MUMBAI: Not many know about music supervising as a profession, thus Azeem Dayani, the music supervisor of Dharma Productions enlightened one and all at MTV Music Inc on this fascinating career option.  

Azeem, who has contributed to three films for Dharma Productions as a music supervisor was talking for the first time at a conference.

On his first instance at MTV Music Inc, Azeem said, “I don’t know why I’m here as I should work more first to be at a conference like this. But, if a young composer can understand what I do and also if I can probably find some composer with a great talent here, my agenda of coming here would be fulfilled.”

“I don’t want to talk about what we have done, what we can do and how can we make a difference,” he further added.

Azeem’s hobby of listening to music and the taste for songs landed him the job of a music supervisor at Dharma Productions.

Speaking about the same, Azeem Dayani said, “I started my journey in 2008 with an advertising firm. I had a keen interest to watch almost all movies. Once on my mom’s suggestion, I sent my CV to Excel Entertainment. I got a call from them for a marketing role. I would say that I was at the right place at the right time. Later, KNG Consultancy told me about Dharma Productions and a marketing job and I opted for it. I used to listen to a lot of songs while there. Once, Karan Johar saw me and told that my taste of songs is nice. He then asked me to come up with some songs. That’s how I found the song Dariya, which was sung by Arko Pravo Mukherjee, without any brief. I pitched the song to Karan and it was used and that’s how my music supervisor innings at Dharma Productions began.”

On his contribution to Dharma Productions as a music supervisor, the 29-year-old said, “Music supervising is a new thing, currently, in Bollywood. As a music supervisor, I have done three albums as of now, namely, Kapoor & Sons, Baar Baar Dekho and Badrinath Ki Dulhania.”

Introducing his profile of music supervisor and shedding light on his duties, Azeem said, “My job is to find the right song for the situation of a film. It should add to the feel of the situation. To monitor everything from finding the song to the entire creative process to the mastering stage with Eric Pillai or whoever the mastering agent is, we monitor everything to get the right album and mix so that the director, banner and the composer are happy. We also have to find the right blend of songs for the directors. For, example, if there is a sad song, required for a situation in the film; we have to brainstorm on it as a sad song can be of two types. For example, Saathi Re was a dead song; Teri Khair Mangdi was a breakup song.”

Sharing the idea behind music supervision, Azeem further told, “The idea is to find the right talent, the right blend of composers and give chance to new composers, who have not worked with Dharma. For, example, we worked with Arko Mukherjee for the first time with Dariyan and Saathi Re, Amaal Mallik came with Kar Gayi Chul, Jasleen came with Nachdenge Saare etc.”

Azeem also told how Dharma caters to two types of film albums, solo and multi-composer ones respectively. Further, speaking on the functioning of Dharma Production in terms of assigning music composers for the film, Azeem told, “Dharma works in two ways. In one, there is a solo composer album like that of Ae Dil Hail Mushkil (Pritam), Raazi (Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy), Student Of The Year (Vishal Shekhar).But, the movies like Badrinath Ki Dulhania, Kapoor And Sons, Baar Baar Dekho had multi-composers.

On recreating songs, Azeem signed off saying, “See sometimes we get a song we really like and we keep, but sometimes we create a song based situation. The ultimate goal is to get a good song.”