Throwback to AR Rahman's musical career before Bollywood: Music bands, jingle composer and more

Today, AR Rahman stands as a globally known and loved music director, with 2 Golden Globes and 2 Academy Award winner besides countless other honours. However, very few people are aware of Rahman’s career trajectory before his film debut in 1992 with the Mani Ratnam’s Roja.

AR Rahman created the band Roots in 1984

AR Rahman got music as a heredity from his father R.K.Shekhar. Shekhar too was a musician and frequently played for leading music composers of his time. As a result, it wasn’t long before AR Rahman too found himself playing for music composers from an age as early as 11 years. Many popular playback singers and artists have reminisced about times when they first met a young and adolescent Rahman in the recording studio. 

However, when Rahman entered his teens, the mild-mannered musician decided to expand his horizon to some degree. In 1984, AR Rahman joined hands with other notable musicians to create a band named Roots. But even as an indie musician, Rahman constantly kept changing lanes and collaborating with multiple notable musicians instead of forming a base band and sticking to it. In 1987, Rahman joined another rock band named Nemesis Avenue. For this band, Rahman worked in the capacity of a producer-arranger, and collaborated with famous artists like Zakir Hussain and Sivamani, who later went on to be one of Rahman’s most frequent collaborators and a popular name among music lovers himself. 

In 1988, Rahman, Zakir Hussain and a few others produced an album titled Colours. Interestingly, the album credits AR Rahman as Dilip (As he was called those days, before his official religious conversion in the 1989).

Rahman composed 300 jingles between 1987-1991

In the meantime, AR Rahman also found himself involved in the business of making jingles. Rahman’s first jingle was for a Television commercial for the then-popular wrist-watch brand Alwyn. Rahman went on to create jingles for over 300 commercials in next few years. And through this entire phase, Rahman continued his work as a keyboard player, working for many Kannada films of that time. This was the career-phase for Rahman where he was juggling multiple career strands at once.

It was only until a chance meeting in 1991 with Maverick Tamil filmmaker Mani Ratnam that AR Rahman decided to join movies, changing not just the course of his career but the face of Indian film music itself. Even after finding phenomenal success with his debut film soundtrack Roja, Rahman did work on an independent music album titled Fantasy/Andhi Mazhai which released in 1994.

However, despite Rahman’s huge success and following in the decades that followed, very few people are aware of the Rahman’s rich inclination to experiment and innovate much before Roja.