“The Scope of Indie Music Is As Far As We Take It” Jigar Saraiya

Sachin-Jigar, the dynamic duo behind many blockbusters in Bollywood, definitely know how to get the crowd exhilarated as they are all set to mesmerize audiences with their latest independent single ‘Ruka Hoon’. Jigar Saraiya along with Sanjeeda Sheikh who features with him in his debut romantic single talk about the creative process behind the song, how their professional journeys began and the way ahead in an interesting conversation with Loudest.in. ‘Ruka Hoon’ released by Sony Music is a beautiful rendition endowed with a lyrical beauty which is soulful and deep. Composed by the music composer duo Sachin -Jigar the song mesmerizes with Jigar’s characteristic high pitched vocals which compliment with the deep husky voice of his wife, singer and lyricist Priya Saraiya featuring the gorgeous actor Sanjeeda Sheikh, who looks stunning like never before. Talking about the inception and the thought behind the song Jigar said, "While I was making the song the only thought at the back of my mind was to not just make a song but a story and say something which connects with audiences rather than just being a gimmick. The song has been penned by me, and my wife being a lyricist helped me out. The idea was to write something which progresses, as there are a lot of things lyrically which we tried to do. The process evolved creating something simple, soulful, meaningful and full of art." Talking about the duo coming up with the idea to feature Sanjeeda Sheikh in the song Jigar said, "I and Sachin as a duo have done many Bollywood projects, while this is our first single independent song. We needed an honest and innocent girl to portray in the song and her name just came to our mind. Since she happens to be a close friend to Remo sir he helped us connect to her and the rest is history. We met and played her one minute of the song and she instantly said yes while she listened to the melody.” Sanjeeda Sheikh adds, "When he called me I knew it must be regarding some music, and when I heard the song I asked him to play it again because it sounded so good. When you hear the song for the first time there is an instant liking. Eventually, he broke the news that he wanted to feature me in the song with him which will be shot in Istanbul. I was thrilled to have got an opportunity to work with somebody so creatively amazing. I believe in the duo’s music as even if a movie fails to make a mark at the box office, their songs always create a stir.” Sanjeeda reminisces shooting in Istanbul and the overall experience working with Jigar says, "The location was fantastic and has added to the mood of the song in the way it's looking. In fact, I enjoyed the process of doing the song which was very well planned as we had a workshop to begin with, which was conducted to make us familiar to each other so that we can act well together. So we met one day we talked to each other in a session for 4-5 hours, while we shared our life experiences on random topics. We had a very good vibe with each other and thereafter we had fun while we shot in Istanbul which was like a picnic. Also, we had this fantastic stylist Karishma Acharya who made us both look very well and planned everything well in advance, as usually for a 2-3 minutes video no one does so much hard work.” On working with Sanjeeda Jigar says, “It was as if I made the song keeping her in mind and she looked like a dream in the song. The Best thing about her was that she was part of the team all through its journey. For an actress who’s done so much work and is used to so much luxury, she had no tantrums as she traveled with us adjusting with our tight shooting schedules ate roadside food, kept going with our pace shooting back to back for two days without asking for breaks even for food, so it was normal for her.” Jigar adds, “ I would call this not as a song but rather a project which has been created with a lot of love as all my friends have collaborated in it to include our  Director Arunima Sharma, Karishma Acharya and the cameraman and editor who made us look so good and are now a family. Jigar Saraiya began his musical journey at an early age of 3 when he was exposed to the kirtan music at home sung by his grandmother, father, and uncle. By the age of 5 young Jigar took to playing a Dholak and eventually learned to play table in school. He grew up listening to and practicing with the records of tabla maestros Ustad Allah Rakha Khan and his talented son Ustad Zakir Hussain. Eventually, he joined Pandit Nikhil Ghosh’s Sangeet Mahabharti for a few years to learn tabla formally while also learned piano at the theme music world. Eventually, in the dew course, he met Music composers  Rajesh Roshan and Pritam Chakroborty in the dew coarse of his life. Talking about his journey to work with stalwarts in the music industry Jigar says, “I learned everything on the job so it was programming, arranging and sequencing from Rajesh Roshan Ji who held my hand to leave the tabla and play the Conga and then leave the Conga and do the programming.

I think I learned the ‘Namak’ of Music creation from Rajesh Roshanji, like what is salt in food, similarly, he taught me about the key elements in a tune.”

Talking about his take away from every composer Jigar says, “Everybody does music but everyone’s outlook for the audience is different like for Pritam Da audience wants something and for Rajesh Roshan Ji, the same audience wants something else. So how they look at the audience and how they gage what to give is the trick of the art. They are completely two different schools of music wherein one needs time to grow while one needs time to make new songs. So for Roshanji, it’s like doing one song in 15 days, while for Pritam Da it was like giving a presentation for 15 songs in a day, while the completion time was one year. While it required a lot of experimentation and possibilities to explore. Me and Sachin were with him for 3 and a half years and we did a host of albums. The fun was to learn how he would think the audience would receive a song.” Jigar shared how destiny created the successful duo, “I met Sachin through Amit Trivedi who’s our common friend when we were programming for Rajesh Roshanji and met Sachin there. Amit introduced me to him who was then looking for someone to help him with a Marathi serial projects, and  I agreed and that’s how we started working together. It’s been a partnership of almost 13 years now.” Before they stepped into being independent composers the duo Sachin –Jigar have programmed and arranged for almost all music directors in Bollywood from the legend A.R. Rahman, Anu Malik, Nadeem-Shravan, Sandesh Shandilya, Pritam, Vishal-Shekhar. The duo has created music for various platforms from films like Stree, Badlapur, ABCD 2, Shudh Desi Romance, FALTU, Ramaiya Vastavaiya to theatre television soaps to jingles and have done not less the 500 plays,5000 television episodes, 100 jingles, and numerous chartbusters, having won many awards to their credit. Sanjeeta Sheikh tells some interesting insights on how she met the television Queen Ekta Kapoor which acted as a turning point in her life. “Initially I was into dancing as I was a choreographer and I used to teach dance at an American school and some of my private students. Once I was partying one day and Ekta Kapoor happened to be in that party who kept noticing me and sent a friend to me with a message that she wants to meet me for a new project. I auditioned for the show ‘Kya Hoga Nimmo Ka’ and that’s how I got into television. I did a couple of shows for Balaji and some other production houses and took a break as I wanted to explore acting as there was no creative satisfaction. “After the break, I did a Punjabi film ‘Ashke’ with Amrindar Gill, which did very well last year. I’m doing my first Bollywood film ‘Tehesh’ written  and directed by Bejoy Nambiar which is releasing next year, which I recently shot and in the meanwhile ‘Ruka Hoon’ happened for which I am very glad because for an actor to be visible is very important but  to do the right project at the right time is also very important. I wanted to go good work so that people talk good about it, and it is not repetitive.” Talking about the response received from Ruka Hoon Sanjeeda says, “For me the response for ‘Ruka Hoon’ is very special as the audience has seen me doing a lot of stuff but haven’t seen me doing something that I have done in this video, nor the way they have seen me looking like the way I’m looking in this video. It’s all very new and I feel like a newcomer with every project, I feel like I have just begun.” Talking about the duo’s plans, Jigar said, “We plan to do more of independent music. This song ‘Ruka Hoon’ was by me and Sachin but featuring me, Next will be by both of us featuring him and the third song will be composed by both and will feature both of us too. So there’s a lot of exciting music coming up. Also, we are doing a host of films starting with ‘Made in China’ which is releasing soon, then is ‘Bala’ which features Ayushmann Khurrana then are  ‘Street Dancer’ and ‘ Tedhe Medhe’  in the pipeline. Jigar talks about his musical aspirations and scope of Indie music, “ I have been a very big fan of indie pop, alternative rock, country music and the last few years I have been inclined and have been listening to a lot of folk music of late and that’s where my heart stays right now and in fact, I am trying to get so many folk artists to do indie music  and aim to spread good music, which is my only motivation to touch people’s heart and to retain honesty in music. I think the scope for Indie music is as far as we take it, since no one is stopping us if we don’t push it's our fault.”   https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=RDW6RzUBLTYw4&v=W6RzUBLTYw4