Bollywood churns out meaningless music: Jagjit

<div class="section1"><div class="Normal">KOLKATA: Having charmed the international audience with his soul-stirring music in the just-released English film <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Leela</span>, ghazal maestro Jagjit Singh seems poised to make a grand comeback to film music with at least four more projects lined up. <br />“After the success of the music of Somnath Sen’s <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">leela</span>, four more diaspora film-makers have approached me to score music for their films.My kind of music is getting more recognition by music lovers beyond the Indian borders,� Singh said in an interview here. <br />The Dimple Kapadia-Vinod Khanna-Deepti Naval starrer, which made an impact with its soft numbers punctuated by the strumming guitar in that typical Jagjit Singh style, was his first film venture in more than a decade and a half. <br />And after its good draw at the box office, Singh has been flooded with offers from overseas Indian producers making English films for a global audience.<br />“Deepak Nayar, the producer of <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Bend It Like Beckham</span>, has asked me to score music for his new film and I have already begun work on it. Three more offers are also lined up and I am looking forward to them,� Singh said. What had kept the maker of unforgettable music in films like ‘Saath Saath’ and <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Arth</span> away from the glamour world of celluloid this long? <br />“I did not score film music since no one wanted my kind of music, no one ever came to me with an offer,� the talented singer replied with candour.<br />Singh said he was anguished by the ‘meaningless music’ that was being churned out from Bollywood today. ‘‘Tell me, do they make melodious music in Hindi films any more? Barring a few, our mainstream cinema hardly has any serious themes for any serious music,� he said. <br />Singh said Indian film-makers were not willing to experiment with music at all since nobody wanted to take a risk on what is considered the most important selling proposition of a movie. <br />“After all, you cannot expect commercial film-makers to use something which will not go down well with the masses,� he said. <br />International Indian film-makers, on ther other hand, had come of age and were making meaningful cinema, Singh said adding this was the niche market where ghazals and Indian semi-classical numbers could fit in well. <br />Naming his choice of singers who could strike the right note with these new-wave films, Singh said Hariharan, Sonu Nigam, Babul Supriyo, Shreya Ghoshal and Alka Yagnik had the right orientation to meet the needs of such serious cinema. </div> </div>