Kingdom of Dreams in Gurgaon played host to the royalty of the Indian music industry recently. The Global Indian Music Awards (GIMA) was instituted last year to recognise talent in both film and non-film music, in the technical and non-technical categories. In its second edition, too, it was an elaborate affair. A long one too, considering the red carpet arrivals kept walking in for much over three hours, the event stretched to a couple of hours past midnight.
Actor Ranveer Singh played the affable host for the evening, while Shah Rukh Khan, as brand ambassador for Kingdom of Dreams, kept cropping up on stage throughout.
In the film music category, Sunidhi Chauhan won the award for Best Playback Singer (Female) for ‘Sheila ki jawani'. (Among the five nominations in the category, Sunidhi had three.) Mohit Chauhan' ‘Pee loon' from Once Upon a Time in Mumbaai won him the Best Playback Singer (Male) award. Once Upon a Time in Mumbaai won in three other categories too — Sandeep Shirodkar for Best Music Programmer and Arranger, Irshad Kamil for Best Lyricist for ‘Pee loon', and Best Song for ‘Pee loon'.
Dabangg had its bags full — Eric Pillai for Best Engineer - Film Album, Leslie Fernandes for Best Engineer – Sound Mix, Sandeep Shirdkar for Best Background Score, Mamta Sharma for Best Music Debut for ‘Munni badnam', Sajid-Wajid and Lalit Pandit for Best Music Director, and Best Film Album.
In the non-film music categories, Bada Boom was chosen Best Fusion Album, while Nirgun by Ustad Rashid Khan was Best Devotional Album. Desert Slide , by Pt. Vishwa Mohan Bhatt, featuring folk musicians of Rajasthan, won for Best Folk Album.
Sanjay Subrahmanyan's album Chandran Oliyil won Best Carnatic Classical Album – Vocal, with co-nominee Sandeep Narayan collecting the award on his behalf, while Ustad Rashid Khan also won for Best Semi-Classical Album for Nirgun .
Performances were entertaining, be it Papon, Shubha Mudgal and Kailash Kher performing with the Midival Punditz, or Sunidhi Chauhan rendering a medley of her hits.
M. Balamuralikrishna, who was honoured for his contribution to Indian classical music, said, “Indian music is global music; artistes like us have proved it. My fans all over the world are responsible for what I am today. Their love and blessings I always carry with me and I hope to carry it with me for a long time.”
Shah Rukh Khan didn't lose a chance to promote Ra.One , getting singers Shaan and Sunidhi Chauhan to sing ‘Chhamak challo' in Gujarati, Marathi and Bengali styles.
Pyarelalji, of the music duo Laxmikant-Pyarelal, was honoured for his contribution to film music. “Lyricists, singers, musicians, recordists… they make the team. Whatever we have achieved we have done because of our team. Also, I have to say that Lata ji (Lata Mangeshkar) had a big role to play in our success,” he said.
That was the high point of the evening — Sonu Nigam rendering old hits like ‘Chahoonga main tujhe shaam savere', ‘Sawan ka maheena' and ‘Yeh jeewan hai', with the elderly Pyarelalji standing beside him and directing the orchestra.
