Rekha Bhardwaj: ‘Vishal Discovered Shakespeare on the Train…’

Darminyaan, from the series Musafir Café, about an unfinished chapter, unabated longing and an aching sense of loss, is the song on everyone’s lips today. Rekha Bhardwaj, who has sung it with composer Raghav Kaushik, agrees it lures you with its melody and simplicity, its language and Amrita Saluja’s poignant lyrics, its relatable characters and their emotions which we have all felt sometime.

“In India, music is a part of our lives. Netflix doesn’t usually have songs in their shows, but for this one, they recorded a full album and even shot videos,” says the National Award-winning singer, surprised that Darmiyaan has clicked even with youngsters. “I guess, they are looking for love, peace and melody far more than we are today,” she smiles, sipping her cappuccino in a quiet café in a bustling Mumbai suburb.

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Rekha grew up learning music from Pandit Amarnath and remembers that in ’86, when she was 22, classical vocalist Kishori Amonkar had come to Delhi’s Shriram Bharatiya Kala Kendra where she had classes for a lecture demo. “Kishori-ji spoke about the importance of riyaaz, insisting we needed to practise eight hours every day, pointing out that there are seven surs (musical notes). If we sang each 108 times, it would be around six-and-half hours. Add palta and bandishes, and you had your eight-hour riyaaz. Following her advice, maine sur lagana shuru kiya aur zameen taiyar hone lagi (I started these vocal warm-ups and slowly tilled the ground),” she recalls, the hoops in her ears swinging with her memories.  

Her riyaaz had to increase because  Jagjit Singh. Rekha had grown up listening to ghazals by Farida Khanum, Mehdi Hassan, Anup Jalota, Talat Aziz, Pankaj Udhas and hi among others. Jagjit Singh revolutionized the genre with his voice, the simplicity of his compositions, by bringing the guitar and keyboard into his singing. Rekha was fascinated by the ghazals he composed and sang for Gulzar’s ’88 biographical series Mirza Ghalib. She waited impatiently for the Doordarshan show every week even though the poet’s struggles—brilliantly portrayed by Naseeruddin Shah—made her cry in empathy. “Jagjitji and Gulzar saab brought Ghalib into our homes, making his poetry comprehensible to all. I see the same fascination with Musafir Café and Darmiyaan’s today, the lines Hum tere hote toh zakhm sabhi sile hote toh, haan, tum mere hote toh bewaqt na mile hote toh having as much of an emotional impact as Ghalib’s Kabhi kissiko mukammal jahan nahin milta, kahin zameen, kahin asmaan nahin milta. My only complaint is Raghav kept all the best lines for himself and is spinning reels now,” she laughs with gentle humour.

Vishal Bhardwaj

Rekha had wanted to collaborate with her idol since she was in college. “I’d boast that my voice perfectly complemented Jagjitji’s. In ’82-’83, when we came to Mumbai, Vishal (her singer-writer-composer-filmmaker husband Vishal Bhardwaj) took me to meet him. When he heard I was Pandit Amarnath-ji’s student, he asked me to sing his bandishes and made the request every time we met, even saying he wanted to cut an album with me,” she reminisces.

Then, one day, he shocked her by saying that while she had a good voice, she needed to bring some chamak (spark) into it. Not understanding what he meant, heartbroken by what she perceived as criticism, Rekha cried all the way to Andheri from Western Outdoor Studio in Fort. “Knowing I was upset, Jagjit-ji asked Sudarshan Faakirji—lyricist of Kagaz ki kashti—to accompany me in the cab. To his credit, he didn’t try to pacify me,” she narrates.

Back home, Vishal told her she simply needed to work harder and Rekha did 3-4 chillas —10 to12 hours of riyaaz daily without a break for 40 days—which helped her hone her talent. “We need people like Jagjit-ji who tell the truth no matter how much it hurts or we will never grow as artists,” asserts Rekha, who later sang Tum Bin 2’s Teri Fariyaad with him.

Musafir cafe

Today, she’s a sought-after singer, but there was a time when she only sang for Vishal because no one else gave her work. The turning point was her Namak ishq ka from Omkara. With Maqbool, Omkara and Haider, adaptations of Macbeth, Othello and Hamlet, Vishal familiarized us with William Shakespeare the way Gulzar had done with Mirza Ghalib. Rekha reveals that having schooled in Meerut and gone to a government college, he had never studied the Bard. “Vishal discovered Shakespeare on the train. When bringing our god son home from his school in Dehradun, he asked Alaap for a book to read and was handed Tales of Shakespeare. He was fascinated by the drama in these plays and decided to set Macbeth in Mumbai’s underworld where human dynamics and overriding passion give a woman the power to make or break anyone,” she informs.

Lauding her husband for being an intelligent, observant man who often tells their son Aasmaan that it’s important to connect with common people because that’s where the real stories are, Rekha shares that Omkara’s Langda Tyagi was modelled on a boy Vishal went to school with. It was a world he had seen, standing at the nukkad, and his understanding of human relationships came from the many relatives always dropped by his home. 

The film industry has a simple rule: give a hit song and you will get work. But Rekha believes to have a long innings, like Gulzar, you need to work on your skills and up the quality of your work. “Vishal and I have always strived for excellence, never compromised on creativity. Had even one of us been mediocre, zindagi bahut mushkil ho jati (life would have been difficult),” admits this musafir (traveller) who has found the love of a lifetime.

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