When RD Burman created iconic Hum Dono Do Premi song with just three instruments

Rahul Dev Burman, or R.D.Burman as he is better known as, is one of the most prolific and significant music directors in the history of Hindi Cinema. The composer particularly gained fame in the 70s for his contemporary sound, and use of Indian classical elements with a western template in Hindi film songs. While the composer was known for his polished soundtracks, which had a lot of elements and detailed sound, he was also known to be some what of a maverick genius, because of his ability to come up with tunes or sounds on short notice. One such occurrence happened during the production of Shakti Samanta’s film Ajanabee.

RD Burman had one day to compose the song

Ajanabee, which eventually became very popular for its soundtrack, was being produced at a time when actor Rajesh Khanna was at the peak of his stardom. The actor had 16 back-to-back hits between 1969 and 1973, and the busiest schedule among all actors. As a result, it was very difficult to get shooting dates from Khanna - even for someone like Shakti Samanta who was instrumental in Khanna’s stardom, having made hits with him like Amar Prem, Aradhana and Kati Patang.

However, one day in 1973, Rajesh Khanna called Samanta out of the blue to inform him that he had a brief window open in his schedule, and that they must shoot an outdoor love song - which was to be shot atop a train - during this period. Now the problem was, Samanta did not have the song in place, and was caught by total surprise. Now it was up to the film’s composer R.D.Burman to rise to the occasion.

Unfortunately, there was a musicians’ strike going on around that team, and RD Burman did not have his usual full music band at his disposal. At such a moment of crisis, RD Burman called his percussionist Ranjit Gazmer and two other musicians to compose the basic beat and melody.

And on the spur of the moment, RD Burman came up with an idea - he asked Gazmer to rub two sandpapers against each other at a consistent pace. Everybody in the room was surprised to hear the results - the outcome sounded like the sound of a moving train. 

Now with this ambient music piece in place, RD Burman created a basic guitar-driven rhythm with the two other musicians. That’s how the iconic romantic song ‘Hum Dono Do Premi’ was conceived - on one day’s notice. The song, picturised with Rajesh Khanna and Zeenat Aman on a top of a moving train, achieved great love on all music popularity charts that year, and continues to enjoy a cult status till date.