During my travel to the Hyderabad airport or back from it (which is very frequent), I invariably put AR Rahman’s Tamil Hits in the music section of Ola Play and end up gently swimming through those 40 mins. On several occasions, the driver has asked, “Tamil, Sir?” and then after listening to my reply in negative, the guy almost always asks, “How Tamil music, sir?” To which, my response is, “I love this music in totality…don’t need to understand the lyrics.”

\And I think that’s the power of storytelling with just music, with or without words. The best composers across genres have this power and that’s how they create hooks and melodies, which one remembers forever and hums every now and then.

One can get into the technical details of how certain notes / chords are happy (major) or certain sad (minor) or strange (diminished) and so on and how they become the ingredients for the musical story-telling. But that would be boring. It’s more interesting to illustrate this storytelling by taking a few examples.

In classical, take Beethoven’s marvelous Moonlight Sonata and listen to it carefully. You will probably see the gradual spread of a moonlit night which is getting more and more intense with every passing note. There is so much drama in there. Or take the genre of jazz and listen to Thelonious Monk’s Round Midnight, and you will see the scenes from the midnight hour, people leaving the bar, last of the drunkards still sitting and nursing their drinks in the company of themselves and dim lights. Or take Raag Bhairavi from Indian classical music. While listening to it you will start seeing all the morning scenes…the milkman and the newspaper boy floating around, people doing their morning walks, kids going to the school. And, if you pay real attention, you may just smell tea or coffee, depending on what you prefer to begin your mornings with.

In the realm of modern music, let’s take the opening bars of Michael Jackson’s classic Billie Jean’. It will always make you feel like you are 21 and walking into a night club that is brimming with possibilities. Closer home, take the first 40 seconds of guitar intro from Salil Chowdhury composed title song from the movie ‘Rajnigandha’. It has a beautiful aroma of a fresh and budding romance. The interludes of the song have the same mood. The compositions of giants like The Beatles, Van Morrison, Miles Davis, Radiohead, Ilaiyaraja and RD Burman have the same quality of storytelling. It’s magical.

But let me come back to Mr. AR Rahman and the Ola cab. Let’s take the song Nenjukulle, sung beautifully by Shakthisree Gopalan (& ARR) from the movie ‘Kadal’. Obviously, I don’t understand the lyrics and never looked it up as well, but I feel that the song is about a girl who is smitten! I think, I am correct. But, I will never look it up…what if I am not.

By Meraj Hasan

Meraj Hasan is a Mumbai based communication professional (and an amateur poet/musician) with a passion for listening to music the vinyl way. His 25 year old Technics turntable along with a humble collection of LPs across genres like Classic rock, Classical, Blues and Jazz (amongst others) are his prized possessions.

He can be reached at +91 9833410791 or email: meraj.hasan@gmail.com