New Delhi, June 17: AR Rahman`s father was a very-much-sought-after person in the Malayalam film industry as he was an efficient assistant and arranger but went unnoticed in the music scene as he ended up ghost composing in many movies without any credit, says a new book.
"It wasn`t long before R K Sekhar (Rahman`s father) was the most wanted man in the Malayalam industry. He was the best assistant in the industry, the best arranger, the best orchestration man, and sometimes, for certain music directors, the ghost composer," writes journalist Kamini Mathai in "A R Rahman: The Musical Storm."
The book, published by Penguin India, tells the fascinating story of the double Oscar-winning composer – his family, his early days and his rise to the top.
"Rahman, in many of his interviews, has stated that his father had ghost composed for many movies but never got the credit for it, which was why people outside the industry never heard of him. Rahman’s mother also admits this is true," the book says.
According to the author, Sekhar was hot property in the Malayalam film industry.
"Everyone wanted him as an arranger– he was efficient, he was talented, and he could compose. The Tamil, Telugu and Kannada industry composers started taking note too.
"It got to a stage when producers would first find out if Sekhar was free before they fixed the composer for the movie. They knew he was reliable, he always stood by his director at work," she writes.
Sekhar managed to compose for at least 24 movies between his first in 1964 and the time he died in 1976. He worked as an assistant to one of the bigger names in Malayalam cinema V Dakshinamoorthy.
From arranger to ghost composer, Sekhar also became the accountant for composers.
"Musicians say he was the man who handled all their payments, and that was a new trend for them because they were used to collecting their money directly from the composers." The writer says Sekhar was different from his son in many aspects.
"Sekhar worked like a well-oiled machine, on a blueprint, unlike his son who works on the spur of the moment.
He would come home late at night, eat and sleep. There was not
much he said to his wife or children, he just gave Kasturi (Rahman’s mother) enough money to run the house.
"As far as work went, Sekhar was inflexible – very unlike his son, who people say is very casual at work – he knows what he is doing but he also knows how to have fun. Very few musicians say Sekhar was gentle – which is how Rahman is spoken about – and most confess he was quite the tyrant in the studios."
"We used to call him Tiger Sekhar," the book quotes Kalyan, a violinist who played for Sekhar and now plays for Rahman, as saying.
"He never liked to waste time and he never liked us making mistakes. He was the no-nonsense type, who wanted the work to get done…Rahman, on the other hand, never gets angry or shouts," says Kalyan.
The book was billed as an authorised biography on the composer but Rahman denied that saying "there`s nothing authorised about it."
The publisher calls it "a marvellously readable, chatty and anecdotal biography that will delight every fan of his."
Bureau Report
First Published: Wednesday, June 17, 2009, 14:08
