He may have brought the best original song Academy Award home for the superhit Naatu Naatu from RRR, but celebrated music composer MM Keeravaani believes accolades bring you honour, not work.
The Telugu foot-tapping chartbuster Naatu Naatu, penned by Chandrabose and featuring Ram Charan and Jr NTR, from 2022’s blockbuster RRR is the first song from an Indian film production to win an Oscar.
“Oscar is not a criterion or a factor for getting work. Winning an Oscar is like an additional honour but honour never brings work to you. It’s only competence that brings work to you, competence is very much different from honour,” Keeravaani told the media.
In his over three-decade-long career, the musician has had a successful association with RRR director and cousin SS Rajamouli and filmmakers Mahesh Bhatt and Neeraj Pandey, with whom he has his next Auron Mein Kahan Dum Tha lined up for release on Friday.
As someone who has scored music for films across various Indian languages, including Telugu, Hindi, and Tamil, Keeravaani underlined the importance of having a strong rapport with directors.
“If you’ve good rapport with the director, it reflects on the quality of the work you do. But if that rapport is from childhood itself, like I knew Rajamouli when he was two years old, that reflects even more,” said the composer, who has worked with the filmmaker on all his films including the Baahubali franchise, Eega, and Magadheera.
“He narrated the gist of Auron Mein Kahan Dum Tha, and elaborated on the song situations and texture he is looking for. It was a memorable journey, he said.
Central to Keeravaani’s approach is the incorporation of ‘ragas’ — ancient melodic frameworks in Indian music — into his compositions. With this, he said he can tap into new realms of music and generate innovative musical notes.
Auron Mein Kahan Dum Tha is a musical romance drama stars Tabu and Ajay Devgn in the lead with Saiee Manjrekar, Shantanu Maheshwari, Jimmy Shergill and Sayaji Shinde in key roles.
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