MUMBAI: What started as an out of the blue opportunity, turned into a career for ace music director in Marathi music industry, Ajit Parab. He was a trained vocalist in classical music and had taken formal lessons from Pandit Kedar Bodas, and music direction wasn’t something that he thought of. But opportunity came knocking nonetheless.

“I along with many of my now peers were a part of a cricket team, that was formed by some Marathi artistes. This team was formed under sheer passion for the game and was called Marathi Kalakar team and we had zero discussions about music. Other members of the team were Mahesh Manjrekar, Shivaji Satam among our seniors and Kaushal Inamdar, Bharat Jadhav, Ankush Choudhari of my generation. We forged great friendship at that time. That’s when music direction happened by chance. One day, all of sudden Mahesh Manjrekar asked me if I would compose music for his upcoming Hindi film. I agreed to do, as I love to explore different avenues.” The film was named Deh, starring Jaya Pradha and Dino Morea, which stays unreleased.

However, later Ajit saw himself composing music for many movies in Marathi. “After that, I did one song for Yanda Kartavya Ahe starring Ankush Choudhari, but my full-fledged first album was Mahesh Manjrekar directed Maati Chya Chuli.”

Ajit is a known face in Maharashtra, given his multi-faceted profile of a singer, music director and actor. His professional partnership with the leading Marathi director Mahesh Manjrekar has given several hits like Me Shivraje Bhosale Boltoy, Maati Chya Chuli and latest being Nana Patekar starrer Natasamrat, in which Ajit also played the role of Patekar’s son.

“Mahesh Sir is my senior by good 17-18 years, but there is a comfort level when we are working.  Also, I personally don’t like to knock on doors for work, so with Mahesh Sir there is an unsaid bond which makes thing easy. Apart from Mahesh Sir, I have worked with other leading directors like Kedar Shinde, Om Raut.” Ajit also sang one track for Mahesh’s Hindi film Viruddh, starring Amitabh Bachchan and Sharmila Tagore.

Ajit has some very interesting projects in the kitty like Ani Kashinath Ghanekar, a biopic on legendary Marathi stage actor Kashinath Ghanekar, produced by Subodh Bhave, followed a film on Sant Ramdas named Raghuveer, another film called Panghrun and many more.

He is also a part of a semi-musical act called Amhi Ani Amche Baap, co-starring Atul Parchure, Pushkar Shotri, and Anand Ingale, which is an amalgamation of certain acts from the work done doyen of recent Marathi literature Acharya Atre and Pu La Deshpande. “It has portions of the vast work done by these legends. Music has a role to play in it, as the act also features some songs.”

On the current scenario in Marathi music industry Ajit comments, “I think, despite generating good music, what we lack is a solid platform. There are few names which are saleable in the market like Ajay Atul. In Hindi, the promotions are wide and strong. Even the culture of original albums is not as strong as it was a few years ago, like it was during Radha Hi Bawree. Also, the problem is people don’t realise that they are engaging in piracy, which is harming the artistes and industry at large.”