Ahead of the upcoming Disco Dance: The Musical show live on April 14, The Pioneer’s Tejal Sinha placed a call to the renowned music composer, Salim Merchant, who shared some exclusive insights about the musical show, the challenges of recreating a classic film for the stage, Bappi da’s reaction, and more.
Disco Dancer, one of the blockbuster hits of the ‘80s era, which starred legendary actor Mithun Chakraborty and Kim, has been one of the classics that’s remembered to date. Not only did the film, but its stupendous soundtracks, including I Am a Disco Dancer, Koi Yahan Nache Nache, Yaad aa raha hai, Ae oh, and Goron ki na kaalon ki, have been remembered as few epitomes by the legendary maestro Bappi Lahari, or as we’ve known him as ‘Bappi da’.
Every ‘90s kid would’ve once caught the sight of our dads and grandpas grooving over these tracks. And why not? One of the films back then that had so many successful songs in the same film was Disco Dancer. The songs were such a hit that once you think of Mithun da, you’ll envision him dancing to Disco Dancer. We would’ve heard our parents talking about this era many times.
But what if you get to live in that era for a while, which you’ve just heard of? Wondered how? India, get ready to witness once again the Disco Dancer era live in front of your face! Without further ado, we bring to you the ‘larger-than-life’ musical, which is all set to take place in Mumbai on April 14. And guess who’s behind this musical show? It’s none other than one of the most loved duos in the Indian music industry, Salim-Sulaiman Merchant. Ahead of this musical show, we interacted with Salim Merchant, one-half of the musical duo, over a telephone call, who gleefully shared some exclusive insights about the musical show, the challenges of recreating a classic film for the stage, remembering Bappi da’s reaction, and more.
“Musical has been a big-big thing right now,” shared the Shukran Allah singer. “I think entertainment has taken a very big turn. People like live entertainment; they like to see performances and concerts. Especially after COVID, you know how big the joy of the musical has been in our country, especially in a country like India, which is a singing and dancing nation. Disco Dancer brings back all that glory and joy, bringing the 80s era live on stage. This is one film that has done so well back in the 80s, and we thought it’d be a great idea to replicate it as a theatrical production on stage with live music and live singing.”
The love that Mithun da starrer Disco Dancer received not only back then after its release, but for all the obvious reasons it’s remembered as one of the best “classics” so far. The remarkable performance that was delivered not only by the actors but by the entire team left me at a loss for words. In fact, it was through the film that Mithun da first tasted stardom. To recreate such a classic isn’t an easy task for sure, and adding to it, this time it was going to be on a different platform, from film to stage. “Stage has a different ballgame altogether. There are no edits or cuts, and everything is live; everything is happening right in front of you with no cuts, which is in itself a huge challenge. Bringing out the details of the music, the detailing of the costumes, the props, and the whole styling was definitely a difficult task. It wasn’t easy to bring Mithun da onstage with the main character, who is playing Jimmy, and to recreate the music and have the singers dance, act, and sing,” vocalised the Maula mere lele meri jaan artist.
The composer duo that previously successfully presented the musical, Umrao Jaan, is bringing the upcoming musical, after almost 41 years of Disco Dancer, to the stage. It stars actors who are also singers. Going ahead and briefing us about the cast of the musical, the Jigar da Tukda singer shared, “There’s a huge cast. There are two people playing the character of Jimmy because, obviously, we need a backup. There’s Arjun Tanwar, who’ll be playing Jimmy, and then there’s Tia Kar, who is playing Kim. They are the main two characters, and there are other supporting characters who are equally good. In the musical, they’re all playing their parts, doing their acting, doing their dancing, everything together.”
For the unfamiliar, this musical first happened in London and did exceptionally well. And thus, this time, the virtuoso is not really nervous, but, “We are right now bringing it to India and Bombay with a lot more confidence and with a lot of happiness.”
While the soundtracks from the film were few out of the many epitomes of Bappi Da, it would’ve surely been a pleasant view to watch the maestro seeing the musical live, but it was unfortunate that we lost him. But he did know that this musical was going to come up. “He (Bappi da) was very much aware of it and very happy about it; he was confident that we were creating it, and also I’d told him that we were composing two fresh songs for the musical, and he was very, very happy,” recalled the Ishq wala love singer, adding, “Bappi da was a workaholic, and I loved that about him. He never stopped working and always did non-stop working.”
Recreating a classic is never as easy as it may seem. The maestro couldn’t agree more. “You should not recreate a classic unless you don’t need to. We were re-creating the classic in the full sense. We were not just recreating the Disco Dance song but for the same film as a musical,” shared the composer, who said that he isn’t a positive person when it comes to recreation. “I feel that the recreation that’s happening in the films is of any use or serves any purpose. But here we were actually recreating the entire musical, and obviously, every nuance, every piece of music, every lyric, and every interdune are all intact. We haven’t chosen anything.”
Being deeply rooted in the industry for a long time, he believes that there’s been a huge change in the industry. He remarked, “There was a time when, in order to prove yourself, you had to sing a film song, but now it’s nothing like that. There’s more of an independent music scene, and right now it’s a huge movement. Back then, there was no Facebook, YouTube, or streaming platforms, so we were all dependent on the recording labels to release a cassette or CD. But today everything is digital. You yourself can go ahead, release it, and do whatever you want in your own channel.” On the other hand, while one-minute music and songs trending on social media have been the criteria to make a piece of music go viral, he shared, “Change is the only constant, but having said that, you cannot make music for the one-minute music. You should make music as music. It’s an art. You can’t make music by thinking about what’s going to work and what’s not. If you have a beautiful piece of music, it will work, and that’s what I believe.”
As we came to the end of the interview, the maestro shared that through the composer duos on Merchant Records, they’ve been constantly making music. After completing three seasons of Bhoomi, and two seasons of Mehfil, they are starting a new season of a new property called Soundcheck, which is going to come out very soon.
