Sonu Nigam has traversed a long in his career winning hearts of millions of people both in his country and abroad. The singing king is back to India with his new achievements in the form of experience as well as love of audience from his Birmingham symphony. Here is a brief of conversation with Sonu regarding his journey to the Birmingham…
Q. You have represented Md. Rafi’s voice at the Birmingham. How is the experience?
A. It is fare well. At the same time I am amased with the love and appreciation they offered me with. I would like to tell you about an interesting incident.
Normally you should find very suited-booted kinda sophisticated audience in any symphony. They appreciate songs with almost inaudible claps. But Indians are always Indians. They simply cannot enjoy any concert without screaming and proving their presence aloud.
But the conductor of the show, Michael, was very shocked with the sight. Michael had previously doubt of my presence as a singer also; but then he believed my fame when girls went frantic with my name.
Q. Which kind of songs of Md. Rafi did they enjoy the most?
A. Rafi sahab has fans at every corner of this world. As far as India is concerned, most of the fans are in the age bracket of more than fifty. One can rarely hear out the old melodies on radio here.
There are merely ten songs that one can hear on most of the channels in India. But things are quite different in abroad. They like to hear out old melodies, irrespective of any age group.
The radio stations do telecast all the old songs and ghazals quite regularly. They know even about those songs by Rafi sahab that we have hardly heard about. But they really appreciated all the songs.
Q. Was there any foreigner amongst the Indian audience?
A. Yeah, there were few Pakistanis, Afghanis and few British people also. I think Indians bought all the tickets before British people came to know about the concert. You must know about our specialty i.e. we either don’t buy tickets or we buy it before anyone else can go for it.
Q. What do think is the reason that Md. Rafi enjoyed so much fan-following?
A. There are two things that matter most. First and foremost is the X-factor which is very tough to be defined. Kishor Kumar had it in his appearance. Md. Rafi had it in his voice.
He started his career and became famous only because of his voice and nothing else. I think that he never thought about his X-factor and that turned to be his most appreciative part.
Q. What would you like to say about the singers from the reality shows?
A. They are good because they are not corrupted. But they also can be corrupted once they come to know about how anyone and everyone can be a singer today.
From 14 to 22 of their age they have the will to become good singer but till they reach 25, they lose their intention as because they come to know that they don’t need to sing better to become a good singer.
Q. Music directors are even singing these days. What do you say about that?
A. (Smiling) What would I say? Let all be happy. Who am I to say something? But again, I would like to say that if you will do better then people will appreciate it otherwise people will definitely laugh at you.
Q. But S D Burman, R D Burman and Hemant Kumar were well known as singer cum actor besides their fame as music director.
A. But they never made fool of themselves. I am not saying that there is anything wrong with acting and singing for a music director, but the most important part is that you have to be prepared enough for those roles. Those legends cannot be compared with today’s music directors.
Q. When will you be back into acting?
A. Back in 2001 I hardly had any knowledge about films. Acting doesn’t mean that you always wait for your director to tell you about the expressions. I did the same and now I can understand how it was my mistake.
Now I know that co-starts are also very important in a film. I have also noticed how stories look better but they become something else after going through the shooting and editing stages. I didn’t have any idea about how Jaani Dusman will look like after the post production stage
. I just thought that Akshay, Suniel, Sunny, Manisha, Aftab and Arshad are signing the film so it has to be something better. Now I am decided that I will do only those films that my audience will love to watch. I know that they cannot accept me in any kind of character.
I have many offers but I cannot accept anything and everything. I have to think twice before signing a film. For the time being I am interested in the genre of Vishal Bhardwaj.
Q. What about the reality shows?
A. For the time being I have no wish to join any reality show. I know they offer good amount but I have no wish to break glasses and scream out at people anymore. Even if I have to go for television, I will do something else. - Rajnee Gupta.
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I have no wish to join any reality show: Sonu Nigam
