Rahmaniacs encore with musical nostalgia

The traffic police, fire bridge and security department of Mumbai were on toes on Sunday to put citizens safe during a special music concert of music composer A.R. Rahman.

From the cab drivers, who were dropping passengers from Churchgate station to the concert venue- Brabourne Stadium, to the vendor who was selling ice-cream to the fans of ARR, had one favourite song each.

For the cabbie, it was 'Rukmani Rukmani/ Shaadi Ke Baad Kya Kya Hua' and for the ice-cream vendor, it was 'Maa Tujhe Salaam'.

'A.R. Rahman Encore the concert with MTV', a multi-city tour music concert, managed to bring three-generations -- people aging from eight to 80 -- together in the audience of 20,000 people.

The gig that celebrated the 25 years of Rahaman's musical journey also included musicians of different generations like Ranjit Barot, Mohini Dey, Mohit Chauhan, Jonita Gandhi, Javed Ali, Hriday Gattani, among others, on stage.

Famous for his compositions like 'Dil Se', 'Patakha Guddi', 'Humma Humma', Rahman interacted very less with the stadium filled audience but enthralled them with his performance.

People enjoyed on Rahman's compositions like 'Matar Gashti', 'Mustafa Mustafa Don't Worry Mustafa' and sung along 'Jadu Hai Aisa Friendship Ka'.

A grey-haired couple got emotional on 'Ye Jo Desh Hai Tera' song and said, "Our son lives in New York. We want him to come back to his own country, to his own land."

In the concert that captured his journey as a music composer, Rahman performed 'Humma Humma' and 'Urvashi Urvashi' songs in the Tamil language. The gig ended with the Oscar-winning song 'Jai Ho'.

--IANS

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