Our movies go all the way to Oscars and they don’t get it: AR Rahman

Two-time Academy Award winner AR Rahman got candid with another music legend, L Subramaniam, in a conversation that’s out on the former’s ‘YouTube’ channel. In the conversation, Rahman talked about what made him do things differently for music.

When Subramaniam asked how he changed the old way of composing music with a lot of musicians and the whole orchestra, Rahman said that it was due to the advancement in technology.

“Back then, they had only eight tracks for a film, but since I came from a jingles’ background, I had 16 tracks and I could do a lot with it. It’s just that nobody thought about it. Everyone wanted depth and the orchestra was costly, but all the big instruments became smaller. So, I came during the transitional period of technological change. It gave me a lot of time to experiment and fail. Nobody knew about my failure. They only saw my success because it all happened inside the studio. We kept coming back again and doing it. So, the freedom I got because of having a home studio,” the composer said.

He added, “That gave me the freedom to experiment a lot. Of course, we all need money, but beyond that, I had passion. I mean, the West is doing it and why can’t we? When we listen to their music, why can’t they listen to ours? I kept asking that and that ‘why’ became better production, quality, distribution and mastering and that still drives me.”

“Sometimes, I see that our movies go all the way to the Oscars and they don’t get it. Wrong movies are being sent for the Oscars. And I am just like don’t. We have to be in another person’s shoes. I have to be in Westerner’s shoes to see what’s happening here. I have to be in my shoes to see what they are doing,” he further said.

The interview was shot on January 6 this year, much before the Oscar nominations.