Renowned for his remarkable accomplishments, Ricky Kej, stands as an exceptional Indian music composer and dedicated environmentalist. With the honor of three Grammy Awards to his name, Kej’s musical prowess knows no bounds. His mesmerizing compositions have graced stages in more than 30 countries, captivating audiences worldwide.
Notably, he has performed at distinguished venues such as the United Nations headquarters in both New York and Geneva, leaving an indelible mark on the global music scene. In a significant recognition of his contributions, Ricky Kej was appointed as a UNHCR “Goodwill Ambassador” in December 2022, further amplifying his commitment to making a positive impact on the world.
Recently, he released a new rendition of our national anthem on this Independence Day which was performed by a British orchestra, Royal philharmonic
Ricky Kej gave an exclusive interview to Financial express on this occasion.
So we are close to celebrating the Independence Day. And you are giving us the greatest gift, making the Britishers perform national anthem for us. How did that happen?
Ricky Kej: The thing is that I’ve collaborated with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra a bunch of times in the past. And they are my favourite orchestra. Even my latest Grammy award winning album, Divine Tides, had the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in it. So I really like them. I think they are the best orchestra in the world, at least in my opinion. And they are the most in demand orchestra in the UK. And of course the National Anthem is something that’s very special to me, like how it is for 1.4 billion Indians. In fact the first piece of music that I ever learnt in my life was the Indian National Anthem, even before I learnt any nursery rhymes or anything like that. So it’s in my blood and I’ve created many versions of the Indian National Anthem in the past. I created one version in 2015 which was dedicated to the forest and wildlife of India, which was for the COP21, the Paris Climate Change Conference that happened in 2015.
And then I’ve also created one with refugees. Last year, through my work with the United Nations and refugees, I created a version of the National Anthem, which is where, you know, the refugee singers, some of whom were made to leave their country because of their music, you know, but they’re welcome in India, these refugees. So they wanted to express their gratefulness to India. They wanted to express their gratefulness to our country and to our government. So what they did was that they are the ones who came up with the suggestion that let’s sing the national anthem.
And we know the national anthem really well and it is amazing that the pronunciations were impeccable so 13 of us—the 12 refugees and me, we sang the national anthem together. We released that last year went completely viral then this year I thought why not do something absolutely epic so then that’s when I got in touch with the Royal Philharmonic they loved the idea and then we recorded it it was three months of preparation writing down the score and coming up with the parts for the different musicians and all of that stuff and then just on the 7th that is about four days.
That’s great. So, winning three Grammys, how does that feel?
Ricky Kej: Yeah, of course it feels amazing because awards can always be looked at in two ways. One is, you know, awards can be looked at in vanity that you know, yeah, I won something or whatever, but that’s a wrong way to look at awards.
For me, since all of my music has got a very strong purpose and all of my music is about spreading messages of awareness and spreading messages of, what do you call that, of celebrating, you know, world and our country who we are. So I believe that awards give you a beautiful platform for more and more people to take you seriously, more and more people to listen to your music and to spread your message further and wider. So I believe that awards are very important. A lot of people say awards. But of course awards should not be the end goal. But at the same time when awards come in, it is very very beneficial. And also it’s very beneficial in order, especially if your music has got a purpose, you know, to spread further and wider.
And we are proud of you for that. So people usually learn classical music at a very young age, but you started at the age of 21. And I personally, I wanted to learn music but everyone said that this is not the age for you. So what gave you the motivation?
Ricky Kej: So I’ve been self-taught since I was a child. And by the time I was 21, I was already quite successful as a musician. I was already doing commercial work. I was already performing across India, some concerts even outside of India. But then the thing is that at the age of 21, I started feeling that I need to have a formal training in music because art is all about breaking the rules and pushing boundaries, but you need to know the rules first in order to break them. And also I wanted to get, I wanted to sidestep a potential handicap that might happen in future, you know, that I won’t be able to communicate with other musicians properly.
I won’t understand the language that they speak when it comes to music. So to overcome all those potential handicaps, that’s when I decided to take a formal training in Indian classical and in western classical. And I took that training, yeah. But I think it’s important to have a music education because I benefited very strongly.
So my personal favourite is Winds of Samsara. And it’s so simple and yet so deep and a simple scene where the mother is stitching the kurta. Where did you get the inspiration from? How did you create something that seems simple yet with so many emotions?
Ricky Kej: So that’s the thing about music, you know that music can be very intricate, it can be very layered but at the same time it has a sound simple to the listener. And I believe that the most successful musicians in the world, musicians like Chick Corea, the great jazz musician, even John Williams, have these complex harmonies.
And they have these complex compositions, complex time signatures. But the biggest mistake a musician makes is to make their music sound difficult to impress people. But I believe that music should always sound simple so that there is an emotional connect and that is the most important thing. The music could be created in a simple manner and could be presented in a simple manner and if it has an emotional connect then that is all that matters. At the same time even if it is a complex piece of music and complex piece of rhythm, it should still have an emotional connect.
The whole purpose of music is to have an emotional connect, whether it’s for entertainment purposes or whether it is for advocacy. The emotional connect is the most important thing.
So that is what it was with Winds of Samsara and even with Divine Tides, the latest album. It is all about having that emotional connect with the audience. We are not trying to show off our musical talents, you know. It’s not a talent hunt. It’s about connecting with the audience so that you are either spreading a message of awareness or you are uplifting their mood.
And about advocacy? When did you know you can use music for environmental cause?
Ricky Kej: So then the thing is that. Like for example, we are talking about the national anthem today. Every country has got a national anthem. So why does every country have a national anthem? Because music is powerful, it’s a powerful binding force. The minute you listen to the first few notes of the national anthem, you find a sense of patriotism and you fall in love with your country all over again. That is very, very important. So music has got that amazing ability.
I spent a lot of time doing commercials for television and radio, almost 13 years. And the thing is that the reason why big brands are ready to spend so much of money and to air that music on television and radio is that they understand the power of music in their case to sell something.
So music is a very very powerful tool to get people to do things and to motivate people and to get and to have a strong sense of a feeling you know it could be it could be happiness it could be sadness it could be it could be love for the country it could be urging them to buy a product it could be anything. So I feel strongly about so many things I’ve been been a strong advocate for positive social impact and you know and for children’s rights so for me it was a natural extension that if I’m going to be creating music that I feel strongly about it has to be about topics that I feel strongly about so that so now I enjoy myself a lot more since I’m not doing commercial music because I’m just creating music about topics that are very close and dear to me.
So now let’s come to Bollywood. What are your views on the remake of songs that are happening in the industry?
Ricky Kej: See Bollywood music is for entertainment. Nobody is trying to become like Mozart or Beethoven or whatever. It’s not a talent hunt as I said. It’s basically for entertainment. And Bollywood songs are used to promote a movie. There’s a specific purpose for Bollywood songs. There’s no other purpose. It’s just to promote the movie. Now if you make a new song and you will have to first promote the song and then when the song becomes popular, you have to promote the movie whereas when it comes to remixes, the song is already popular and so that whole journey is completely eliminated and then you can just use the song because it’s already familiar so what I’m trying to say is that I do not see anything wrong with it because it’s serving its purpose, that’s all
But I do not see any wrong in it and I enjoy some of these remixes. I think they’re pretty good. Some of them are terrible But some of them are pretty good. Like I remember that Ankhmari did that I really like that remix. I like that one. A few others also I like Bachna ae hasseno, is you know the one which Vishal Shekhar had done.
I thought that was amazing So there are some remixes which are very very good. Some of them are absolutely terrible But the thing is that but I do not see anything wrong with it because it’s a promotional media It’s not like these guys are trying to show how good they are musically or whatever, it’s just a promotional thing.
Well, that’s a very positive way to look at it. Okay, so are we expecting any Bollywood projects?
Ricky Kej: If there is a Bollywood project which is where at the heart of the film it’s about social impact or it’s got a very important cause, I would stop everything and I would do it because I would love to be a part of Bollywood. But the thing is that I’ve made my mission very clear that, you know, that everything that I do is going to be about something that I feel strongly about. So if something is in alignment, I will obviously love to be a part of it.
