Making of Hey Ganaraya

The trickiest part was the Sargam in the first verse – “SA NI DHA PA, NI DHA PA MA GA”. We tried to fit in word after word, phrase after phrase but nothing was as magical as the Sargam itself. So finally, we decided to keep the Sargam as it is. A good musician knows the value of silence and uses it to his / her advantage. Likewise, a songwriter should also know where to put words and where to just let the musical notes do the talking.

Ganesha, is one divine figure that everyone loves. You’ll find Ganesha’s sticker blessing the handle of a hand cart in streets of Sion and you’ll find a gold leafed statue of Ganesha adorning the dashboard of a Mercedes in Malabar Hill. It’s a daunting task to write about a God of this stature. I’ve attempted this twice in ABCD (Shambhu Sutaya and Ga Ga Ga Ganpati) and I was blessed enough to be appreciated by people for both the attempts. But when Remo sir said that he wanted another Ganpati song in ABCD 2, I panicked. What could I say, that wasn’t already said before?

To my rescue came the brilliant composition by Sachin-Jigar. It was pure classical and so different from anything that I had ever written on before, that it immediately got blood rushing into my brain.

The trickiest part was the Sargam in the first verse – “SA NI DHA PA, NI DHA PA MA GA”. We tried to fit in word after word, phrase after phrase but nothing was as magical as the Sargam itself. So finally, we decided to keep the Sargam as it is. A good musician knows the value of silence and uses it to his / her advantage. Likewise, a songwriter should also know where to put words and where to just let the musical notes do the talking.

I wanted to use as much of pure Hindi as I could, in the song and at first Sachin-Jigar said ‘of course, of course!’  But later in Mukhda they changed ‘Swapna’ to ‘Khwaab’. I agreed that it was sounding better but I told them that in the Antara at least we should keep it pure Hindi. ‘Of course, of course!’ They said again. So I wrote:
‘Hey Ganaraya,
Ye Jeevan Halaahal,
Hai jalta pratipal galaa…’

After hearing this Jigar was like ‘Mayur Bhai, Ye thoda zyada nahin ho gaya?’ We laughed. I changed ‘pratipal’ to ‘har ik pal’. But thankfully I could still retain ‘Halaahal’ (means poison in ‘shuddh’ Hindi) and I was very kicked about it because I haven’t heard that word before in a film song.

My point is this: I wanted to prove that I can write a pure Hindi song. In fact, I did it as well. But we changed a few words and it’s not so pure Hindi anymore. But sometimes it’s important that the song reaches more people and is palatable to them. There is no need to bring in your ego as a writer in such matters. I’m glad that I made those changes. And as far as a song in ‘shuddh’ Hindi goes, who knows.. We might do another Ganesha song in ABCD3!! You know what Sachin-Jigar will say: ‘Of course! Of course!

*The article was first published on Pandolin.com

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