I can’t fake a song: Rekha Bhardwaj

Chandigarh : Moved by her music and songs, Rani Breast Cancer Trust’s Bittu Sandhu once sent a text to singer Rekha Bhardwaj. It was a note of appreciation, of love and a request of some day being part of the cause Sandhu has been working passionately for. “I don’t know why, but for some reason I kept that sms and read it couple of days later. I called up Bittuji, and we connected at various levels,” says the petite Bhardwaj, who was in town for ‘her first big concert’ in Chandigarh as part of Rani Breast Cancer Trust at Government Medical College and Hospital Sector 32 on Sunday evening.

From Bashir Badr’s nazms, songs from her album Ishqa Ishqa to her famous Hindi film numbers, Bhardwaj regaled the audience with her soul stirring voice, one that has a fine texture and quality owing to years of riyaaz.

“I would like to credit that to my first album Ishqa Ishqa.making it, producing it was an ordeal, for me, for my husband Vishal Bhardwaj and Gulzar,” says Bhardwaj, recollecting the eleven year journey that went into releasing it. “I now realize it had to be part of my growth.I never left hope or my riyaaz, and I learnt what professionalism is, what life is while working on this album. Perhaps that’s why songs like Tere Ishq Main from the album are timeless.”

While a sequel to the album is being contemplated, Bhardwaj says Vishal and Gulzar are taking their time on it. In the meantime, there is another of her filmmaker husband and music composer Vishal’s favourite poets, Bashir Badr, whose work has found its way into the couple’s hearts. “We are making an album on his compositions, it’s a tribute to him for he is like a father figure to us,” says Bhardwaj for whom moving composition, lyrics and vocals are the backbone of a timeless song.

And that is one of the reasons she is choosy about playback offers too. “The music, the words have to touch me, move me, like AR Rahman’s music, or Sajid Wajid’s for whom I sang Kaanha and Himesh Reshammiya for whom I rendered Piya jaise laadoo. I can’t fake a song.” She would like to sing more with music composer Amit Trivedi too.

And her husband Vishal? “Well, the process is easy, but once I am behind the mike, it is tough working with him,” she smiles, looking forward to playback in Matru Ki Bijli Ka Mann Dola, Ek Thi Dayan and couple of new music composers.

When not singing, she and Vishal join Gulzar in Bhopal, in an NGO called Aarushi for the challenged. “We work with them, hold workshops, like I do on music and dance.the main thing is that we are taught not to feel sorry for them, instead empower them and treat them as equals.”