Challenges of recreating songs: Composers decode

Mumbai, Dec 10 (IANS) As Bollywood continues to recreate some of its cult classic songs, composers say giving a fresh touch to an old song is quite challenging as the originals hold a strong recall value in peoples mind.

Popular songs like "Tu cheez badi hai mast", "Tamma tamma", "Saara zamana" and "Laila main laila" have been recreated for films. With a fresh sound, these songs are gaining popularity and reaching out to the new generation.

But a question that remains is why are singers or composers recreating popular songs instead of utilising the talent to create an original score.

Composer Amaal Malik told IANS: "I get this question so often and do not know why and how the tag of recreation from the original song came to me. Among the 55 songs I have composed in the short span of my career, only two -- 'Soch na sake' and 'Chul' -- were recreated.

"Trust me, reimagining a song that is already popular is quite a tough thing to do. As a composer, I do not want to tamper the DNA of the song, but try to add a new perspective to the song. It is challenging."

According to Armaan, who is making his debut in MTV Unplugged, where he will sing a recreated version of his own song: "As a vocalist, when I sing any recreation, it is almost like a new song where the treatment and instrumentation are new.

"But one shouldn't spoil the core emotion of the song. So, the challenge is to find a balance. As a singer, I want to show musical skills, but it shouldn't be so over-the-top that it would ruin the simplicity of the main song. Therefore, only those recreated version of old songs manage to get popularity that balance both."

Royal Stag Barrel Select MTV Unplugged is a music platform that gives musicians also a chance to recreate their own song. According to many musicians, it is a way for them to approach a song differently.

Singer-composer Shankar Mahadevan, who prefers to celebrate original compositions rather than the recreation of an old song, says he enjoyed the process of recreating one of his songs "Sapno se bhare naina" for the show.

"When I am thinking of recreating a song, I mean my own song, here it is 'Naina...', I tried to touch both the chords, of a classical musician and of a contemporary.

"With the re-arrangement of instrumentation, layering the song with Raga Bhairavi, which is the original base of the song, we tried to create parts to fuse both the genres. The approach is different and that is what is exciting and challenging at the same time."

However, when it comes to remaking cult songs for the film, according to Amaal, changing the trend is in audience's hand as nothing replaces the value of an original song. But is it a good trend?

"Yes, it is a trend and I think it is bad. But as long as audiences appreciate such a thing, the trend will continue. It is in the hand of the audience to change the trend... This year most recreated versions were a hit, which means this experimentation is on demand."