Oscar- and Grammy-winning musician A.R. Rahman will headline Dubai Sufi Music Weekend, a two-day festival that brings alive the mystical appeal of Sufi songs, on December 18 at the World Trade Centre, tabloid! can confirm.
“It’s not going to be your usual stadium-like concert experience. We are planning an intimate concert with A.R. Rahman who will recreate Sufi classics with narrations and songs. He will perform and take you on a journey of Sufi music,” said organiser Samir Ahmad, managing director at Purple Vogue Events, who are organising the event with Emirates Neon Group.
It’s no secret that the Mozart Of Madras, who has composed music for films such as Slumdog Millionaire and Hindi film Highway, is greatly influenced by Sufi, the mystical branch of Islam. His songs Khwaja Mere Khwaja from Aishwarya Rai Bachchan-starrer Jodha Akbar, Piya Haji Ali from Hrithik Roshan’s Fiza, and Ariziyan from Abhishek Bachchan’s Delhi 6 stand proof to his Sufi leanings.
The stellar line-up isn’t reserved for day one alone. On day two of the Dubai Sufi Music Weekend, Pakistani singer Rahat Fateh Ali Khan and prolific Bollywood singer Sunidhi Chauhan will collaborate for the first time for a show.
While Khan is one of the most famous musical exponents of qawwali, Sufis’ devotional music, Chauhan will bring her powerful voice to the show. The nephew of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan has always maintained that Sufi music has no boundaries and never misses a chance to promote Sufi music to an international audience.
“We want to make Sufi music accessible to all. It’s not going to have religious or traditional undertones because our main focus is on bringing alive that genre of music through three biggest stars in music today,” added Ahmad.
Tickets to the Dubai Sufi Music Weekend go on sale on November 20, priced Dh195, Dh295, Dh395, Dh495, Dh750 and Dh1,000, at www.platinumlist.com.
Five lesser-known five facts about A. R. Rahman
Born A.S. Dileep Kumar, he changed his name to Allah Rakkha Rahman when he converted to Sufi Islam, a mystical form of Islam, in his early 20s. “The truth is I never liked my name. I don’t know why, but I just didn’t like the sound of it. No disrespect to the great actor Dilip Kumar. But somehow my name didn’t match the image I had of myself. Sometime before we started our journey on the path of Sufism, we went to an astrologer to show him my younger sister’s horoscope because my mother wanted her to get married. This was around the same time when I was keen to change my name and have a new identity … He suggested names,” Rahman was quoted as saying in an interview with Mumbai Boss.
Rahman, in his childhood, dreamt of being a computer engineer, since he was fascinated by electronic gadgets and technology. Fortunately, for music lovers he didn’t go down that road.
Rahman is a school drop-out. When he was nine, his music composer father died and he was tasked with the responsibility of looking after his family. He then joined legendary music composer Illaiyaraja’s troupe as a keyboard player to earn for his family. “Quitting school was a hard one. I used to think, who’s going to respect me, I’ve not been to college; it was a burden I carried for a while. I don’t care about it now, but at that time, for some five years, I wanted to go back to study, get a degree. I now realise that you study more from life. When you are put in a situation, in a spot, you learn so much more; it forces you to think, to talk, to act. That’s learning,” said Rahman in an interview. Now he runs his own music school, KM Music Conservatory, in Chennai.
Rahman hates the term Bollywood since it doesn’t represent Indian cinema and refers to Hindi cinema alone. Incidentally, his Oscar-winning song Jai Ho was originally composed (but not used) for Salman Khan-starrer Yuvraaj, which flopped at the box office. Rahman will soon be plunging into the world of film production himself, although he’s keeping a tight lid on its details. All we know is that it’s going to an Indian film about music.
Rahman met his mentor, director Mani Ratnam, who gave him his big movie break with Roja, at a function in which the former won an award for a jingle. That leads many to believe that Roja was Rahman’s first film as a music composer. In fact, his first movie project was for the Malayalam film Yodha, starring Mohanlal and Urvasi, in 1992.
