Thakur will feature in 7th season of MTV Unplugged.
7th season of Royal Stag Barrel Select MTV Unplugged will be telecast from 9 December, every Saturday at 8 pm.
