Love, Sex aur Sneha

Sneha Khanwalkar has the distinction of being the only woman composer currently scoring for Hindi film music. Six films on, the girl from Indore is sexing up folk music with gun shots and manic screamsu00a0

Twenty-six year-old Sneha Khanwalkar is in an enviable position. She makes music on the road, finds folk references across the country and has worked with some of the best minds in the business -- Ram Gopal Varma (Sarkar Raj), Anurag Kashyap and most recently, Dibakar Bannerjee for Love Sex aur Dhokha (LSD). In true LSD style we prep our comps for a video chat when she's in Ranchi, the heart of the country's agricultural belt and steel hub Jharkhand. After five attempts, we laugh and give up, switching to the more reliable mobile phone.

Two minutes into the chat and we're ready to call Dibakar's bluff for portraying a video-savvy rural India in his film. "Yeh LSD kuch nahin hota," jokes Sneha, "I'm having a tough time charging equipment here." Here the pretty Maharashtrian composer tells us how she manages to stay out of the studio for most part of the job, and harnesses folk music to produce gritty, snappy tunes for Hindi films.

What takes you to Ranchi?

I'm researching for Anurag Kashyap's next film, Vasepur, produced by UTV. The film is setu00a0 in Dhanbad. The shooting starts in June. I began looking for folk music but found some nice classical and tribal music. There's a music festival going on now, so I might find something there. I'm also sure someone will set out on a political march and there might be some fun music happening there too, but the tribal music is what sounds exciting for now.

What's the story behind the girl from Indore arriving in the film industry?
My parents decided to move to Mumbai a few years ago just so that my brother and I could get a taste of the life here. I did some animation work before doing art direction for films. When I saw how the crew working on films eat, drink and sleep the projects they do, I was hooked. Instinctively, I knew my medium here would be music, although I had an anti-music attitude when I was growing up. My cousins and I were constantly badgered to sing a line or two when a relative showed up at home. At one family gathering, my cousins and I walked down the stairs into the courtyard, singing Chappa Chappa Charkha Chale from Maachis, while banging steel thalis. We started from the first floor because we knew we'd be asked to sing as soon as we came down.

For some reason, that gesture was appreciated. Anything we did became an act. When I moved to Mumbai, music came back to bite me. So, I thought, agar karna hai toh jhak maarke karna hai.u00a0

You've travelled to Punjab and Haryana to find music for Oye Lucky Lucky Oye. How did you work out this travelling composer deal?
I travel only to make the most of the experiences that I may have missed out on while growing up. We didn't have that sort of upbringing in Indore. On a personal level, I want to keep travelling till I hit 30, but that doesn't mean that I will only pick films that let me travel. If a film doesn't require a regional flavour and research, I'm fine with composing right here in Mumbai. Dibakar knew my feet had wings. I'd composed one track for him for a period film that's yet to release, and I'd travelled to Bhopal to meet an author who gave me some references for the track. It was just one track but the author had categorically told me that if I needed to hear anything, I'd have to meet him in person. For Oye Lucky, Punjabi music was very new to me and I felt I didn't know enough to score an entire soundtrack with a Punjabi feel. Besides, I was depressed at that time and wanted to get away from the city.u00a0

Sneha on one of her music hunts across the country

Heartbreak stories?
Yes, full on love, sex and dhokha. It was a break-up. Ironically, the guy I broke up with was a Punjabi, so I was looking at everything around in Punjab and romanticising my misery.u00a0

How do you make music on the road?
I used to carry a Handycam and film home videos of anything that seemed interesting. Now I have a good microphone to record it, but it has no appeal to me if I'm not making original compositions. All these are just references. It's more about watching how these folk musicians do it live and be able to translate that somehow into my music. Music doesn't get bigger or smaller depending on whether you are in a city or a village. Music is the biggest driving force.u00a0

How did you get a folk singer like Des Raj Lachkani, who has never performed in a studio, to singu00a0 Jugni (Oye Lucky) for you?
I took him to a studio in Chandigarh. Des Raj Lachkani is 75. He has never sung to a click (beat). Folk musicians are all very bohemian. You just let them sing and then fit everything else around it. Dilbahar, who sang Superchor (Oye Lucky) was a jaagran (Punjabi spiritual songs) singer. He had a good sense of taal (tempo) because he was a tabla player, but when I was practising with him, I realised that he couldn't read the lyrics.

He was illiterate. He took a vow from me that I wouldn't tell anyone else in the studio that he couldn't read, when they'd ask me to write the lines down for him.u00a0

Did you travel for LSD, though? There's Kailash on almost every track.
Loki Local's (the film's lead) character required a Bollywood super singer's voice that is extremely versatile, confident and has that earthy touch. Kailash has all of that. I did go to a music festival in Rajasthan because I can't hold it any longer required a Rajasthani feel. So, I've used a bhapang on it.u00a0

And what's that squeaking squeeze-me-toy effect on the track?
That's a Rajasthani puppet whistle and a flute going haywire.u00a0

You've sung I can't hold it any longer. How did you make that call?
I've trained in vocals but mine is a non-playback voice. I had to record a dummy track for Dibakar so that he could get on with the shoot, but he quite liked it. When we auditioned singers who also had non-playback voices, we realised we were just attempting to make them sound like me. So, I ended up singing it eventually.
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Is that your USP then to be able to use unusual voices?
For Oye Lucky, it's not that Dibakar wanted me to find new voices. But given a choice, yes, I'd like to use the vocals of people who've lost their voice and people with no teeth, even. How the song is sung plays an important role. It's not just about sur (pitch) and taal. It's not just about voices. So yes, I'd like to work with voices that haven't been heard before.

There's also a spoof on the typical Hindi romantic number on LSD called Mohabbat Bollywood Style.
I grew up on these numbers. We were sold on this music. I'm sorry but I love the Rahuls, Poojas and Prems of my time. I also think these songs were extremely well arranged and composed, which is why they worked for us.
Dilbahar was singing Kajra re and showing off when I was trying to get him to sing some songs! When I went to Muzaffarpur, people were singing songs from the film Veer to me. Amey (Date) and Nihira (Joshi), the talent hunt singers, who sang Mohabbat Bollywood style, would want to do typical Bollywood numbers some day.
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Amey would want to take Sonu's place.u00a0

The song is a direct spoof.
It depends on how it's done. I think we'll have people laughing with us, and not at the genre. It's not meant to offend.

Would you do an Aditya Chopra score?
Why not? I'd love to do an Aditya Chopra film where music is given a lot of importance. I'd love to work with an orchestra with 50 violins and 20 people in the chorus. I don't know about the lead vocals but I know I'll automatically experiment, yaar.

Who do you bounce your music off when you fear there's a danger of going over the top?
I make all my lallu panju friends hear it. Not that I rely on them but if I see them nodding to something or even a little alert, I know it's working. Nobody seemed to mind the non-Bollywood voices so far.u00a0

What was it like working with Ram Gopal Varma?
I wouldn't have been able to do without that experience. Ram Gopal Varma has madness. He lets you think out of the box. Dibakar exercises a method to the madness. There's a thin line between a song that works and doesn't. Analysing this is what I learnt from Oye Lucky. And I love how Dibakar writes. He doesn't know Rajasthani but has managed to imbibe the flavour for I can't hold it any longer. He's very sharp.

Women on Top
Sneha picks and even plays some tracks by her favourite female composers for us off her iPod library. Unsurprisingly, they're all vintage gold
Jaddanbai: The legendary Jaddanbai was classic heroine Nargis's mother. Yehi aarzoo thi dil ki from the 1936 film Madam Fashion is Sneha's favourite.
Saraswati Devi: Saraswati Devi also ruled the charts in the 30s. Sneha plays us a track from the 1939 film Bandhan called Ruk na sako toh jao rendered by Anoop Kumar, Kishore Kumar's brother.