Regular Yahoo group members may be knowing that Pune based group "The Wandering Souls" is gearing up to present 2007 year edition of RAHMANIA, the musical performance based solely on our GURU, Rahman's songs.
The highlight of this performance this year will be a tri-lingual presentation ( in Tamil, Hind & Marathi ) of "Vellai Pookkal" from Kannathil Mudhalmittal. This way, we want the audience to understand the kind of work Rahman has done in languages other than Hindi. All this takes me back to the year 2005 when the group had performed 2 shows in Pune. I attended the show of 29'th June 2005. Being a typical Puneite, I was skeptical as to how a young group of musicians, singers can handle the difficult yet melodius and extremely rhythm based compositions of Rahman. I still remember myself sitting in the audience waiting for the performance to begin to find out whether the performing team was indeed serious and knew their Rahman well or not. I was ready to count the mistakes, I must admit The programme began at sharp 10pm with "Ghanana Ghanana Lagan" followed by "Kehna Hi Kya Bombay". Good so far, I thought. Next performance was the BOMBAY THEME ! I said to myself, now they will be in trouble. This theme is "THE" identity of Rahman. I thought, may be this group should not perform such a difficult and emotionally charged compostition The Bombay theme slowly started with flute and went on to a marvelous and touching climax. I was stunned ! I had thought all along that Bombay theme can not be reproduced live on stage, except highly professional musicians, and here was this group who had taken up this challenge and they did such a remarkable job, they were outstanding !!! One by one, singers came on stage with clockwork precision, the instrument and rhythm artists were extremely competent through various songs of Rahman right from Saathiya, Dil se, Meenaxi, Swades, Yuva, Pukaar, Rangeela, Taal, etc. They received request for Encore (Once more !) for virtually every song !!!!!! The performance ended with a Medley of patriotic songs from TLOB, Swades, Netaji and ofcourse Vande Mataram. The audience gave them a standing ovation, I was one of them 18 months later, this group is back with new songs and I can hardly wait. I have postponed all my office work and looking forward to the performances planned for 7'th and 10'th of Feb in Pune. Friends, Are there similar groups in other cities ? May we know more about you please ? Do you have stage performances of Rahman songs ? Rahmania-PUNE, You guys ROCK !! You have the RAHMAN sound in you !!! All the best........... Dinesh Vaidya Pune
