After 'Karthik Calling Karthik', Karsh Kale eyeing Hollywood

"'Karthik Calling Karthik' happened because me and the Midival Punditz have been working on a few movie projects. My first film project was to rescore the Bruce Lee's 'Enter The Dragon'," Karsh Kale told PTI in an interview.

"We did 13 scenes, 90 queues of music for Karthik Calling Karthik. There were three main shifts where Farhan character goes through transition. Each of these transitions have a completely different sonic pallet," Kale said. The young musician went through records of Quentin Tarantino's movies and the music of the 'Requiem For a Dream', directed by Darren Aronofsky to create the score for the film that stars Deepika Padukone. It is releasing on February 26.

"Farhan and Ritesh wanted to bring International sound to the film. In the beginning there is lot of intimate piano, orchestra and then all of a sudden it becomes electronic where the Punditz pinched it and at the end of the film there are elements of heavy rock," said Kale, who was in the capital to perform at 'Melange' by 100 Pipers.

The musician, famed for blending Indian music with modern electronic sounds, now wants to compose music for Hollywood.   "Cinema is a big door to knock on and I would love to do films all over the world just like I do to my music," said Kale.
In 2007, Kale came out with 'Breathing Under Water' with Anoushka Shankar which also featured contributions by Indian sitar maestro Pandit Ravi Shankar, country singer Norah Jones and pop star Sting.

"I sat with Panditji for hours, we just talked and it was incredible. Anoushka is an amazing musician, even though she plays sitar she is open to all kinds of music, like the bass and jazz," he said.
"We also challenged each other, Norah knows her craft and that I learnt while writing with her. She'll throw something right back at me. In two hours we wrote a song. The three of us we were throwing questions at each other," Kale added.

However, what Kale enjoyed most was collaborating with sixteen-time Grammy award winning singer Sting. "Sting was an idol, I grew up studying him. When we asked him to be a part of the album he said he would love to but he doesn't have the time to write a song. That was the real challenge, it was like Shakespeare asking you to write a chapter of his play," Kale recalled.

"He (Sting) only changed one word. He's also a school teacher so after the recording he came out with the lyrics sheet and gave me 100 for composition and 80 for spelling. It was a great feeling," Kale added.

Kale whose mainstay is 'Six Degrees Records', a series of six CD fusion compilations also feels there is nothing like pure music in the world. "All music is fusion, there is nothing like pure music. Fusion is always happening. Everytime people come together its convergence," he said.

"I was really inspired by Peter Gabriel and people like Zak Hussein whose 'Shakti', (the band featuring John Mclaughlin on the guitar, Zakir Hussain, U Shrinivas and V Selvaganesh), managed to do what others could not," Kale said.

Growing up as a kid in New York, Kale was influenced by an array of musical genres ranging from Bollywood to Rock and Jazz, whose elements are clearly reflected in his music. "I was the youngest of three children and for one hour I was listening to Lata Mangeshkar, next thing it is Bhimsen Joshi, then my brother is listening to Rock legends like Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd while in the next hour my sister tunes to pop. All this happened while I was sleeping in the back of the car, So when I became a composer all of it came along," he said. And this is why, Kale does not want to restrict his music to genres.

"I enjoy doing all kind of music, it bothers me when I am restricted. It's an old way of looking at music. There's a Renaissance going and you have to change," said Kale who is expecting to finish his new album by February.