It was a scene to behold. Some 300 children from different Delhi schools, not exposed to a ‘foreign way of singing’, were singing a folklore from Senegal and Himalayas at the Bahai Temple Auditorium on Thursday morning.
Celebrated singer Mohit Chauhan – who has taken music lovers by storm through his singing in films like Rockstar , Road , Jab We Met and Once Upon a Time in Mumbai – was seen teaching them Himalayan and Senegal folklore. The congregation was a result of the British Council’s World Voice Programme (WVP), which is designed to build capacity of teachers to utilise arts and develop students’ skills. Mohit is the brand ambassador of the council’s three-year WVP project. This congregation was the second “successful celebration of innovative and creative thinking, social adaptability, cultural awareness, communication and inter-personal skills”, as Rob Lynes, the BC Country Director Council, put it.
On the occasion, Mohit, talking to The Hindu , shared his role as an ambassador and his experience with the Hindi film industry.
“When I was in school (in Nahan, Himachal Pradesh), I used to listen to Beatles and other foreign singers and dream of flying to those countries, of singing and dancing with them. Today, programmes like WVP have made such ‘meets’ realistic. Who could think that children from the pockets of Himalaya sing folklore from Scotland and vice versa? Such an education in the initial years develops compassion and mutual respect for each other’s skills. In schools, if you go to teach kids with less interest in music the nuances of music, they feel deviated as it is very technical. But teaching them songs, to begin with, creates a natural desire in them to know the other country, their eating habits, the way they dress up, how they look and others things,” says the singer who teaches Himalayan folklore to students from different parts of the country under the programme.”
Such opportunities, he says, do not come in the world’s most creative space – Bollywood. Nor the industry’s music world goes by any methods of classical creativity like old ‘studio days ’in which the singers, music directors, composers would sit for days, delve upon a song and a gem would come out. “We are ‘taught’ the tune of the songs mailed by the computer, in which they ‘fix’ the pre-made music. But there are some music directors like a new guy called Krishna, who likes to sit with the singer and develop the song. I enjoy such sessions more.”
The singer, who wrote and composed a mesmerising ghazal “ Ghuncha Koi ” in 2005 in the film Main Meri Patni Aur Voh and won the hearts of subtle song lovers, recalls: “I just wrote it like that. I showed it to the director and he included the song in the film. Years after I went to do a show abroad and someone asked me if I would take requests? On agreeing, they asked me to sing, “ Guncha ”. As soon I sang it, the audience went crazy and all joined in. I then realised that the song was worth creating.” In the same breath he, however, agrees that such ‘soulful’ songs that send him in trance come rarely. Of late, Bollywood has taken recourse to Arijit Singh in what could be called a herd mentality. Mohit reacts feebly, “Look, this is an industry in which songs and music is just a part of the film, and rarely vice-versa. Everything is fixed – the situation, the location, how it will be sung, hero, heroine. The singer comes last. It is driven by economics. Lekin mujhe koi shikwa nahi (But I don’t mind),” he smiles.
Mohit, a St. Xavier product, is not formally trained. Does it prove to be counter productive at times? “Yes, when I am given some tough songs to sing, I feel some training might have helped. But having said that even Kishore Kumar wasn’t trained when he became one of the most popular singer. I feel more than training, it is the expression which is important while singing.”
Next on his platter are a few films with directors Imtiaz Ali and Anurag Kashyap.
